by Scott Ostler
“Or just cool,” Dizzy said. “So how is your team doing?”
“Uh, kinda so-so. We lost again last week. It was my first game, but the team has lost three in a row. All three by a lot.”
“Ouch,” Dizzy said. “Losing sucks. Not to bore you, but my first year in the minors, in Alabama, we went the first two weeks without winning a game.”
“Two weeks?” I said, my eyes bugging out. “How many games was that?”
“Thirteen,” Diz said. “A donut-baker’s dozen.”
“Dang! What’d you guys do?”
“We moped,” Diz admitted. “Finally the manager let us have it. He said, ‘Look, if you guys can’t deal with losing, maybe you’re not cut out for sports. Go get yourselves some job that doesn’t mess with your emotions. Try coal mining. Very emotionally stable job, and then you die young.’ The skipper was right. Losing was hard, man, but we were playing baseball! It was the best job in the world, even with the losing.”
Wow. It seemed like everyone was a philosopher—Trooper, the old man on the bus, this guy’s baseball manager. Did they all read the same coaching book?
Diz handed me the bag and said, “Hey, Carlos, please stop in and say hi next week on your way down the hill. You don’t have to buy a donut. I like to keep track of how my favorite teams are doing.”
I smiled. “Sure.”
He said, “Can I ask you a personal question?”
I shrugged and nodded.
“When you mentioned your parents, you said ‘were,’ past tense?”
“They died a year ago,” I said.
Diz bowed his head. “I’m sorry, Carlos.”
I nodded.
“Here I am philosophizing, and you know more about life than I do,” Diz said. “Hey, good luck with the Bucs. I have a feeling you guys will turn it around.”
I reached into my backpack to get money. Diz waved me off.
“This one’s on me, Carlos,” he said. “You’re my one millionth customer. That means good luck for both of us.”
It’s funny. Some people, five minutes after you meet them you feel like you’ve known them a long time.
LOCKED OUT
FROM THE TOP OF RAILROAD AVENUE, I COULD SEE THE Palace two blocks away at the bottom of the hill. The neighborhood didn’t look as creepy as it had that first morning. At one house, an older lady sitting on her covered front porch smiled and waved. Then the hill, really more of a slight grade, became a basketball court and I was dribbling through an imaginary Boston Celtics full-court press.
Oops. I remembered what Augie had said about not dribbling in the rain. But Railroad Avenue dead-ended just past the gym, at the railroad tracks, so there was no traffic.
Practice started at nine sharp because the team had to be off the court by one, when a senior citizens’ bingo group took over the Palace.
I rolled through the gate, over the blacktop outdoor basketball court, and into the gym. Coach was already there, a ball in one hand and a paper coffee cup in the other, talking to one of the parents. Some of the players were out on the court, shooting and goofing around. Loud music was blasting from DJ’s speaker, blaring about Kansas City.
I left my donut bag by the bleachers and switched over to a basketball chair, with the help of one of the dads. I rolled onto the court, trying to ignore the nervousness in my stomach, when I realized that I was doing bounce-push-push without thinking. A small smile spread across my face, easing the nerves a little. I found an empty side basket and I noticed James rolling toward me.
“Crazy rain, huh?” he said. “I saw you come in by yourself. How’d you get here?”
“Bus.”
“You’re lucky,” James said. “My parents aren’t crazy about me taking the bus by myself. They let me do it once in a while, but not when the weather sucks. Hey, how do you like the music?”
It was that Kansas City song. “Uh, I don’t know that song,” I admitted. “Kinda weird.”
“It’s our unofficial team song. Some old blues tune that DJ found in his grandfather’s record collection. This year the Nationals are in Kansas City. Last year we got blown out at the state tournament and we set our goal this year to win state and make it to the Nationals. Like the song says, ‘Kansas City, here we come’!”
I started to say something when a scream echoed across the gym.
“A rat!” DJ shouted, pointing to a corner by the bleachers.
