playing basketball

woww

if there's one thing you can do, it's finger-roll

hahah props to dudes wife tho sticking up for her man

Yep it was kinda cool actually. Except when I called her an idiot (after I called her out on the cheap shots she was all up in my face, yelling nonsense. I wanted to punch her so I felt she got off easy with a light insult), she threw out "you're a racist!". They're both native american. Lost any respect for her then.

imo invite them both over for brunch

Last week I had to suspend this kid for a couple months. He threw a vicious elbow 2 feet from me. After game he asks me what exactly he did wrong. I explained that no matter what he thought another player did to him, he can't respond that way. He kept trying to justify it. I said sorry man there's no justification, if another player is playing dirty or whatever, let me know and I'll address it. Then he just stares at me and goes "you know you're a bitch right?". Uh ok? "What're you gonna do about it? Call the police cause you're a lil bitch? Let's 'go outside' right now."
He's actually a pretty sweet guy off the court. I've given him rides to the gym several times. Just gets hot-headed on the court. Maybe a napoleon complex too. This was like the 4th incident with him wanting to fight someone. Straw that broke camel's back.

oh I'm totally cool with that native guy now. He hardly comes tho cause he lives up on the rez.

Just broke my 2nd pair of glasses in as many months. Anybody here ever do goggles?

think most ppl use contacts

It would feel like I was lying.

Plus goggles look sick.

yeah i mean by all means dont think theres anything wrong w them after all this guy scored the most points

https://i.imgur.com/kXfjEHG.jpg

when I was a kid, before I got contacts, I begged my mom for Ho Grant style RecSpecs googles. Got them and immediately HATED them. Very uncomfortable. The strap on back of head presses them against the only contact point on the front of head: just above bridge of the nose. If strap is too hard, that spot starts to hurt almost immediately. If strap is too loose, the goggles jiggle around like crazy. And as soon as you get sweaty, they start sliding around some no matter what.
There's prob better versions/concepts for goggles now but there's def a reason why you hardly see any players wear them.

yeah good point i hate shit like that i tried to run with a camelback once and it drove me insane

any ideas for our league team name??
team facts:
we have no bigs
all wites with 1 asian
1 old guy (me) and rest are 20s-30
we met by playing at Sedona open gym (rest of teams aren't from Sedona)
we're all pretty goofy but have competitive streaks

1st yr team names was Plain White Ts (I didn't realize this was a band name)
2nd yr was FootSpeed, some sort of inside joke I was half in on, I think making fun of coachspeak cliches

'we have no bigs' is my favorite

We got a big! Recruited him from the dudes from rehab program who come to open gym. He's a Blake Griffin lookalike. Pretty skilled but I was able to contain him in the post. Post D is one of my strong suits but I'm too short and thin to stop a big who really knows what he's doing.

Our GM already chose a name. Valley Boyz. Apparently that's something some of the Suns players have started adopting? Logo looks p dope actually. Hoping my custom t-shirt lady can incorporate it.

Our GM already chose a name. Valley Boyz. Apparently that's something some of the Suns players have started adopting? Logo looks p dope actually. Hoping my custom t-shirt lady can incorporate it.

Rec league canceled 5 games into the season. Haven't been told open gym nights are canceled but I'm expecting that will happen soon. At least I can still go shoot around by myself I guess.

Can barely shoot around by myself now! Found one super janky hoop 15 minutes away that hasn't been closed. I noticed there's super nice outdoor hoops at this church at edge of town, might check n see if those are open to the public. I have key to a school gym but I'm not supposed to use it outside of running the open gym nights.

