An End to My Six Month Sabbatical

Before I get into my blog topic: A wild rumor I heard through the proverbial grapevine:

In lieu of a talent night for Christmas as we have done in the past, we will be holding a celebrity look-alike contest: Clint showing up as Carrot-Top and Nick is coming as George Carlin. Can’t wait…

Moving on…
On Wednesday night I did something for the first time in six months. It required patience, long-suffering and a little bit of motivation. No, I’m not talking about going to church. I’m talking about basketball, which I guess is going to church seeing as how we played in the cultural hall. Anyway, to commemorate my first step on the hardwood (or church carpet in this case), I kept a running diary of the event.

8:32 pm – Mutual is officially over. About five or six guys are in the cultural hall already waiting for all the kids to get out of the way. Normally I wouldn’t give it much thought but it piqued my interest in two ways. First, it reminded me of the invite I got from one of my home teachers, who is a regular for Wednesday night basketball. Second, I brought some shoes in the car that I could always change into.

8:40 pm – I make the decision to get my shoes and shorts out of the car. The shoes are vintage 2000 Nikes, gray and blue with absolutely no ankle support. The shorts are my shin-length brown cargo shorts with approximately seventeen different pockets. For what? No idea.

8:46 pm – I make myself onto the court. By now, the number of players has grown to about 13. The reason I love playing church basketball, besides seeing players look toward the stage for NBA scouts, is that there are so many different types of players. I will give a small list of some of the players involved this Wednesday:

Jean Shorts Guy: Most of us have played with this guy. He often completes his outfit with his hat backward. He will shoot the ball with little or no provocation. The only thing different about this guy is that he wore his cap facing toward, which is good I guess when the sun is in your eyes.

Walking-Endorsement Guy: Complete opposite of Jean Shorts Guy (skills, however, may be comparable). This player has $200 Nikes. Of course, he usually doesn’t wear them to the gym—walking on the street or sidewalk between his parking spot and the court may somehow hurt his $200 shoes thereby hindering his performance.

Uncle Rico Guy: You know what I mean…

Normal Guy: This guy plays basketball every once in a while. He will box out but won’t throw any elbows. He usually doesn’t wear expensive hightops and probably wouldn’t play in Vans or Birkenstocks; he’s usually wearing some kind of cross-trainer (If you couldn’t guess, this is me).

Note: Every single player will have won their Stake Basketball Championship.

8:56 pm – Obviously we’re not playing 5 on 5 due to the size of the court (smaller than Madera), so well have to shoot for teams. I’m the last guy to shoot and thanks to the 5,000 free throw shots I took my Freshman year in High School, I put it right through the net. A quick observation tells me that a lot of these guys have played together already. My team is comprised of three Normal Guys and one Normal Guy/Uncle Rico Guy. The other team has two Walking-Endorsement Guys and Two Normal Guys.

8:58 pm – My first knee carpet burn of the night.

9:06 pm – I’ve made two baskets, and both of them were from offensive rebounds. We’re up 7-3 and we’re playing to 11. I start wondering when my heart is going to explode. I feel like I swallowed a bottle of lighter fluid, ate three cans of Kidney beans and swallowed a match…all after eating Dad’s gumbo. I keep having to remind myself that the last time I ran was six months ago.

9:07 pm – I can tell that my simple box out is really frustrating a guy on the other team. He just got off his mission and he doesn’t like the fact that he can’t out-rebound the hump (aka my barrel-chested back and chest). So on this next trip down, I get a pass on the left wing, fake middle, start going baseline (I’ve got the guy beat) and then he pushes me from behind with two hands. Anyway, he turned and walked away. It was then that I realized I was playing with the fifth type of player—The-It’s-Not-Just-a-Game Guy. Needless to say, I lost a lot of respect for him.

9:15 pm – We won the game, 11-8. It wasn’t pretty but my legs stayed under me for pretty much the whole game and luckily I didn’t have to guard any sweaty guys with their shirt off. My stats for the game:

4 Field Goals
3 Steals
2 Blocks
78 Rebounds
1 near Respiratory Failure

9:18 pm – The next team steps on the court. This team is made up of one It’s-Not-Just-a-Game Guy, one Jean Shorts Guy and two Walking-Endorsement Guys (And yes, they did put on their basketball shoes after they got to the gym).

9:26 pm –We’re losing 8-3. Our guys are sucking wind more than a new Oreck. I’m beginning to realize that they have yet to pass to the JS Guy; and this is probably affecting the outcome. Of course this doesn’t stop our Zone Top-of-the-Key defender from practically running a box and one on him. I think he guards him so it makes him look good. It’s like me saying I studied my swimming final twice as long as my Physics exam just so I could get an A in swimming instead of a B plus in Physics.

9:27 pm – I’m posting up one of the guys at the top of the key (which is pretty much the half-court line anyway). Finally with nowhere to go, I attempt a turnaround fade-away. Now, it would be easy to assume that turn-around fade away skills might run in the family. Well, according to the errancy of the shot (airball), it looks like Dad kept that attribute to himself. I don’t even know why I tried to equal his prowess.

9:32 pm – Well, we lost 11-6. It wasn’t a very defensive minded game on our side. They did, however, keep trying to pass over the top of me, which led me to have about 6 steals. You would think they would learn after the first two or three times. I just don’t think they expected me to have a 36-inch vertical (if you count my outstretched arms).

9:35 – 9:45 pm – The team we lost to beat a team with two JS Guys. You just knew they were going to lose right off the start. Anyway, I made another free throw and started with a fresh team.

9:47 pm – About a minute and a half into the game, I went up for my 59th put-back try on an offensive rebound and came down hard on my ankle on someone else’s foot…again. I tried my best to take it like a man (whatever that means) and shuffled myself over to the stage. After walking it off a little, I felt a little better but just decided to call it a night. I didn’t want to aggravate it any more and put me out for the rest of the season, especially if BYU needed me for March. We’ll see.

10:01 pm – I get home and, whadya know, the ankle start hurting again. Jenn somehow sees that I’m in pain (no matter how hard I try to hide it), and gives me a nice foot and back rub (I think it affected my back too).

Maybe I’ll go back next Wednesday, maybe not. Maybe I’ll wait another six months, so I’ll have something to write about.