SuperNova Afterglow: End Of Days

Thursday, March 23rd

Bullet Points

I have yet to process the events of the day playing ball at the YMCA gym. I will decompress my thoughts on these subjects and more when I return from dinner with my wife. (Still no kids! But only one whole day left)

I'm An Idiot...
...because my goggles broke away and flew off my face after I got hit gathering in a rebound. My orbital socket started to bleed, so I took myself out of the game. I stopped the bleeding and pulled a band-aid from my wallet and applied it while using the bathroom mirror to place it just over the eyebrow under my glasses. I got back into the next game and played out the day in my regular glasses without incident.

I'm an idiot.

The Saving Play...
...was a thing of beauty. I was playing good defense again and on one particular play I stole a ball in a manner that felt like I had mastered walking a high wire.

The other team had just recovered the ball and the guy I was guarding, Tyrone, was on a hot streak and was ahead of me down court. He had enough room sideline to receive a pass and I had not yet closed on that space. I like to bait people into throwing passes into places where I can close on the ball and steal it. Another player from my team was retreating nearby when I saw the pass come and pounced. They underestimated my closing speed. I had little room to work as I tried to knock the ball to my teammate, but the ball went straight up into the air and I was falling out of bounds. No problem. I managed to cup the ball with my other hand as I was running by and from behind my back was able to flip it without looking to my teammate, who was still standing near. The next thing I know, my teammates were about to score at the other end of the court.

I felt calm, collected and didn't hear any adulation. Because, I think it's expected of me now. Players are not surprised when I make hustle plays like that. I'll say it surprised me, that I pulled it off so adeptly, my saving play.


James Jones and Me...
...both like to shoot the three from way out. When I started stepping back to launch my missles it raised a lot of eyebrows and drew quite a few groans. They weren't going in as frequently, because I was adjusting my game to suit my blindness. So, if I set my feet to shoot more than two feet behind the arc, I heard a lot of teammates dissuade me from trying. I knew I could make them, because I had spent a lot of time shooting them in preparation of pick-up games. But, they didn't know me.

People did know James Jones. As the Green Bay Packers wide receiver, he made a lot of new friends when he came to the gym to play his brand of ball. It involved quite a few pull up threes from 23-feet out or longer. NBA threes. He could make them and didn't look bad missing. I also knew I could can shots like that. He and I developed an unspoken rapport when I kept draining those shots in shoot-a-rounds. He set me up for a few tries in the games we played together. The encouragement helped.

Because he liked my shooting ability and because he paved the way with his long range artillery, more people were accepting when I launched my long heaves that started going in. The more I burned people with that shot, the further out the defense was drawn.

James Jones helped me gain acceptance in that gym where I once felt like a stranger. I now feel people have come to know me through my game and will give me some respect for my shooting ability. And now, I have to prove to them I can do more...off the dribble, as a passer and an inside player.

John Kuhn and Me

I have some thoughts on this Packer player who has participated at the Y and may be returning sometime soon. (Saw him working out on Thursday as I was leaving) I will revisit this part of blog post to finish another time because I cannot recall now what I was thinking of writing.