Got to play some 5 on 5 yesterday yesssssss shhhhhh don't tell Fauci

Seen this fairly small kid at local courts tearing shit up. Really hard to stop from scoring. Article about him in the paper today, accepting scholarship to a NAIA school in Iowa. Dude avg'd 26ppg senior year so now I don't feel as bad that he torched me a couple times.

played ball in high school -- i was okay, and at least tall -- but a year ahead of me was kevin lloyd, who was also not that good and of merely average height. but he was fuckin dirty. i mean we were on the same team but he would absolutely try to knee me in the groin in *practice*. in games i saw him literally spit on people.

his dad was also kevin lloyd, better known as spanky. they were a . . . florid people. our team colors were orange at home and black on the road, and 30+ years later i can still hear spanky (who later became mayor) at our away games bellowing 'D IT UP BLACK'

it's a phrase i simply cannot shake

nice

my kids are suddenly both super into basketball. i now know where the hoops are in my neighborhood. though they have no opportunity to get involved with a team for obvious reasons. i go with them sometimes. i can still shoot okay. i have no moves though. i never did.

my kids have evinced zero interest in watching the finals. today i asked them why. “it’s boring watching other people play” they said

they need a rooting interest

otm

yeah and nobody at school talks about it etc (we live outside the us). one of them has decided golden state is his team because of curry.

curry seems to have a cachet among young people that no other player has recently equalled

i was gonna suggest a french player, but none of the active ones seem to have much cachet

curry is awesome but hitching oneself to a 32yo won't end well

the best french player rn is probably gobert and he is for herbs (aka jazz fans)

killian hayes is french and is about to be a top 10 draft pick, so that might be exciting

granny hows that ankle?

I started playing again about 6 months ago after taking 3+ years off. its been really fun but ive lost like 30% of my game. legs are cooked after a couple games and my confidence is low. just once a week for now, might need to ramp up. the best guy in this group is probably 55-60 years old... the reason he's the best? well its cos we play 1s and 2s and this dude is probably like a legit 70% shooter from three. dont think ive ever seen him miss two in a row and he only needs an inch of space. my outside shot is completely abandoned me but my midrange pull up and around the basket touch is still my calling card. just sucks that im not helping my team much cos im not knocking down 3s. been thinking about bringing up switching to 2s/3s but theyve had this group running for 20+ years so i probably wont try and disrupt anything.

"I often think about how pickup 1s/2s scoring overweights the three, but how that may be counterbalanced by the fact that you don't see a lot of true knockdown 3 shooters in pickup games."

Don't find this to be true. Most guys I play with, 3's is their main bball skill and they are lethal from there. I'm always trying to score games 2/3's instead of 1/2s (even moreso before I improved my 3 pt shooting). I do not understand where the 1/2s thing came from and why it overtook 2/3s as the standard.

was trying to explain to one guy how 1/2s overweights the long distance shot, but he couldn't grasp it. "but 2 is one more than 1, just like 3 is one more than 2...". i'm sure there's a lot of other guys out there who don't get it, either.

― A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Thursday, September 3, 2015 1:08 PM (six years ago) bookmarkflaglink

haha

― Spottie, Thursday, September 3, 2015 1:21 PM (six years ago) bookmarkflaglink

so much frustration from working hard to get 6 high percentage buckets...and then the 5 ft 2 sharpshooter drains 3 in a row from behind the arc in like 30 seconds and it's a tie game.

― A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Thursday, September 3, 2015 3:10 PM (six years ago) bookmarkflaglink

I just got the email that the weekly game in the neighborhood is back. I'm kind of scared... so out of shape

i hesitated for months cos of that but it was fine once i started going. just played a game or two the first couple weeks back.

Ankle getting better by the hour Spottie! Thanks for asking. Sat out last night (runs are Tues and Thurs), prob could give it a go Tues but would be smart to wait til next Thurs. Managed to avoid injury for long time now so I was due.

Yeah it sucks when you're an interloper and can't really say shit about how they do the 2s and 1s thing. Or "maker's/winner's outs", which is just as antithetical to the balance of the game.
Are you doing full court?
Come up to Sedona some time and hoop my dude!

good to hear its nothing too serious.

yah we're running 5s full but about half the time we end up with 8-9 dudes and run 4s full which im not in love with. average age is probably about 43 so the speed is good by me. good group overall.

my daughter is doing city hoops right now and my 2nd son is too so we are doing a lot of shooting/horse/games at the house of late. been loving that and seeing their improvement. ill catch them both out there on their own shooting a couple times per week, brings a tear to my eye. my daughter has the two handed push shot going which is kinda unfortunate, trying to coach her through breaking that habit before its too late.

sedona ball would be sick, if im up there ever ill hit you up.

my daughter has the two handed push shot going which is kinda unfortunate, trying to coach her through breaking that habit before its too late.

how old is your daughter? i thought this was pretty normal for most kids

10. it is kinda normal but pretty pronounced. the real problem is probably that they play on 10 foot rims and it should be 9 foot at this age.

