What Lebron James and Dwyane Wade can learn from "Watch the Throne"

When the clock struck midnight to usher in August 8, I downloaded Kanye West and Jay-Z's "Watch the Throne." Two of my favorite artists, two of the most talented musicians of this era, collaborating together for an entire CD. Sign me up. But after watching the 2010-11 NBA season, I should have known that the recipe --- two world-class stars joining forces on the same team --- called for disappointment.

On paper, Kanye and Jay-Z equal the best rapper duo ever. You can easily argue that Jay Z is rap's G.O.A.T., and even maturing in the same era as Jay-Z, Kanye is the most talented hip-hop artist of this generation, though I doubt anyone would call him the generation's best rapper. Put them together, and you form a duo capable of blowing up tall buildings with a dozen bars, causing fire hazards in dance clubs with a single beat, or producing music that cures diseases and gives angels wings. But the world-class rappers are also two of the most egotistical beings in the world, and those egos lit a torch to what could have been one of the best albums ever.

Operating at their best, Kanye and Jay-Z are introspective, bright, and offer the world-view of wise mentors. Think Jay-Z's "Song Cry" (I can understand why you want a divorce now/ Though I can't let you know it, pride won't let me show it/Pretend to be heroic, that's just one to grow with/ But deep inside a nigga so sick) or Kanye's "Family Business" (All my niggas from the Chi, that's my family dog/ And my niggas ain't my guys, they my family dog/ I feel like one day you'll understand me dog/ You can still love your man and be manly dog). Their best songs mean something, tell tales we can relate to, discuss problems we have experienced to a certain extent, or describe an aspect of life that's real, if not always tangible or easy to articulate. Sadly, too few songs on "Watch the Throne" evoke situations we can relate to. Jay-Z and Kanye instead spent most of the album trying to tell us they're better than we are, and, while doing so, doomed the album's incredible potential.

"Watch the Throne" might as well have been an hour of Lebron James telling us, "At the end of the day, all of the people that were rooting for me to fail, tomorrow they'll have to wake up and have the same life that [they had] before they woke up today. They got the same personal problems they had today and I'm going to continue to live the way I want to live and continue to do the things I want to do." There were brief interlude's to the album's ego-driven message, of course -- "A New Day," in particular, travels to the inner sanctums of the duo's mind, sharing the lessons they'll teach their sons, and "Murder to Excellence" begins as an intelligent discussion of inner-city violence before the duo digresses into a discussion of how Kanye and Jay-Z have escaped the threats of the inner-city and now spend all day driving Maybachs and buying Gucci apparel and, what goes unspoken, fornicating with beautiful women.

Mostly, Kanye and Jay-Z just want to tell us they live on a different planet than we do, that they have more expensive clothes than we do and drive nicer cars, that they can afford beautiful vacations and have met the President of the United States of America. Meanwhile, Kanye and Jay-Z forget that what made them better than we are in the first place was an ability to make music that relates to the average man, rather than the man driving Maybachs and waving $100 bills at the valet driver, the ability to make music that sounds great to the ear but also means something substantial. I expect Gucci Mane to rhyme (or not rhyme, depending on his mood) about cars and clothes and materialistic possessions. I expect Kanye West and Jay-Z to provide something more meaningful.

Maybe the album's title should have alerted us to the ego-driven bars we would soon listen to. Watch the throne. View me from your perch below me. I am the king, you are the commoners, and you should watch me and feel lucky you get the opportunity to do so. Gag. Puke. Dry heave. I WANT MORE FAMILY BUSINESS AND SONG CRY!!!

The title was Ye and Jay's version of the Miami Heat's pre-championship championship celebration, their proclamation, "Not one. Not two. Not three, not four, not five, not six, not seven. And when I say that, I really believe it." The difference, of course, is that Lebron and Dwyane Wade play a team sport in which a title is presumably a player's ultimate goal, and they were predicting championships they had not yet (and still have not) won. Jay-Z and Kanye make music, where titles are individual awards and, well, titles are also money and Maybachs and meetings with the President --- in their minds (and maybe they're right), they have already won all those titles.

