GRH Book Club

Those of you not familiar with Jim Dent may recognize his previous book, The Junction Boys, which chronicles the Texas A&M teams under Paul "Bear" Bryant. Dent is an excellent writer who used to cover the Cowboys and still resides in Texas, which is why it's no surprise that Twelve Mighty Orphans includes the mystique of Texas high school football.

Dent chronicles the Masonic Home, an orphanage in Fort Worth Texas that was funded by the Freemasons to provide for orphans of former Masons during the early to mid 20th century. Naturally, during the depression the home reached a peak in terms of students. The home was about as good as an orphanage could be during that era, but the students routinely lacked self esteem and continually hopped the fence in hopes of escaping. Enter Rusty Russell the head football coach. Russel entered the school in the late 20's and fielded one of the top teams in Texas football for roughly 15 years. What's more is that Russell achieved this fielding squads of 12-18 players. Those of you familiar may recognize some of their opponents. The Mighty Mites played the likes of Amarillo, Waco, And Highland Park (Matthew Stafford) High Schools. Furthermore, the Masonic Home played on the highest level of Texas football with a co-ed K-12 enrollment of 153 students.

Now, Dent is a great writer, but anybody could write a bestseller with this story. The first thing that I really enjoyed was the football aspect of it. The Mites achievements on the field are stunning considering the fact that they played with 135 pound guards who faced opposing tackles easily over 200. The other interesting fact is that Russell was not only a motivational coach, but also an excellent tactician. Russell, seeing that his team was outmatched, would throw the ball up to 40 times a game. Dent goes a little far crediting Russell with the creation of the spread offense. (For football elitism, it seems that Russell used a busted out single wing, utilizing short passes. As much as Dent talked about the innovative offense I really wish he would have included some diagrams)

To say that Dent does a great job with character development would be an understatement, and this is really the core of the book. Football aside, it's amazing to hear about what some of these boys and girls went through in order to end up at the home, and how they grew despite the odds against them. Whether going down to the water tower for the nightly fights, stealing grape juice, or feeling up the local city girls, Dent does an amazing job highlighting the personalities of various team members. It's really these side stories that makes the football side of the book so much better. It was also refreshing to see, despite the harsh discipline, that people at the Home truly cared about these kids and in some cases loved them like family. Another interesting note is that some of the players on the team went on to become great college/pro players. Specifically, Dewitt Coulter of Army and Giants fame, and Hardy Brown, known as the meanest man to ever play the game. But other than the orphans and the team, Dent does a good job on the characters that existed during depression era Texas. My personal favorite was "Two Guns" McCoy who was the self proclaimed handspring champion of Texas and dressed in full cowboy gear would sneak onto the field doing handsprings in the endzone after the Mites scored. Much to the dismay of local law enforcement. Essentially he was the forefather of this guy. (NSFWish)

At the end the book is also about how the Mighty Mites served as an inspiration to individuals affected by the depression not only in Texas, but the nation as a whole. Dent uses a fine analogy comparing the Mites to Seabiscuit and how the nation supported the two. Especially when the downtrodden team played Highland Park, which if I'm not mistaken was and still is one of the richest communities in the nation. I won't go into the ending because it is somewhat epic. Not The Junction Boys epic, but amazing nonetheless.

All in all, if you liked Hoosiers you'll love Twelve Mighty Orphans. It's essentially a cooler less Gene Hackmany version of the underdog story. It's in paperback, and if you really are into this type of stuff it's worth the 15 bones. If not you could wait for ESPN to make a half assed TV movie about it like the did for Junction Boys. Still pissed about that bullsh*t. Whatever, I'm over it.

GRH Book Club: Boyz N The Hood.

INCREASE THE PEACE

Ok, ok, ok. I know it’s not a “Sports Movie.” Hear me out.

Sports plays a large factor in the movie, and plays a pivotal role in the development of one of the central characters. Plus, it kind of connects to a lot of current things, so, shut up and listen.

Boyz N The Hood is the coming to age story of Tre Styles, Ricky Baker, and Doughboy Baker, following them from childhood up to the cusp of adulthood, in the poverty-ridden environment of south-central Los Angeles. The three take essentially the three different paths available to those of this plight.

