some new words

A recollection of Basketball Dreams and other stuff by TZ

Now at the not so ripe age of 48, I realize that I actually do have some sports stories up my sleeve.
When I was seven years old, I began attending a sleepaway camp in Connecticut, that was run by an owner who was good friends with an NBA agent.

The result of this was that several NBA stars of the day actually visited our camp. One of the earliest visits that I can recollect, was of a pair of twins who played in the NBA who were not on the same team
but they both were of mid-level caliber, not superstar material. This was the Van Arsdale Brothers, Tom and Dick Van Arsdale. They were both good looking well built guys who were about 6 foot 5 inches tall, Dick played for the Phoenix Suns, and Tom played for the Atlanta Hawks. Now in my short
lifetime, I had never seen a pair of Adult twins before. The Van Arsdale Brothers were giving the men and boys a clinic and asked if anyone had any questions. I raised my seven year old hand and asked,”Are you two Brothers?” The crowd laughed in amazement. This question was to go down in the annuls of camp folklore history and follow me throughout my several summers at this camp.

One of the great stars of the day, Oscar Robertson came for a visit. The Big O gave us a Basketball clinic, He began by reading the name on the ball, it was autographed by a bench player on the New York Knicks a the time, named Cazzie Russell, a college star of some note back then. Oscar asked us if Cazzie's name should be on the ball, everyone said, “YES!!”. I yelled out, “NO!!” Oscar called me out and told me that he liked that I wasn't afraid to speak my mind. One guy who really impressed me when I was a little bit older was Nate “Tiny” Archibald. Here was a basketball great who had a body that was built for the game. Not being a big guy, Tiny could dominate a game like no other guard. He brought a mix of Big O and playground skills to the court which was unstoppable when he was healthy. There was this one moment in the 1976 NBA Allstar game which I'll never forget, for those of you who don't know the terminology, a fastbreak in basketball is when several offensive players on the same team are heading fast down the length of the basketball court and have gained the edge of speed over the defense, a well executed fast break often results in an easy hoop, or score, again, for those who don't know the terms. Tiny was leading a break full throttle down the court during allstar game, when all of sudden he whips a pass between his legs to a man down court. This was such an astonishing play, to date I've never seen, nor heard of anything like it being repeated, except maybe in a playground somewhere.

My Basketball Hero was and still is Dr J, Julius Erving. When he was in the ABA he did things with a basketball that no one had done since Connie Hawkins. I was too young to see Connie Hawkins in his prime so I can't make the comparison. Dr. J led the Nets to 2 ABA championships. I was actually there in Nassau Colosseum for both final games of each championship series. In one of them the Nets were down by around 15 points in the 3rd quarter then all of a sudden Dr J and one of the Net guards, John Williamson, got red hot, and destroyed the opposition. By mid-4th quarter the Nets were up by 10 points and soaring from that point. But that doesn't begin to describe the ballet in hoop space that was Dr J. When most players went up for rebounds Dr J came down from antigravity to get one. Dr J went on to the NBA and years later there was Michael Jordon, and now there's Kobe Bryant, and that guy in Cleveland.