"Watch the Throne" was more like a victory lap than an honest attempt at making great music. It was Jay-Z and Kanye telling us, "We don't even have to try. We can just look into our garages and rap about whatever we see, and our album will still go platinum." At least, I hope it wasn't an honest attempt at making great music. Because if it was, two of rap's best ever have pushed themselves off the throne and now lay with the commoners, in a place they never should have fallen to.

Lebron and Dwyane Wade failed in different ways than their musical counterparts, but both duos fell far short of their potential, at least in their initial collaboration. Kanye and Jay-Z displayed more teamwork -- both portrayed a similar vision for the album, both seemed okay with rhyming mostly about money and cars and fame and social standing, real music be damned. They were entwined in failure, almost seemed resigned to it, whereas Miami's duo took turns trying to lead the Heat to a title. Lebron faded in the Finals, but we should not forget that he carried the team there. Dwyane Wade tried to carry Lebron and the Heat on his back against Dallas, but we should not forget that he could not, nor should we forget the back seat Lebron pushed Wade into in the previous rounds. Or maybe we should forget all of that, and just remember that the Heat lost, they lost without any glory, they found out how my Dirk tastes, and they presumably (and finally) realized the need to earn the titles they predicted last summer, the titles Wade and Lebron thought would arrive at their doorstep without any hint of a fight, as if dropped by a stork.

Kanye and Jay-Z believe they already won many (mythical) titles, and they seem content parading their spoils around town, telling everyone who will listen about their gorgeous whips, beautiful clothes and extended trips to Paris. Lebron and Wade can keep doing that --- writing their own version of "Watch the Throne," hosting pre-championship championship celebrations, and being content with what they've accomplished during their careers --- or they can start making real music.

It's time for the NBA's Terrific Two to make a choice --- Watch the Throne, or Family Business?

The White Pickup Basketball Player

He's 20 years old, built like a steak knife, angular but strong, with high cheek bones and a military buzz cut, and he's shooting hoops in Baltimore, Maryland, at an indoor gym where he knows nobody and nobody knows him.

He plays college basketball. Division III, but still. He can play. His shots mostly swish. He practices moves with precision. Jab step right, sweep through left, finger roll at the rim. One dribble left, spin move right, pull-up jumper from the free throw line. In and out to the right, behind the back to the left, use the bucket to shield an imaginary defender, lay it in high off the glass with a little English.

He is 6'1, 195 lbs, with 7% body fat. He's not an All-American and he can't quite dunk, but wearing a cut-off T-shirt that says "Five Star Camp All-Star team" and reveals arms familiar with the weight room, he looks the part of a player. Except that he's white, and he's not particularly tall.

Other players come in. They are all black. He watches them play. They are young, or old, or bad, or out of shape, or some combination of the previous characteristics. None of them could play college basketball, he knows, as he watches shaky handles and suspect jump shots and guts protruding from shirts. But they are black, he is white, and this is pickup basketball.

They ask him to play. He says yes. Two of the better players, he suspects, are selected as captains. Two youngsters get chosen. Then a couple old guys. Then three players who couldn't hit a layup if the hoop was the size of Glen Davis's appetite. Finally, the last pick is made. You can guess who.

At first, nobody will pass him the ball. He rebounds an opponent's miss, dribbles upcourt, pulls up for three. Swish. A murmur comes from both teams. Maybe this white boy can play. He steals an opponent's pass, leads a two-on-one fast break, makes a bounce pass to his teammate for an easy layup.

His teammates start to look for him. He keeps making his shots. Not all of them, but enough for his opponents to get mad.

"Get a fucking hand up."

"I've got him."

"Got him, my ass. He just hit three fucking shots in a row."

He hits three more shots, too. And a few more. The game is to 21, and he scores 12 points, dishes out a few assists. His opponents switch his defender twice, the ultimate sign of respect. He would be proud, but these players are not good. He knows that. He just wants to get a workout in, practice some moves against defenders, and maybe, just maybe, prove that he should not have been the last pick.

