I'm the Old Guy!

It was always the same for me:  if there was a game to be played, I didn’t care if I was the youngest.  In fact, I spent many of my pre-pubescent to teenager years playing basketball, soccer, golf, baseball, whatever, against older guys.  At first I got discouraged, sure, because I was initially a step slower, an inch or two or more shorter, or just overly less skilled.  I’d hang my head, pout (often) and wonder why I seemed to always be on the losing end.  Then one day my dad said something like this to me, “You may feel like you’re losing to the older guys, but you are actually getting better.  To be better than kids your age you need to play with those older and better than you.”  It wasn’t hard to motivate me; I have been very, very competitive my entire life.  But once he said that to me I almost relished each and every outing against my more senior athletic peers.  Once, while pitching for my dad’s radio station team in their monthly game against a rival station, I struck out the final guy.  The dude was ancient, like in his 30’s-old.  I was 10 or 11, maybe 12, but I had struck him out to secure the win and the team chased me down to congratulate me. 

That’s how I grew up.  Of course I played sports against kids my age, but once I got to middle and high school I was never a step behind, because I spent all that time playing against older kids.  In fact, I was usually two to three steps ahead because I had always had blazing speed.  But when not in school I was on the basketball court, playing my friend Randy Kurlander one-on-one in basketball, and still losing because he was six inches taller than me.  And elderly, like 34 or something.  But I got stronger and better, and loved playing with the old fellas. 

Time warp-----------------------------

I am the old guy.  What?  WHAT!!!???  Did I miss something?  Did I somehow close my eyes and slip into some sort of time paradox coma and come out the other side having missed my college soccer career, my entire 20’s, and awoke to find myself NOT a professional athlete, a dad, and old?  I guess I did.

I’m 33.  Me.  The same age as Jesus (in his final season).  Today, last week, all summer, many days, I am the dinosaur on the basketball court amongst the guppies.  High School kids, who don’t know what the Smurfs, Airwolf, or, gasp!, Hypercolor shirts are.  Or maybe I have been on the soccer field in my men’s league, sometimes playing against kids whose metabolisms sprint faster than I can remember.  Seriously, eat something.  But you know what?  I’m holding my own.  Yeah, I don’t wish to be on the skins side of Shirts v Skins, but I’m actually rooting for these kids to lose to me.  C’mon, I’m the old guy!

Call it pride.  Call it a no-surrender, no-quarter edict.  No, pride.  I hate losing.  Always have.  I don’t like losing to these kids probably as much as they don’t like me beating them.  They probably have no idea I’m in my 30’s,, they just see me as an old, bald guy who sweats way too much and in the position to either be an embarrassment or an enigma.  Last week 16 year-old said to me, “You never stop moving.  It’s annoying.”  The week before a 15 year-old, between pick-up basketball games, said to his teammate, “You guard him.  He never stops running.  He’s like a fly.”  I consider these two statements compliments.  I’m the old guy.

I have to.  I can’t cross-over dribble, or zip through the passing lanes.  Often I stalk the three-point arc, hoping for a crumb that I can turn into gold.  On the soccer field I know I can no longer run for days, or to daylight, but I have one or two good sprints in me per half.  I just choose my spots.  I’m the old guy. 

When Michael Jordan unretired for the second time and decided to go play for the Washington Wizards, as an aging, fading superstar, he was asked about playing against the younger guys.  He said he didn’t worry about it because his basketball smarts would be the equalizer.  He knew where to run, where to cut, where to cheat so that he could always stay ahead of the youngsters.  That’s how I feel now.  I see the game better because I have been playing, living twice as long as these kids.  And as far as positioning and blocking goes, these kids can’t post me up or knock me off a ball.  I respect their intent and desire, but outweigh them by 50 pounds and I just know how to use my body better than they do.  I’m the old guy.

I don’t think I’ll pull these kids aside if I ever see them dejected for losing to me and tell them to keep their heads up.  I’m not that close with them.  If I get a chance to play sports with Gray, my son, and he loses to me I might say something to him like my dad did to me.  It may be quick and to the point.  The best lessons aren’t learned from winning.  We learn from mistakes and failure.  And it is better to fail against people who have succeeded than those who have not.  I’ll tell him not to sweat losing to his pappy, but to embrace the experience, because we may not have that many opportunities to play together.  After all, I’m the old guy, 33, like Jesus, with a better jump shot.