When I was a kid, my big dream was to score a 1,000 points in my high school basketball career. Thousands of hours in my backyard gunning the rock I'd dream of scoring my thousandth point on a snowy February night in my high school gym, then go play ball for UVa, where I'd hang out with Jeff Lamp and Lee Raker. Well. Even if they were 13 years before me. But hey, I was a kid!
When I was coming through there were 4 1000 points scorers in the history of my high school: Jerome Whitaker, Darryl Hammond, Alfred Johnson (saw him get his 1000th) and Eugene Smith. To me, these were the most hallowed of giants, I pictured them as did whichever knight it was from Camelot that as a boy dreamed of knights as they were big, beautiful angels in white gliding across a field. I pictured these guys spending their lives in a club somewhere, drinking soda and patting themselves on the back in another world.
I never did get that thousandth point, but I was thinking this morning about Eugene Smith, who finished his career with 1,004 points. Just got into the hallowed club. I don't know Eugene Smith, never met him, he graduated from my high school I think in 1974. Ish. I knew of him only through old yearbook sports sections I'd memorize. Sometime when I was a junior, 1988-1989, someone discovered that there was a mistake, that Smith had been credited with 14 points from a scrimmage. 990 points. Goodbye hallowed club. Looking back, I have no idea how anyone discovered this; in my high school and district I'm shocked they kept track of old scores, much less individual scoring from 15 years back. I remember how sad I felt for Eugene, how devestated he must have been when he heard the news. As I'm thinking right now, I hope he never did find out. Knowing what I do now, odds are he was probably flipping burgers at a BK Lounge when the mistake was discovered. Maybe being a 1000-point scorer was the peak for him, maybe he thought about it a lot. Maybe not, maybe he went on to become a doctor, I have no idea. Why would someone dig up something like that and expose it? This was small-town, nothing ball; it's not like discovering 20 years later that Laettner didn't get the ball off in time to beat Kentucky.
Anyways, just was thinking about it this morning for some reason. Poor guy. A great achievement, found a decade and a half later to be erroneous through no fault of his own, wonder if he knew and if it had an affect on him. Ah well.
Course, if he stumbles on Xmastime and that's how he finds out I'll never forgive myself!!
5 comments:
Ruminating on SOMEONE ELSE's glory days?! Someone's got to get their head back in the game!
Here's a funny "Only in Bayonne" story to help brighten your holiday, Xmastime (although I'm sure it will be hard to top your upcoming Naked Christmas at 100 Metro).
I'm walking to the Light Rail the other day and I see this little sign posted in the patch of grass next to the curb in front of someone's house. It reads: Pick up your dog shit (and sure enough there's an arrow pointing down to a pile of dog shit on the grass). Of course, I immediately begin to wonder about the effectiveness of such a sign. I mean, what are the chances that someone is going to see that sign, realize that indeed that is their dog's shit ("It looks like Spot's, smells like Spot's"), and pick it up? Pretty slim, I would think. But the sign must have served some purpose for the writer of the sign to have gone through the trouble in the first place. And I think I know what that purpose is: to air your grievance with other human beings--and their dogs--against an indifferent universe. There's something to be said for bringing attention to all the crap you have to put up with for living in close proximity to other human beings. I've noticed this tendency in myself and my neighbors which is why Bayonne will always be close to my heart.
Have a Merry (and nude) Christmas, Xmastime (is that redundant?).
well, now i guess there are at least two drawbacks to reading xmastime daily.
for the record, i had not heard about being shorted 14 points. ungrateful bastards!
thanks for the early christmas present f*ckface!
yours,
eugene smith
Hey, look. Xmastime can write "Tuesdays with Morrie."
Jeff Larkin
i was initially excited by the headline but then disappointed when i realized you weren't talking about W. Eugene Smith, the great humanitarian photojournalist. see you at will and gs.
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