The game ends after he hits a runner in the lane. He walks to the wall and sits down, grabs his bottle of water.

"You play like Steve Nash, man," one of the youngsters tells him. Always Steve Nash, or Peja Stojakovic, or J.J. Redick, or some other NBA player capable of getting a sunburn. "Do you play somewhere?"

"I play a little college ball. Nowhere you'll see on ESPN."

The two teams run the game back. This time he's the centerpiece from play one. The other team double-teams him. His own team lets him run the show. Last pick, huh? Against these guys?

Soon he will be at a new gym, in a new city, and a new group of players will ask him if he wants to play. He'll say yes, he'll get chosen later than he should, and then he'll get to proving himself, and if he does a good enough job somebody will compare him to an NBA player, and the player will always be white.

Twilight tennis

(Irving Levine serves before his match with Fran Calarese.
Photo credit to Michael Beswick, The Republican.)

Fran Calarese’s cheering section was colorful for a tennis tournament.

There was a 65- or 70-year old woman who imparted wisdom at every opportunity.

“Hit it where he ain’t, Fran.”

There was a man who smiled when Fran’s winner struck the line, who frowned at Fran’s unforced errors, who rarely said a word but reacted to every point during Calarese’s match, every deuce, every serve, every game point.

There was a jovial guy who spent most of the match chatting with anyone inside shouting distance and didn’t care much for tennis.

“I just wanted Fran to know I was here for him.”

And there was a woman who verbally assaulted the line judge at every chance.

“That was out? C’mon! That was in by a good three inches.”

Loud, spirited, diverse. This cheering section was different than most but similar to many. And it was rooting for a 90-year old man.

Thirty minutes before he will begin the 90+ finals at the Clem Easton Super Seniors tennis tournament, Fran Calarese and I sit at a plastic table. The finals is the only round in the 90+ division – I suppose it’s difficult to find more than two 90-year olds with accurate serves, forehands that repeat themselves successfully, and the endurance to play two or three sets in 90-degree heat. A local boy, err, a local participant, Calarese has just driven twelve miles to the match in Longmeadow, MA from his Wilbraham, MA home. He sits down next to me with a smile on his face, a smile that immediately takes twenty years from his appearance.

Curious about the path that led Calarese to the Clem Easton Super Senior tennis tournament, I ask about him. He tells me he began playing tennis in 1942, after serving in World War II. He played in Longmeadow, my hometown, in a league that met two or three times per week. Longmeadow is where he honed his groundstrokes, where he fell in love with the game he never thought he would still play seventy years later.

Our conversation turns to Calarese’s personal life, and he tells me about his wife. The two were married for 52 years. He still misses her. At one point, he tells me the couple spent fifty of their married years living in Longmeadow. A few minutes later, he tells me they moved around more than an army family.

“But let me tell you about my father,” he begins.

Fran Calarese’s father took a boat from Italy to the United States, searching for opportunities for himself and his new fiancée. He lived in the United States for a year until he found the right job, then returned to Italy to bring his fiancée into their new life.

“My father did everything,” says Fran Calarese.

Mostly, Fran remembers his father’s garden. And his father’s wine collection. And the grapes his father grew. And the four or five miles his father walked each day to attend work. Fran’s father worked at the Draper Corporation, a loom manufacturing company in Hopedale, MA.

“He made pots in weaving machines,” Fran explains.

By making pots, Fran’s father supported nine children. After his fiancée, who by then had become his wife, passed away at age 43, Fran raised the children all by himself.

“He did everything,” Fran repeats. “Everything.”

Everything includes passing down his good genes to Fran, Fran’s four brothers and Fran’s four sisters. At 90 years old, Fran tells me, he is the youngest of his father’s nine children. All, Fran says, are still alive.

My grandfather needs a walker to travel ten feet to the bathroom, but Fran Calarese is readying himself to play a three-set tennis match at The Field Club, a Longmeadow country club known for its well-groomed clay courts and high-quality tennis. If he wins, Calarese will become the Clem Easton champion for the third time in his career. He won the tournament years ago in the 80+ division and the 85+ division. But if he wins the tournament for his third time, Calarese will have pulled off a major upset.