James and I wheeled over to see.
A small rat had found my donut bag and was clawing at it. Jellybean grabbed a broom leaning against the wall and started to chase the rat, which had a hunk of my donut in its teeth. Jellybean cornered the rat and raised his broom, then froze.
Another rat had hopped into the battle.
This rat was bigger, and was missing a front leg. The big rat hopped in front of the little rat and stared up at Jellybean, as if daring him to swing. While the big rat and Jellybean had their stare-off, the little rat scampered to a corner and into a little hole in the wall.
Then the big rat hopped to the hole and disappeared, too.
The gym went silent.
Finally: “That was awesome!” Trooper said.
“That was disgusting,” Mia corrected. “Coach, this place is rat-infested!”
“That depends on your perspective,” Trooper said. “From the rats’ viewpoint, this gym is people-infested. This is their home. We’re lucky they don’t call an exterminator to get rid of us.”
“Trooper, they’re gross little rodents,” Jellybean said.
“You realize we’re related to them, right?” Trooper said. “We’re gym rats. They’re like our second cousins.”
“Yeah,” Hot Rod said. “The Palace is their home court, too.”
“So it’s the Rat Palace,” I said.
“The Rat Palace!” Hot Rod said. “Very poetic, Carlos.”
That’s when, unofficially, the Earl C. Combs Armory became the Rat Palace.
“Did you see how the big rat hopped?” James said.
“Must have lost that leg in a ferocious battle with a cat,” Jellybean said.
“He’s like Captain Hook,” Hot Rod said.
“We’ll let the captain go about his business,” Trooper said. “It’s time for us to get to work.” He clapped his hands. “Let’s go to the drawing board.”
Coach rolled over to his dry-erase board as we gathered around.
“We’ve been struggling recently, you guys know that,” Trooper said. “I don’t have any magic solution, but I do have some ideas. I think we need to update our game. Most of you have been playing for BARD at least a couple years now, and the emphasis has been on the basics. This is my fourth season with this team. It was baby steps at first, the basics, which are still important, but I think you’re ready to move up to the next level of basketball. Think of it like this: We’ve been doing regular math, and now we’re moving up to algebra.”
Jellybean looked at me and said, “Don’t worry, Carlos, Trooper doesn’t mean that for real. Do you, Coach?”
We all laughed. In the team group email, I had mostly hung back like an outsider, but when they talked about school, I had mentioned that I was doing lousy in algebra.
“How about a different analogy?” Trooper said, looking at me. “We’ve been playing checkers, now we’re going to learn chess. Look, this new thing isn’t rocket science; it’s just more advanced basketball. It’s really about thinking more and moving more.
“We’re going to pick up the tempo, and we’re going to move constantly, with and without the ball, but with a plan. We’ll have a few basic plays, and then once a play starts, there will be a lot of options.”
“Kind of like the Warriors, Coach?” I asked.
Trooper nodded. “Just like the Golden State Warriors. On offense they’re in constant motion—setting picks, cutting, everyone moving. Remember two key words: motion and space. You should always be moving or about to move. If you’re close to a teammate or a couple teammates, move a
way and find an open space on the floor.”
“Cavorting beasties!” shouted Hot Rod.
Everyone stared at him.
“What’s cavorting mean, and what are beasties?” James asked for all of us.
Hot Rod shrugged. “Cavorting means moving around like crazy. Some Dutch dude made a new kind of microscope and the first time he saw live bacteria, he called them cavorting beasties.”
Trooper nodded. “That’s us,” he said. “I call what we’re learning the Flow offense, because of the constant motion, but I suppose you could also call it cavorting. We’re also going to push the pace. More fun for us, more work for the opposition.” He moved closer to the whiteboard. “Here, I’ll diagram a couple plays. Understand, we’ll be moving faster and doing more things, so we’re going to make mistakes.”
I grimaced. Like I needed more chances to make mistakes.
Trooper took us through two plays, then we hit the court—five players running the offense and three—counting Trooper—on defense.