Tre, raised until the age of eleven by his mother (who earns a master’s degree and becomes a denizen of a higher social status), is taken in by his father, Furious. His life is maintained by a strict code of ethics set forth from his father, with words of wisdom like, “any fool can make a baby, but it takes a man to be a father.” Tre has a job, excels in school, and is ambitious and driven enough to make college a reality.

Doughboy, played aptly by Ice Cube (the dude that makes family movies?!), is the opposite. In and out of prison, his life is consumed by drugs, alcohol, and the perpetual and cyclical violence which he himself perpetuates, and succumbs to, postscript.

Tre’s best friend and Doughboy’s half-brother is Ricky Baker. This is where the movie intersects with our interests. Ricky has been sports-obsessed since a young age and is now an All-American Running Back for Crenshaw High School, is highly touted and recruited to play the position at USC. Ricky is not without his setbacks. Like of many of the same young men in his situation, he is already a father, and does not excel in school. When the recruiter comes to talk to Ricky, he is obviously put off by the young son, and sends Ricky into a spiral of self-doubt when he mentions that Ricky must score at least a seven hundred on the SAT to be eligible to play at Southern Cal.

Tre is the exception whose eyes we see the movie through. He has two supportive parents and seemingly only has the weakness of female attention. Doughboy and Ricky, on the other hand have the same mother, but we know nothing else of their fathers. Crime is the only avenue that Doughboy seems destined for, and football is the only outlet – and way out – for Ricky. This seems to be a prevailing notion, for when the USC recruiter comes to visit Ricky, one of Doughboy’s associates asks for a scholarship, saying, “I want to go to college, too.”

I won’t spoil the end for those of you that would like to know where it goes, but needless to say, it’s not a feel-good movie.

What got me on this line of thinking is a game that tips off here in a little less than an hour. How many times in the last weekend have you read something about how great it would be for the state of Michigan if Michigan State were to win tonight? Seriously, how many? It’s all anybody can talk about, really. I’m not trying to take anything away from the accomplishments of the Spartans, they’ve done very well, and been pretty fun to watch. OMFG! FUNK!

What I don’t want is for sports to be the only thing that these people have to cheer about. I don’t want people in Detroit, Flint, or any other impoverished Michigan community thinking that sports is the only thing that can heal a community that has been ailing for decades.

Maybe I’m reading to much into it, maybe I’m just being a jerk, but it seems to me like it’s just a scrap of happiness being thrown their way, while the real pervasive problems of their society go largely ignored.

Put it another way. In the words of Doughboy, “Just goes on and on, you know? Either they don’t know, don’t show, or don’t care about what’s going on in the hood.”

If you like A Clockwork Orange, you’re a f*cking weirdo.

Every once in a while, the spirit of this fair experiment manifests itself to us. Normally he's pissed about something. This is an account of one of those supernatural experiences.

I just… I just have to get this off my chest.

Every time I walk into some fucking hipster joint, like an indie movie store or a sous chef’s apartment, there’s a fucking Clockwork Orange poster.

So I said fuck it, I’ll give this thing a whirl, see where it takes me. I read the book first. It sucked. The main character’s running around hopped up on milk, raping and pillaging a bunch of worthless chumps, while acting like quite the yankee doodle dandy-queer that he is. This guy that wrote it, Anthony Burgess, is a complete failure other than this “visionary” [makes quotation mark hand gestures] piece of shit. People were telling me, “But Roy, he invented new slang.” Fuck yourself with that. That means I have to read a whole bunch of shit like “rooker,” “gob” and other goddamn atrocities to the king’s English. Everything is “malenky” and “real horrorshow, my brother.” Pfft. Not like the shit I hear these days. Calling someone a ‘douchebag’? That’s gross enough for me to go up somebody’s head with a corked bat.

So I gave that a shot, and it didn’t pay off. But I thought, maybe, just maybe the movie is somehow better, and I put it on my Netflix queue. I’m telling ya fella, big fucking mistake. Now, not only do I have to look at this mascara’d piece of fop, I’ve gotta hear him say all these stupid made up words. Fuck me, this was worse than being gutshot, and THAT’S BAD. Not only that, but the gayest future ever envisioned is now fully frontal with its balls on my chin. Shit! There’s phallic shit all over the screen! It’s awful. I can’t believe people respect this goddamn thing. [eyes sink to the floor, head shakes]

The fight scenes kind of cracked me up, because these people I was hating got their asses kicked. At one point in time, they show these Dorthies walking like badasses in slow motion, and then BAM! JIMMY CLUB TO THE CODPIECE!