In thirty minutes, Calarese will compete against Irving Levine, a senior tennis circuit legend. During his career, Levine has earned more #1 tennis rankings in New England than any other player. He has represented the United States senior national team in international competition multiple times and, in 1996, he started the New England Senior Tennis Foundation with $250,000 of his own money. Also an international-level table tennis player, Levine once played table tennis at midcourt during halftime of a Celtics game at the Boston Garden. Eighty-nine years old himself but playing in the 90+ division due to a technicality (any player who turns 90 years old during the calendar year is considered 90 for the sake of the tournament), Levine has not yet retired from his job as the president of Copley Fund, Inc., a company he founded in 1978, thirteen years after he sold the country’s largest ladies handbag manufacturer for a small fortune. Levine’s wife, or at least the woman I believe is his wife, looks considerably younger than Levine, which is marvelous because Levine looks considerably younger than any 89-year old should.

Levine was born in New York, raised in New Bedford, and lived in Fall River for years, but now calls Rehoboth, MA, home. When I hear about Levine’s Fall River connections, my mind instantly thinks of “Fall Rivers Dreams,” the book written by Bill Reynolds about the falling city, its high school basketball team, and a young stud with a limitless future named Chris Herren. I ask Levine if he is familiar with Reynolds’ book.

“Oh, of course,” he replies. “Bill once wrote a piece about me, back during my table tennis days. I told him it was the best piece he ever wrote. The New York Times published a piece about table tennis during that same time period, and Reynolds’ was better.”

Levine will play the tournament with a broken finger and a three-dimensional tattoo on his chest. He will wrap the finger in a splint and complain about it infrequently. And the tattoo? Not long before the Clem Easton tournament, Levine fell during a match and landed on the butt end of a tennis racket. His chest is now molded in the shape of a Wilson tennis racket’s handle, and will probably remain that way forever.

Forever. It’s a word that actually seems possible while looking at two of the world’s spryest 90-year olds. The two competitors don’t quite have a bounce in their steps, but they move freely and uninhibited by wheelchairs, crutches, or any other device most 90-year olds need for support.

Early in the first set, Levine serves and Calarese slices a backhand back to the other side of the net. The backhand slice, delivered with the gentle touch of a brand new teddy bear, is Calarese’s favorite shot.

“Most seniors can’t handle that drop shot,” says one local tennis aficionado. “But Irving Levine isn’t most seniors.”

Their match isn’t as beautiful as Rafael Nadal vs. Roger Federer, but in entirely different ways, it’s just as compelling. There is no Wimbledon championship on the line, no national television coverage and no million-dollar tournament purse. I am the only newspaper reporter at the match, and just one local news station has sent a camera crew to film highlights and make a small report. Still, there is a buzz at the Field Club courts. Observers know they will not see points with twelve or thirteen rallies, 130-MPH serves, or forehands that almost look like they could shatter the net. But the observers also realize something else: it’s more rare to see men equaling a combined 179 years of age compete against each other in a sport meant for young legs.

The match quickly becomes lopsided. Levine and Calarese have played each other several times during the past twenty years and Calarese has never won. Today will not change that drought; David will not slay Goliath this time. Goliath is too mobile around the court, too strong with his groundstrokes, too calculated in his motions. Calarese hits some beautiful shots – one two-handed backhand paints the back baseline and leaves Levine muttering to himself. But Levine is a better player.

A few times during the match, Calarese forgets whether he is serving or returning. He also forgets the score on numerous occasions, and occasionally tries to serve from the left side rather than the right. These slight miscues, which should be expected – he’s 90 years old, after all – are my first indications that Calarese’s memory might not be entirely reliable. I think back to his wife, his father, his siblings, and hope everything he told me, the life he remembers, is true.

