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| KOBE BRYANT: young and old |
With his arm outstretched, a young boy greeted me upon entering Staples Center and was preparing to hand me a gift DVD from Kareem Abdul Jabbar,
"On the Shoulders of Giants"
I quickly lit up with a smile.
Mostly because of this young kid. I asked him what it was (I have already seen it but wanted this young lad to explain it to me anyway).
"It's this movie about this really good basketball player.." he says to me emphatically
"It IS?" I say..."Well, do you know who HE is," I say as I point to the image of Kareem on the DVD.
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| Fans, young and old should REALLY watch this HISTORY |
As I walked away I asked this boy, who was probably 9 or 10, to please watch the movie. It is history and lore unto itself and a remarkable production.
It was about HIS (the kid's age) that I did one of my first current events in school. As fate would have it, Kareem Abdul Jabbar had just broken the all-time scoring record.
THIS was a no-brainer. It had to be done! Sports was my life and I was going to report on one of the greatest sports records of ALL-TIME on one of the greatest players to have ever strapped up dem laces and graced the hardwood or the playgrounds.
Thank you Kareem AND Lakers.
Mychal Thompson was around as well. Kareem's teammate from 1986 to 1989. Earlier in the day I had seen a tweet that Mr. Thompson had just become a US Citizen. I approached him, asked him if that was true, he said it was and I proceeded to shake his hand congratulating him.
Mr. Thompson is from the Bahamas originally. Younger NBA fans might know him as "Klay Thompson's father," and I am sure he is alright with that. I know him as a World Champion and a class act.
When I first walked into the arena I asked if Charlie Sheen was present. She looked at me and nodded with what appeared to be a "no" and that was satisfactory enough for me to say aloud, "Winning!" We had some fun with it as Matt Barnes was straight tushing threes in warm-up.
Winning games for the Lakers have been FEW and FAR so thus have been FREE TACOS and some "We Love LA" at the end of what used to be regular dubs for the purple and gold.
As fate would have it, my friend and I end up sitting in seats owned by the gentleman who sings the National Anthem at the beginning of every Lakers Season for the past 30 years, "Jeffrey Osbourne."
During halftime, my friend ended up seeing a legend of another kind.
"that was Danny Carey.. the Greatest Drummer in the WORLD!" He said this after catching back up with me
I looked over and saw a very tall man, wearing a gold Lakers hoodie, with his sandy blond hair tied back and looking like he could play small forward for L.A. (why NOT?)
This same friend introduced me to Tool's music in 2003 even though I had known of them, especially since he was following them from inception.
When I heard Tool for the first time I was out of my mind stoked and proceeded to share some of my Rush albums because of the similarities between Carey and Neil Peart (RUSH)
We didn't run into Neil...
BUT, there were a lot of LEGENDS in the house so although the Lakers might NOT have gotten the win,
WE ARE "WINNING"
_chauncey