I once caught a man peeping on me. Or at least I thought I did. I was eleven or twelve and playing a one-on-none basketball game when I saawishhhhhhh’d an impossibly long fade-away shot. I theatrically thrust my hands in the air and screamed, “And the crowd goes wild.” In the midst of my solitary celebration I noticed the curtains inside a nearby house rippling with signs of voyeurism. Someone was watching and since I had heard that house belonged to a local high school basketball coach, I was tingling with excitement. I presumed he was taking notes, admiring my jumpers, scouting me from afar. Someday I’d be his star, the talk of the town.
That I would grow up to become a hoops sensation wasn’t any old Don Quixote reverie given the fact that my older brother was 6’7” and according to the newspapers, he was one of the better high school ballers in the area. Chris was not just a hero to me but to my whole circle of sports-cards-trading, autograph-seeking, memorabilia mongers. To us, the only thing more exciting than meeting a pro athlete was actually knowing someone who would someday play in Madison Square Garden or Giants Stadium. We weren’t sure which sport he would pursue, but the flood of recruitment letters and phone calls from some of the top basketball and football programs in the nation suggested that he wasn’t going to be paying a penny for college.
Unfortunately however, as of the eighth grade Chris’s talents had not yet rubbed off on me. At least my coach didn’t think so. Despite being the tallest player on my hapless middle school squad I was only averaging a point per game, which isn’t all that bad actually when you consider the fact that I was only unleashed for about thirty or so seconds when it was patently obvious to everyone, including the disheartened cheerleaders, that the game had slipped too far away. And even though I joked along with the other benchwarmers as the clock ticked away, “Put me in coach, I’m ready to play today,” beneath the camaraderie jokes I was beating back tears.
I reassured myself that I just needed to find a coach with a little bit of vision. Hopefully one who would do the math and realize that “Good God, if this Keneally kid played all thirty-two minutes he would be putting up 52.3 points per game!” Much like my little league baseball coach who assigned me to deep center field, my basketball coach didn’t believe I had much talent as much as potential.
After my sophomore year of high school, after another season of sitting like a splinter at the far end of the bench, I decided to try harvesting my so-called potential. I signed up for a sleep-away camp run by the legendary coach Bob Hurley of St. Anthony’s Prep in New Jersey. Coach Hurley’s teams consistently won the state championships and were regulars atop the USA Today national polls. Most importantly, his son Bobby would be there, at the camp, in the flesh, coaching.
Bobby was by far my favorite player, my desert island draft pick. He had led his father’s team to two high school national championships before winning another two at Duke University. During his illustrious college career, he was a three-time All-American, broke the all-time NCAA assists record, and twice had landed on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Shrink-wrapped at 5’10” and what looked like under a hundred pounds, the scrappy point guard used blazing speed and bionic ball handling to burn the best the college game had to offer. And the fact that he grew up only thirty minutes away plucked a note of Jersey pride that resonated in all of my friends. My younger cousin also signed up.
Although two years younger, Pete was already a more notable basketball player than I. Like Bobby, he was fast and flashy and fluid on the court. During the first day, before the teams were established all of the campers scrimmaged in pickup games. The coaches watched from the sidelines and if we scored lots of points or looked capable they asked us for our names and jotted them down. With Bobby watching, I put on my best act of course, lurching for loose balls, drawing charges and ripping down rebounds. I out hustled everyone with a gutsy throwback style of play that would even make Larry Bird blush but whenever the coaches asked, “What’s your name, kid?” the answer was always the same – Pete. Nobody bothered to ask my name.
Bobby and his younger brother, Danny, marveled at my cousin as he sunk one jumper after another. It was rumored that Pete, or “Pistol Pete” as the Hurley brothers now called him, was Danny’s first pick in the coaches’ draft. Neither of them selected me but still, I was determined to invent myself in their lives. During the week at Portsmouth Abbey, Rhode Island, I stalked the Hurleys. When I overheard Bobby telling someone he was going to lift weights I darted to the gym. By the time he arrived I was already on the bench press.