A few times, Calarese threatens to steal a game. But Levine is too good; he controls every aspect of the match as if he is a puppeteer. Calarese is a good sport even in defeat, but he gets frustrated with himself. His drop shots hit the net too frequently. Some of his groundstrokes miss, sometimes even after Levine has inadvertently left Calarese with an open court and an easy winner. More than a few times, Calarese shakes his head in disgust after an easy shot bounds somewhere he does not want it to.

“Hit it where he ain’t, Fran,” Calarese’s loudest cheerer shouts. “That’s all you’ve gotta do.”

Calarese is trying. He has earned so many tennis trophies that he recently had to throw most of them away, but he is playing Irving Levine now, and Irving Levine isn’t most seniors. Maybe if Calarese was entirely healthy, he could threaten Levine or even beat him. But after a recent, scary fall, a doctor told Calarese to stop playing on hard courts.

“Little does he know, I do,” Calarese said. But still, his body won’t follow his commands like it used to.

Levine wins the match, 6-0, 6-0. The two familiar competitors shake hands and clutch each other at the net, sharing some stories, reminiscing about all their matches, congratulating each other for a match well played. Then Levine walks to his bag, takes a sip of water, and undoes his finger splint. Meanwhile, Calarese traipses to his spot on the bench and looks at his racket like it just slapped him in the face.

“I wish I could have played better,” he whispers.

Then Calarese’s cheering section surrounds him. His friends slap him on the back and grab him delicately by the shoulders.

“You played great, Fran,” I hear. “That Levine’s a phenomenal player, but you played him close. Some of those backhands you hit were gorgeous, just gorgeous.”

Calarese smiles, and then he lets his racket drop to the ground.

I am a little embarrassed because it speaks poorly to my green reporting skills, but I need to ask Fran Calarese a few more questions for clarification. Somehow, even though he stressed his father’s importance, I forgot to ask his father’s name. So I wait until his cheering section finally disperses, then I ask Fran Calarese a question I should have asked earlier.

“I think it was Alfons,” he tells me. “A-l-f-o-n-s. But it might have an ‘e’ on the end. Or an ‘o.’ On second thought, maybe you should look it up.”

“I will,” I tell him. “Thanks for offering me a wonderful gift today. I enjoyed watching you play.”

He smiles and looks at me earnestly. “If only I could have played better.”

Then we part ways.

I return home to research Alfons Calarese, or Alfonse, or Alfonso, or whatever it may be. My quick Google search offers only one relevant hit. It is an obituary from November 29, 2005, the obituary of a 95-year old man named Joseph T. Calarese.

“Son of the late Alfonso and Alberta (Leo) Calarese,” the obituary reads. Joseph T. Calarese died at a nursing home in Newport, Rhode Island, but he was born in Milford, MA, the town next to Hopedale, which is where Francis Calarese’s father worked for so many years at the Draper Corporation. Joseph was survived by his daughter, her husband, two brothers and three sisters. One of the sisters, according to the obituary, resides in Hopedale. One of the brothers is named Francis Calarese, and at the time of Joseph’s death, according to the obituary, Francis lived in Longmeadow, MA.

In the article I write for the newspaper, I do not mention that Fran’s siblings were all still alive. I no longer believe it to be true, so I can’t put it into print, even if it makes for interesting reading.

At some point, unless the obituary was a coincidence, one of the oddest coincidences, Fran Calarese forgot about his brother’s death. If there were originally nine siblings, like Fran told me, the obituary indicates that there were five left after Joseph passed away. And that was six years ago. Maybe more of Fran’s siblings have passed away since. Maybe not. Maybe the obituary is just a coincidence. But it can’t be, right?

Thirsty, I grab a glass of water and ponder everything. I think about growing old, and Fran’s sweet backhand slice, and family, and Alfonso, who walked four or five miles to work every day. I think about the cheering section that accompanied Fran to his match, and how they supported Fran when he lost, and how they induced him to smile even after a tough match. I think about Joseph T. Calarese, whose brother (barring wild coincidence) forgot about his death. I think about Irving Levine, who beat Fran Calarese six-love, six-love even with a broken finger and a Wilson tennis racket tattooed into his chest. And I think about how it would feel to forget about my own brother’s death.