When we don't have 10 guys (hasn't been happening lately, finally built back up a solid group of regulars; struggled for awhile with low turnout after resuming from lengthy covid shutdown) we just do half court 4s. Full court 4s is too "empty" just like half court 5s is too crowded (on Tuesdays we only have a half court, so only do 4 on 4). Love the vibe we're cultivating. I'm in the position to be able to just kick out guys who are jerks, or harass them enough that they don't wanna come lol. Recently had one guy who was good but just total cocky asshole ballhog, and eventually everyone else followed my lead and let him know either stop killing the vibe or stop coming.

I was reminded of said asshole by Spottie mentioning not really being able to come into an established run and change how they keep score. Cause very first night that guy came he wanted to change to 1s and 2s. Knew he was gonna be trouble then.

i love half but these guys want to 'get a run in'... where id rather play more games then run old man full. theres not a lot of fast breaks as it is so its just lightly jog to one end then play half then lightly jog to the other end and play half, rinse and repeat.

these guys i play with are very protective of who they let in. i happened to know one of them really well who was able to vouch for me and get me an invite. even then it took them 3 months to get me on the text chain. my first week i pissed off one of the regulars for playing too physical inside, he's much bigger than me and everything i was doing was legal but apparently he wasnt used to being bodied or boxed out. i had to apologize and claim it was cos i hadnt played in a long time, we're cool now but i kinda just have to let him go where he wants to go unimpeded. the whole group is extremely touchy with the foul calls which i dont like. ive made it a thing to not call fouls when i get fouled (unless its egregious) and they still sometimes call touch stuff and apologize...

the 1s and 2s thing... so when i play against that shooter guy i always try to tell whoever is guarding him to sell out on the 3s and let him drive, hes not fast and who cares if he shoots a pull up inside the arc. they really dont get it and give him too much room for his little side step 3, or leave him open completely. ive only guarded him a few times (hes usually matched up with another older guy) and i havent lost to him yet doing that. deny ball and stay right on him on the perimiter, let him get by if i have to but dont give up an open three.

Huh I wouldn't think a guy that age would have an issue with some physicality down low. Def see that with younger guys. Might even told the story upthread of guy who wanted to fight me for boxing him out. I wasn't even being aggressive about it, he just had no idea it was part of basketball (he was Kenyan and didn't play or watch ball growing up).

Yeah you gotta make someone like that put it in the floor! Inability to "know your personnel" is very frustrating trait in a teammate.

My daughter (fourth grade) hoops now. It’s pretty awesome. We watch college basketball together, play one on one, went to a local high school game. She’s really into it.

BTW she has the two hand push shot too - I think at that age they just kind of need to get it to the basket any way they can until they develop more strength.

over the shoulder is prob preferable, not trying helicopter parent anyones children here

My parents weren't athletes but my uncle was, and when I was a kid he got me to practice shooting by flipping a ball into the air using just wrist power while lying around watching TV or whatever. Def gave me a headstart on transition from pushing the ball towards the hoop to an actual wrist-flick high-arc shooting motion.

over the shoulder is prob preferable, not trying helicopter parent anyones children here

My ankle healing progress stalled this week. That combined with ugly looking bruising/discoloration (and girlfriend and sister on my case) prompted me to see a doc and get x-rays. Yep just a sprain. Doc ordered me some PT so at least it wasn't a total waste to see him.
My sister and cousin are visit beginning of April so if I'm smart I'll stay off the court until after they leave, rather than risk reinjury and not being able to take my guests on hikes. I can run and jump but it gets very sore quickly. I still am running the open gym in Thursdays, so it's tough watching from sideline. But things could be much worse!

ankle sprains are seriously the worst