“You can work in with me if you want,” I offered, but he was working on his legs that day. I had guessed wrong. I should have been on the squat rack.
“So, how do you like Duke? I’m thinking about applying there,” I said.
“I like it.”
“Is it fun?”
“Yeah.”
“What are your teachers like?” I said, reeling for some connection. He didn’t answer and I felt like I had just heaved an air ball. I was hoping for some personal information, some interesting conversation that would have impressed my friends. That’s why when he rebuffed my advances I cornered his then-girlfriend, Anna.
“What’s it like dating a college sports legend?”
“What does he really think of Christian Laettner?”
“What was the story behind Bobby’s DWI last spring?”
With any one of these details it would appear to my friends as though “I got to know Bobby.” But I took it one step further and cooked up a plan to become a camp counselor the following summer. Granted, I was grossly under-qualified and had even scored in the wrong basket in a middle school game six months earlier, but there were several St. Anthony’s players of my age that were coaching eight and nine year olds. And if I could charm Bobby’s mother Chris, a camp co-director, I figured I had as good a chance as anyone.
That week, whenever I, a) wasn’t playing, or b) couldn’t find Danny or Bobby or Anna, I could be found lurking near Mrs. Hurley. I incessantly volunteered any assistance she needed. “Don’t be silly, let me do it,” I’d say, bussing her lunch tray or rounding up loose basketballs. I know she enjoyed the attention because when I asked her for a job she gave me her home phone number without hesitation.
I immediately called my friend, Rick, the star of our middle school squad who once saw me score in the other team’s basket. When I broke the news he said “Whaaaaaaaaat?” and wanted to know what exactly I was going to teach them, “To shoot at the wrong hoop?”
As expected, after the round of ribbing, my friends were all famished for stories about the Hurleys. My budding relationship with the Kennedy’s of Jersey City not only reflected well upon me but on them for knowing someone who knows Bobby Hurley.
By the following summer I was a bit of a big shot with that whistle twirling around my fingers. And best of all, at least now I had an excuse to sit near Bobby in the cafeteria. One day I heard them planning a trip to Foxwoods Casino later that evening. The opportunity to spend an entire evening bonding with them was too good to pass up. I knew that I would have to approach Bobby if I were to successfully skinny my way into their plans. Danny was standoffish and sarcastic and with his shifty eye movements I had the severe suspicion that he was onto my parasitic plan to befriend them.
Later, I found Bobby in the hallway outside his dorm suite and shouted, “Hey Bobby!” with my signature ebullience.
He nodded.
“Um… so,” I stammered, “You up to a little gambling tonight?” By suggesting that I was privy to his plans, I hoped he would assume that Danny had invited me.
He stared back at me. His eyelids, flickering.
“I love Foxwoods. You guys wouldn’t mind if I tagged along, would you?”
“Aren’t you under age?”
“Yeah, but I have my brother’s I.D.”
“Actually, I think the car is full. Sorry.”
“Oh, that’s no problem. I have a car,” I said. I think the swiftness of it even stunned Bobby, for he sort of shrugged. I received his reaction as an invite.
The only problem was that I had no money. I certainly couldn’t borrow any cash from Bobby even though he was in the NBA and worth millions. I went to my room to devise a plan. I had a couple hours before our planned nine o’clock caravan.
Sprawled on my bed, I decided to do what I often did in times of conflict or personal crisis — I flipped open a Playboy and jerked off. And while wiping myself with a dirty sock, I had an epiphany. It dawned on me that I was probably the only one in the dorm-full of pre-teens with access to smutty magazines. Thus began my first door-to-door sales job.
I didn’t particularly want to part with my coveted Stephanie Seymour, Drew Barrymore, or Elle MacPherson issues, as they were in fact the cornerstones of my compulsive self-indulgence, but the promise of the night with Bobby loomed too large to resist.