It beats not forgetting, I decide.

I remember something Calarese told me earlier.

“Who knows what life has in store for you when you reach your eighties and nineties,” he said. “Some of us are just lucky.”

Then I think about Fran’s final words to me.

“If only I had played better.”

But if he had, how much would have changed?

Fallen and he can't stand up

My grandfather Pop-Pop fell today and he could not stand up.

I speed-walked upstairs to help. Pop-Pop was inadvertently planking in his closet, breathing heavily after attempts to pull himself to his feet. He and my grandmother Kicki have lived in a second-floor apartment at my house for the last decade, and lately Pop-Pop has regressed. Cancer has invaded his face. A tumor the size of a softball eats at his left jaw. Most days, he cannot close or blink his left eye. It remains open instead, the color of a stop sign. His legs, once muscular, resemble toothpicks. His lifestyle, once self-sufficient, now relies on everyone else. He cannot read, his favorite hobby, without a powerful magnifying glass. He cannot walk to the car without someone to lean on. He cannot urinate without someone to help him balance.

I carried Pop-Pop to his feet and led him to his bed. He sat on the edge and held me in his hands.

“Thank you,” he said, panting from all the exertion it took to hold me while I lifted him. “What’s your name again?”

Then he cried and hugged me tighter than he ever has.

Eighteen years ago today, Reggie Lewis was 27 years old when he collapsed at Brandeis University and passed away two and a half hours later at Boston’s New England Baptist Hospital. He died doing what he presumably loved to do. He did not have any tumors growing from his face. He did not need someone to help him piss or someone to be his crutch whenever he walked to the car. He never forgot the names of his loved ones or looked into the mirror to see an eye the color of a Chicago Bulls away jersey staring right back at him.

Lewis missed all the good stuff.

Pop-Pop flew dozens of missions in World War II. He played in a golf league every Thursday night. He sold used cars in Springfield, MA, coached his only son’s CYO basketball team to a 44-1 record one season, read more books than any other person I have met, and once scored an own goal to lose a playoff game for his high school hockey team.

When my mom returned home after a night of partying, Pop-Pop would be sleeping, but his arm would hang over the edge of the couch to make her stop and say goodnight. No sneaking into his house.

When my uncle Kelly was young, he once slept over a friend’s house but told Pop-Pop he was attending a MacDuffie School dance. The next day, Pop-Pop picked Kelly up and asked how the dance had been.

“It was fun,” Kelly responded. But Pop-Pop knew.

“There was no dance,” he said. He had sold a car to MacDuffie’s headmaster earlier that day. When Pop-Pop asked, the headmaster knew nothing about his school’s alleged dance. No lying to Pop-Pop, either.

Now, my aunts and uncles take shifts to take care of Pop-Pop. They make him meals. They help change his clothes. They drive him to radiation. They chat with him, or, when he doesn’t feel well enough to chat, they sit and keep him company. Pop-Pop hasn’t been alone since the day he married Kicki.

“It’s Jay,” I told Pop-Pop.

He looked at me once more and said, ”I love you, Jay.”

I love you too, Pop-Pop. I love you too.

My pitcher Vinny

I woke up yesterday morning to discover my car's brand new flat tire. I don't know how the flat developed, because I had driven the car the night before with no problems. What I do know is that I couldn't drive, AAA towed my car to the nearest repair shop (which will presumably cost me hundreds of dollars---or, in other words, a month's worth of blogging), and then I got called to cover a baseball game on a night I was supposed to have off. Not a glorious baseball game, either---an 8-10 year old tournament, which would inevitably stir up memories of my Little League glory days while simultaneously reminding me just how distant my sports journalism glory days remain. That is, if "my sports journalism glory days" ever come to fruition. They currently feel like they will stay caged in my dream world forever.