Play Number One: James passed to me and cut through the key to set a pick on the right baseline for DJ, who went the wrong way and crashed head-on into James.
Next play: James, Hayley, and I all wound up together in the left corner. Trooper whistled.
“Are you three having a committee meeting? Look, if you’re close enough to touch a teammate’s chair, or two teammates’ chairs, move away. Find open spaces.”
For every pass we completed, we threw away two.
“Bumbling beasties,” Beans said.
Trooper said, “Let’s try some full-court.” He called Hot Rod’s mom and Hayley’s brother onto the court, to give us ten players.
My team brought the ball down, and just as I was passing to Mia, she decided she was too close to Hot Rod, so she spun her chair and took off to find open space. My pass found open space, sailing out of bounds.
Hot Rod looked at me and rolled his eyes. “I don’t know about this,” he muttered as I wheeled past him.
My team got the ball, and I dribbled downcourt holding up two fingers. James was coming up from the baseline to set a pick for me at the top of the key. Hot Rod’s mom, who is able-bodied but a pretty good wheelchair player, knew what play we were trying to run, so she rolled in front of James to cut him off.
James stopped on a dime and cranked his chair backward, toward the hoop. I lobbed a pass over Hot Rod’s mom and James had an easy layup. There was no defensive help because Mia and Hot Rod had pulled their defenders outside, away from the hoop.
We all whooped.
“Nice cavorting,” Trooper said with a smile. “Way to read the defense, James, and good reaction to James’s move, Carlos. No matter what the defense does, there’s always a countermove.”
At the end of practice, Trooper huddled us up. My arms felt like lead. I figured that was because I was new, but I could see that the other kids were tired, too. Trooper wasn’t kidding about the new offense being hard work. No resting. As we rolled to the huddle, James said, “Man, I’m looking forward to Pizza My Mind.”
Mia said to me, “That’s our after-practice hangout. If we can make it up the hill…”
Trooper said, “So, what do you guys think?”
We all looked at each other.
“Pretty sloppy,” James said. “But fun.”
“I’m dead,” Mia said, hanging limp in her chair and blowing a piece of hair out of her face.
“It was ragged,” Trooper said, “but that’s what I expected. We’ve got five more games and five more practices before State. We’ll get better—as long as we work at it, and commit. You guys in?”
We exchanged glances again. I wasn’t sure, but…
“We’re in, Coach,” James said.
“Might even be fun,” Jellybean said.
Everyone nodded or said yes. I still wasn’t sure, but I wasn’t going to be a “no” vote.
“Good,” Trooper said. “Let’s wind it down. DJ, what have you got for us?”
DJ got out his phone, put on a Kendrick Lamar song, and turned up the volume.
James turned to me and said, “Sometimes Trooper gets a little goofy at the end of practice.”
“Everyone grab a ball,” Trooper said, and motioned for us to follow him to the top of the key.
“First to hit one of these is the winner.” Facing the opposite end of the court, he tossed the ball backward over his head toward the hoop. Not even close.
Hot Rod shot next and missed the entire backboard by twenty feet.
“Close,” Jellybean said, and everyone laughed.
I shot next and hit the top of the backboard. Everyone else missed the entire backboard, but James went last and his shot bounced off the rim. Everyone cheered.
“Can we work that shot into our new offense, Trooper?” Hot Rod said.
“I’ll let you shoot your free throws like that,” Trooper said. “Might improve your percentage.”
As we were leaving the court, Trooper rolled over to me.
“Carlos, in this new offense, a lot of the roles are interchangeable, but we need to keep the ball moving, keep the players moving. I still want you to shoot when you’re open, even though I know you’re not confident with your shot yet. But you can play a strong role for us in moving the ball and working the offense.”
Passing had never been my thing. But maybe that could be a way for me to actually help the team instead of dragging it down.
“I like how you seem to be catching on to the offense already,” he said.