I knocked on the suite where three of the players on the team I coached were staying. When I flashed them the magazines, they clamored around me like any ten-year-old would at the sight of those beauties in their skin suits. There was a minor quarrel about who got which issue, but faster than piranhas could pick a cow clean I had thirty-three bucks in my pocket.
Now armed with desperate ambition and some seed money I hit the nearest convenience store. I studied the rack of smug mags behind the counter, passing on the premium porn before eventually buying several four-packs of four-year-old porn stuffed in plastic wrapping.
Back at the dorm I knocked on each door, soliciting sixteen dirty magazines. The irony of rapaciously selling them copies of dusty Barely Legal wasn’t lost on me but I was comforted by the one hundred sixty dollars in my wallet. I considered making another run, but I didn’t want to risk missing Bobby and Danny in the parking lot especially since I feared they would try ditching me.
For the whole hour before nine I hid in the bushes near the minivan I had seen them driving. I wasn’t sure what I’d do if they tried to slip out early. Was I really going to run out from the tree line yelling “Wait, wait!!” Fortunately, they arrived on time.
I approached them with the trepidation of knowing the people I was about to greet couldn’t give a shit. After a lukewarm hello, Danny said, “You can follow us there.” I felt disheartened when I saw there was plenty of room in their minivan for the three of us.
Still, as I walked into the casino with them I stood tall with my shoulders propped up and my chest puffed out. Through association I imagined everyone thought that I, too, was some kind of basketball playa. The three of us sat down at a blackjack table together. The minimum bid was fifteen dollars and at that rate I feared that my night of gaming could be over in just minutes. But I had much better luck than I ever could have expected. At one point I was up almost four hundred dollars. Bobby and Danny weren’t so lucky.
Our dealer kept asking Danny to register for a Foxwoods rewards card since he was losing so much money. “You could be earning valuable points towards things like clothing apparel or dinners and hotel rooms,” she promised.
“Great, I always wanted a twelve hundred dollar sweatshirt,” he joked. We all laughed spontaneously and I laughed extra hard because for once his sarcasm wasn’t trained on me. This was our first shared moment and I started to think that they might even be (gasp…) enjoying my company.
The leotarded cocktail waitress came by and we ordered drinks. By this point, there was a large crowd of people in a half moon behind us. I felt like a mini-celebrity. When the sad-looking woman in red and white-checkered leotards came back with our drinks, Bobby bought three cigars from her — one for each of us. We all lit the cigars and I hoped this would become a ritual on golf courses, the beach or wherever the three of us may be hanging out. I was a little nervous since I had never smoked a one, I thought I had seen Scarface enough times to get a sense of what looked cool. I even pulled a no-hands puff while placing a bet but when I reached to up my ante smoke drifted into my eye and I whack! splashed Jack and Coke across the green felt. By the time my eyes stopped stinging, I saw that I had washed out Danny’s winning hand. The crowd went Oh and then whispered among themselves while Bobby and Danny disowned me with their eyes.
The card dealer immediately placed a clear chip on the table in front of us. Apparently, we were disqualified and nobody could play at these spots until the table dried.
I bet alone for the rest of the night.
When it was time to leave, I was up two hundred and forty dollars but felt broke. Fortunately, I had the chance to redeem myself with Bobby. He was late for a 6 A.M. flight to another camp and asked me if I would take him to the airport. Apparently Danny didn’t feel like driving two hours out of his way at 3 in the morning, which is probably why they let me follow them in the first place. But of course I didn’t mind. As we ripped down the freeway I grasped for something smart to say but within a few minutes I thought I heard him softly snoring. But I still sparkled. I had Bobby Hurley in my car.
**
Back in my small town I reveled in my new big fish status, patiently answering any and all questions. When one friend asked if Bobby knew my name, I said of course, “We shared a cigar and I drove him to the airport for God’s sake.” It was like a game verbal show and tell. I showed them my best poker face, as I told them about the Hurleys and me.
posted by Scott Keneally @ 3:03 AM
1 Comments:
Oh Scott, if they only knew the truth on how you got that money from the 10 yr olds.
Your Bro!!
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