Basketball from a fan’s perspective

Patrick Mahomes-the athlete

He is Super Bowl bound, most of us are aware of his athletic prowess in the NFL. He exhibited on Sunday why he is the best QB in the NFL, let’s check out his other talents. Many believe he could have been a professional in baseball or basketball, he decided to concentrate on football. Patrick Mahomes Jr. was a pitcher in baseball like his father, in basketball at 6 foot 2 he played every position at Whitehouse HS in Whitehouse Texas. We might ask the question just how good a basketball player he was.

We can debate whether he could have played in college or better yet talented enough to play in the NBA. As a point guard he averaged 19 points a game and there exists video of him in action. An opposing player cut off Mahomes on a fast break attempting to take a charge. A former teammate said “He (Mahomes) could hardly dunk but he did that time going over the top of the opposition.” Standing 6 foot 2 and 225 pounds I don’t know how much weight Mahomes gained once he begin concentrating on football. This is an interesting note, Mahomes claims baseball and basketball training aided his development as a QB, was named Maxpreps Male Athlete of the Year 2013-14. As my friend Rory says, “Mahomes has that “IT” factor working for him.

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The latest A/P Top 25 poll places Kansas basketball in 8th place while the Coaches Top 25 poll placed them at number 9. If we check the current Big XII standings prior to Monday night’s action they list Texas Tech, Houston, Iowa State and KU in that order. Houston is the only school at 4 is listed above Kansas, as for the others number 15 Tech and number 12 Iowa State are listed behind Kansas on both polls.

Rebound the ball

A fan wrote, “Victor Wembanyama should average more than 10 rebounds a game.” I’m sure his statement was based on the 7-foot 4 height of Wemby, while height is important effective rebounding is more than one guy being taller than another. I’ve read and continue to believe an athlete must have a work ethic plus the ability to “see where the ball is going.” I’ve mentioned this previously it was said 6 foot 7 Dennis Rodman would intently watch how the basketball would bounce off the rim. Depending on the angle of the shot is the bounce going to entail the ball coming off the left or right side of the rim. This is how Rodman at his height was able to lead the NBA in that department 7 consecutive years.

There were numerous players much taller than Rodman but he did have an advantage. Teams he played for, especially the Bulls, didn’t call on him for offense, it was strictly a defensive role and rebound the ball. This leads us to the Pistons Jalen Duran, I witnessed him playing for Memphis University and not the Pistons. It would appear the 6-foot 10 250-pound Duran has “a nose for the ball.” He’s averaging almost 12 rebounds a game and his most recent game was a gem. In an upset victory over the Thunder Duran scored 22 points and pulled down 21 rebounds, in addition he managed to deal out 6 assists to teammates. Rest assured he’s not going to get 20 rebounds every night he plays but it clearly proves to all he’s got the ability. Duran doesn’t turn 21 until November so Duran and others become building blocks it’s hoped will produce a winning Piston’s team.

Unicorn

I saw a report recently, it’s claimed Kevin Durant was the first to introduce the term unicorn to the NBA. He used the term to describe Kristaps Porzingis at the time the 7 foot 3 Porzingis arrived in 2015 to the NBA. If you are like me on first hearing unicorn you probably thought of the mythical creature however we discover the term unicorn has more than one description. From the Cambridge dictionary a unicorn is “Someone or something that is difficult to or impossible to find.”

The question becomes why is it only applied to extremely tall players skilled at the game, does their capability exceed many of the other players around them? My question is why we can’t locate the term being applied to some skilled player below 7 feet in height. More recently we had another term added to our lexicon, LeBron James seeing Victor Wembanyama in action for the first time used the term “alien” to describe him. Of course that was LeBron indicating this youngster was not of this world based on many of the skills he demonstrated on the basketball court.