Great Moves for 31 Year Old Rec League or Playground Players with Bad Legs

The Loaf - This isn't a move so much as it is a way of being ... a way of life ... a giant fuck you to all those hot shots that want to drive the lane in your game. And it's so simple ... Park yourself in the middle of the key, arms down at your side, and don't plan on making any moves that are more than half a meter to either side of you. The loaf works best after a heavy pasta meal about 45 minutes before the game, followed by a large glass of water to give you that extra girth. Make sure you swell up really nice like. Make sure your post opponent knows that the loaf is filled with what I like to call multi-grained pain by tripping he or she up with little seedy shots whenever they pass. Nothing mean ... just a few little elbows to the ribs (as we have learned about already) and loaf-like trash talking when they are in the post (your mama's bread goes stale within the hour ... or ... you call that a crouton?!?!). And finally, when those aforementioned drives start coming in ... give em' the ol' dough is rising by waiting until the last minute, throwing your arms straight up in the air, but at the same time turning your head and pushing your upper chest into their jump at such an angle that you avoid getting hurt yet give them the loafiest power stop they have likely ever had on the drive.

Great Moves for 31 Year Old Rec League or Playground Bball Players with Bad Legs (part deux)

Welcome to the second instalment of GMF31YORLOPBPWBL. I believe it very important to give back to my community, thus the verbal basketball clinics you receive in these posts. Use them well my beautiful children.

The Fit - Throw a fit ... arms flailing, jumping around, and of course cursing. Oh! ... and don't forget to seem remorseful afterward. The simplicity of the fit can be deceiving. You have to really sell it. Freak the hell out.

This bastard post has been a draft for a month ... so fuck it ... that's all for today ... one fucking move.

More to come!!!

YBC and the Weird Genesis of Learned Sport in a Non-Sporting Family (part 1)

My immediate family never really followed sports growing up. We'd watch the Olympics, my mom loved the Blue Jays, and my Dad could pop dingers at will in our family softball tournaments (which took place every 3-5 years). We were more an All Creatures Great and Small \ Victory Garden type of family. How I became such a passionate basketball fan, both on the court and off, is somewhat of a mystery.

Personally, I don't remember having a strong desire to play sports in my earliest years of rec league action. I played soccer for much of my early childhood but it never really caught on (ie I sucked really badly and never could improve enough to develop an early love for it). I then started playing baseball. Summer sports were all sewn up, but thinking back that is not where my athletic passion was born.

Most kids growing up in the 80s in Canada played hockey. Not coming from a typically Canadian family we had no allegiance to the sport. When it came time to pick a winter sport, basketball got the call. I'm guessing the decision had it's genesis with a neighbor of ours. His son was a classmate of mine and a heck of a good basketball player. He was also the coach of a local rec team in the YBC, or Youth Basketball Clinic, and had tried out for the Detroit Pistons (I believe) in his earlier years. I suppose after talking to my mom he invited me to play on his team ... chock full of ringers.

I was HORRIBLE in my first year of play (roughly grade 4), but I loved it. I remember the highlight of the season was the pizza party at the end in which the entire league and their parents packed a local school auditorium and watched the latest NBA videos on the big screen. I can still recall the goose bumps I'd get watching Isiah, Bird, Magic, Dominique and Jordan doing their thing while eating pizza with my friends and teammates. The memory has stuck and is still one of my favourites to look back upon.

Anyway, that's enough for this instalment. I'll check back later with another post in this series.

Great Moves for 31 Year Old Rec League or Playground Bball Players with Bad Legs

Me:

Streetball Moniker = Hot Deals. Gym Moniker = The Golden Scepter, The Vanilla Thrilla, Neon Tetra the Kissing Gourami, F-14 Tomcat ... and many others. 31 years old. 6'1". 20 + years of basketball. Once a glorious sky walker ... now ... no legs.