As we switched over from our basketball chairs to our regular chairs, a man wearing a Bay City Public Safety shirt approached Trooper and said, “Coach, please get everyone out of the gym as quickly as possible. I’ve got to lock it up.”
“Okay,” Trooper said. “What’s going on? What about the bingo group?”
The man shook his head and said, “No bingo today. My instructions are to lock up the gym at one o’clock.” He turned and walked out the door.
I was one of the last players out, and as I rolled out the door, the rain was still falling. Several of the bingo senior citizens were huddled nearby, under umbrellas.
Jellybean was last out. The man from the city slammed the doors shut. He looped a heavy chain around the push bars, put a big padlock on the chain, and clicked the lock shut.
There we were, basketball players and bingo players, all staring at the sign the man had nailed to the door.
GYM CLOSED
until further notice, pending structural inspection.
Absolutely NO TRESPASING
BY ORDER OF BAY CITY DEPT. OF PUBLIC SAFETY
“They can’t even spell trespassing,” Hot Rod said.
“Trooper, we’ve got a game here tomorrow,” Mia said.
“Well, that city guy didn’t have much information,” Trooper said. “I’ll have to make some calls. Surely they would have given us notice if we can’t use the gym tomorrow. We don’t want to cancel our game. This is very odd.”
I took the ball off my lap and tried to pound a dribble, but the ball plopped into a puddle of rainwater and just floated.
WET AND WORRIED
“LET’S HEAD UP THE HILL,” TROOPER SAID AS WE ALL rolled away from the gym. “Pizza’s on me today. We’ll get settled up there and I’ll get on the phone. Right now let’s not worry about the gym—the Rat Palace.”
As we pushed slowly up the grade, James said, “Trooper, do you really think we can get this new offense working in time to qualify for State?”
“Fair question, James,” Trooper said. “I wouldn’t get us into this new stuff if I didn’t think it was the best plan for our development. The important thing is not to worry about State. We can’t make that our only goal. I know you guys like to talk about State and Nationals, but we can’t get there without getting there.”
“What the heck does that mean, Coach?” James asked.
Trooper said, “It means that it’s important to enjoy what you are doing at this mo
ment, and not spend much time thinking and worrying about the future. If you do that, you miss the present.”
“That’s very Zen of you, Coach,” Hot Rod said.
“Zen?” Jellybean said. “What’s that?”
Trooper laughed, nodded at Hot Rod, and said, “Ask our team intellectual.”
“Zen,” Hot Rod said, pushing his glasses up on his nose, “is the state of being fully immersed in the here and now.”
Jellybean said, “So being Zen means not talking about State?”
“It means not obsessing about State,” Trooper said. “I’m suggesting we enjoy the process, wherever it takes us.”
“Right now it’s taking us to pizza,” Beans said as we reached the top of Railroad Avenue. Pizza My Mind was a few doors down on the right.
“This is such a cool spot,” Mia told me as we rolled through the door. “Mr. and Mrs. Petrillo move tables around to make room for us. When it’s sunny, we sit on the back patio, under the trees.”
It was an old restaurant, with posters on the wall of Italian sports and movie stars. Boy, it smelled good. It reminded me of all the times my old team would sit around a big table, eat pizza, rehash the game, and laugh. My dad called it the Goofball Hour.
This was kind of the same, but without Easy E and the guys. The Buccaneers sat around one big table, the adults at another, and Trooper went off to the side with his phone. He came back a minute later.
“Not good,” he said. “I had a message from the head of BARD and I just talked to her. She got a call from the city an hour ago telling her the Palace might be closed for a while, and we can’t use it tomorrow, so we’ll have to cancel our game.”
Groans all around the table.
“We need that game to help us get ready for… never mind,” James said, staring at the tabletop.
“I’ll see if I can find out any more information,” Trooper said. “But for now the key is to stay positive. We’re still a team and we don’t give up.”
When Trooper was away from the table, Mia said, “You gotta love Coach, he looks on the bright side of everything.”