So next time you see a skinny jeans-wearing square-rimmed glasses jackass with “A Clockwork Orange” on his wall, give ‘em a Wonderboy in the codpiece for ol’ Roy here.

...

...and tell him Bjork sucks.

GRH Book Club: He Got Game

"Basketball is like poetry in motion, cross the guy to the left, take him back to the right, he's fallin' back, then just J right in his face. Then you look at him and say, 'What?'"
-Jesus Shuttlesworth

Anybody who has been around me for an extended period of time knows that this is my favorite movie of all time. While I could talk for hours about it, I'll try to break down for you, dear reader, as concisely as possible, a few reasons why this movie endears itself to me.

The movie starts with a montage of basketball being played all over America by everybody. Young, old, black, white, in urban playgrounds and Midwestern cornfields. Simply by stating that, one could make a convincing argument that basketball is the most American of sports. It's a simple enough concept, and all you need is a ball and a hoop. You can dribble and shoot by yourself, play one-on-one with a friend or stranger, anything.

The cast is phenomenal. Of course Denzel Washington is something of a living legend these days, and he brings his A game to this movie. Normally pro athletes aren't great actors, regardless of how often they try, but there are several in this movie that are extremely convincing of their roles. Obviously the main character, Jesus Shuttlesworth, is played by Ray Allen (who, at the time, was a heralded UConn product in his second year with the Milwaukee Bucks). His character is of the utmost complexity, and he pulls it off. The whole movie hinges on his doing this, as the central conflict in the movie is Jake (Denzel) reconnecting with his son, Jesus, trying to earn his forgiveness. The real difficulty is that along the way, Jesus must navigate his way through all of the pitfalls that come with living in poverty and being the best high school basketball player in the country.

The list doesn't end there. Travis Best is great as Sip Rogers, Jim Brown plays quite the menacing Parole Officer Spivey, and of course, Rick Fox plays the wackiest guy in the world as Chick Deagan. I would have partied with him every night if I went to Big State.

Not to mention dozens of cameos ranging from announcers, coaches, current and former players, guys that never made it, and Michael Jordan's three words: "He got game."

As far as sports being played in the movie, there is an assortment of the best hoops being played in a fictional movie. It's well-shot, well-edited, and performed by people that are professionals at doing it. No stunt doubles needed. My one gripe is, and always is, that Denzel has no game. I'm not sure why movies about basketball somehow always feature a central character with a broke-ass shot (see: Snipes, Wesley and Harrelson, Woody in White Men Can't Jump).

The soundtrack is mostly an original Public Enemy album. The title track, "He Got Game" is a fantastic song about life in general, set over a sample of Buffalo Springfield's "For What It's Worth," and belongs in every iTunes library. That said, when the basketball is being played, the London Symphony Orchestra takes over, which works out magnificently. The pick-up game in a housing project playground is set to Aaron Copland's "Hoe-down" (of Beef, It's What's For Dinner fame). It might be the music, it might be the hoops being played, it might be John Wallace proclaiming, "I got hops! I got hops!" while raising the roof, but the scene is among my favorites of all time.

Finally, there's Jesus and Booger's ride in Big Time Willy's Mercedes convertible. Of course, it's one of the most memorable scenes, being three minutes of Spike Lee lunacy. It includes a couple of homicides, heroin injected, crack smoked, craps played, and hardcore pornography. BUT! In my most recent viewing, during Big Time's discussion on 'bloodsucking leeches,' I noticed a younger Jamie Hector (Marlo Stanfield in The Wire) with one line, asking for money so he can get some new Nikes and a Hilfiger sweater. My mind exploded. I guess I was always laughing so hard at the puertoriqueño sister saying, "I need some pampers for my baby. I need some Dolce and Gabanna for me. I need some Chanel (pronounced, 'Channel')."

Don't put this movie on your Netflix queue, don't rent it. Buy it. Today.