My Moves:

The Elbow to the Ribs - Employed on defense. This is likely the most important move in my repertoire. For whatever reason I have been asked to play a lot of post in the various leagues I rock across TO. In the past I have been a small forward or 2, usually responsible for guarding the opposing teams highest scorer by using my feet to stay between them and the basket. I guess time has caught up with me now and my main duty is to hold down the paint against guys that are multiple inches taller than me. First rule, keep them out of the paint. This is where the Elbow to the Ribs comes in. The very first play of the game, nestle the pointy appendage softly between your opponents lowest two ribs. Once you have placement press hard. It's important not too hit with the elbow as that is crappy violent way to get your point across. Place and push.

The Forearm Check - Employed on defense. When your opponent is darting from one side of the key to the next to find position, make sure you let them know that you don't want them in your house by giving them firm forearm checks as they run by you. The object is to move them inch by inch out of the key before they get the ball to facilitate a help defense scenario when they do, and to make them generally pissed off and possibly think you are mildly bi-curious. Turn the big galoots into jump shooters.

The Lean - Employed on Defense. 6'10" muscle bound opponent. Likes the ball down low or 10 m away from you with room to barrel down the runway. No way to stop him once he gets in these situations. Don't let him. Follow him like a shadow the entire time with one arm wrapped up in his and your entire body weight leaning on his shoulder. A 45 degree angle to his hip can likely hold him in place too, but you might find yourself on the ground if he/she (should have mentioned this earlier ... certainly it's he/she) gets wise.

The Ball Fake - Employed on offense. We all know what this is, the point I'd like to make is that why only use it once or twice a game. It's full devastating capacity can't be overstated. Use it anywhere from 3-25 times in a single possession. Your opponent will be so dazed with the show you'll finally be able to coast right by them when their neck seizes up or they get too bored to care. If I'm stuck down in the paint with the big galoot I mentioned earlier i like to combine the fake with another couple of moves to make this fierce little combo ... The Ball Fake to Coin Pickup Head Plow - A few ball fakes (with some long pivots of course), get yourself facing the basket, bend at the waist like you're going to pick up a coin, and then use your head to plow the person out of the way. Till the soil as it were. Go up for the easy two.

That ends this installment. More to come later. Perhaps I'll get my man Dinner Roll to big up the art of the Long Nail Bad Breath perimeter stylings that have made him famous on the courts of Roxton.

3rd Place

On Thursday the Neon Tetras handily dismantled The I in Team to take 3rd place in the TRSL. Playing in a larger gym suited the team very well as they scored many of their points on exhilarating fast breaks. One can't help but wonder how they'd fair playing in the larger gym on a nightly basis. My guess is a strong second place.

Tetras Lose First Playoff Game

Local heroes the Neon Tetras lost their first playoff game of the year vs. the Airballers.

They should have played man to man.

Neon Tetras: The Scourge of the TRSL

Often confounding rec league basketball team the Neon Tetras are busy preparing for their first TRSL playoff game of the Fall season. Hot off a lazy defeat of Slam Drunk the team is set to face it's most bitter rival, the sociopathic Airballers. (Holy shit I hate them!!!)


In all aspects of the ***team*** game of basketball the Airballers are seemingly better than the Tetras. However, in terms of ***individual skill*** ... well let's just say the Tetras leave the Airballers in the dust. So how is it that the Ballers manage to dismatle the Tetras everytime they play? Simple ... they are dirty cheating bastards that force certain over-emotional players on the Tets to flip their lid and explode, leaving them to stew in guilt for the rest of the game. They step on the toes of the big Tetra forwards, trying ever so hard to force a twisted ankle. They brutally send their female team members at the lovely Tetra ladies with pick axes and boards with nails in them. Yet the league does nothing ... NOTHING!!!

We can only hope that the cries for blood from the audience stay just that and the local heros manage to dethrone the Ballers and make it to the first place game.

Every other day of the week New York is the Mecca of basketball, but Thursdays belong to Eglinton and Mt Pleasant in Toronto. There is no symphony as sweet as Tetra Basketball when it is working.