To make matters worse, the NBA lockout continues and I struggle daily to satisfy my basketball fix. Only during a lockout can I see this (which might as well go under the headline: a few NBA stars and a handful of other decent basketball players will play a glorified pickup game) and immediately call my friend in Washington, DC to inquire whether I can stay with him for the weekend and buy tickets to the event. Yes, I know the play won't be NBA caliber. Yes, I know I don't have nearly enough money to waste on a trip to DC. Yes, I know Gary Neal doesn't seem like the most exciting choice for an All-Star style track meet (nor would he normally fall anywhere near my list of "players I would pay to watch play basketball"). But it's basketball, damn it, and my life doesn't have nearly enough of it right now.

I have baseball instead. 8-10 year olds playing baseball on a field with a centerfield wall that stands 160 feet from home plate, no less. The last time I played baseball, I struck out four batters in one inning (true story). But partly because I was wilder than Charlie Sheen during a weekend-long binge and partly because I missed dozens of practices for AAU basketball, that was the one inning my freshman baseball coach allowed me to pitch. My strikeout/inning ratio might be the best ever recorded in high school baseball, but my love for playing America's favorite pastime had abandoned me entirely. After triumphantly walking off the mound and flipping my coach the bird (I didn't really, but I might as well have), my baseball playing career was finished.

I remained a fan, at least temporarily. But I was a reverse bandwagon Red Sox fan. Before the Curse ended, I watched the Sox play every single night. I loved Manny Ramirez's swing; Big Papi's joviality; Nomar's hustle; and the way all of Fenway stood in unison whenever Pedro Martinez got two strikes on a batter. On the night the Sox finished off the Yankees in 2004, my friends and I started streaking throughout my town. We might have taken twelves steps before wimping out and putting our clothes back on, but the point is that we were excited enough to bear our wieners to the entire community, if only briefly.

After that night, my Red Sox fandom went downhill -- nothing could ever compare to erasing a 3-0 deficit against the Yankees. The Sox won the World Series in St. Louis, and my buddies and I did not streak. Actually, we did not make fools of ourselves in any way. The Red Sox were expected to beat the Cardinals. There was nothing magical about the World Series win except that it ended the Curse. And even the Curse had felt lifted before, as soon as the Sox dispatched the Yankees using a script that came right out of an impossibly unrealistic sports movie.

Three years later, the Sox won the World Series again. I no longer watched every regular season game. I no longer spent as much time watching the Red Sox as I did with my own family members. I no longer cared as much because the 2004 World Series title irrevocably altered my life as a Red Sox fan. I felt like a husband in a miserable marriage -- once, I had been in love and even holding hands felt like ecstasy. But after the wedding, my marriage to the Red Sox became a chore. It sucked, and no matter how hard I tried to find it, that initial spirit was gone. The Red Sox were named the 2007 World Series champions, and I have not watched a full regular season game once since.

With my baseball past in mind, I drove to the field (in my mother's car, since mine was still in the shop) to cover this 8-10 year old baseball tournament, a player who had become disenchanted, a fan whose passion had long since gone, a sports writer who certainly never envisioned covering a pre-teen baseball game in 100-degree heat. A person's memories and experiences shape how he interprets the present, and I feared my confrontational past with baseball would impair my vision and skew my story. Instead, the game took me right back to the time when baseball was one of my lovers. The game held my hand and my heart fluttered like it was our first date.

The players were miniature models of Major Leaguers. A boy named Vinny toed the rubber for the home team, the Angels, and he had swagger for days. He was taller than everyone else, and stronger, and even though he was nine or ten years old, he looked like the type of kid who would need to shave daily by 6th grade. He also had a hell of a right arm, one he used to strike out seven opponents in just three innings. But before every pitch, he looked into the bleachers at a man, I suspect it was his father, for reassurance.

When Vinny hit, he used the same routine before every pitch: he wiped away the dirt with his right cleat, then wiped it back with his left. He finally settled in, stared down the pitcher, and two out of three times the day I saw him, roped line drives into the outfield. I didn't know which pro he was pretending to be -- maybe Vladimir Guerrero, maybe Adrian Gonzalez, maybe Alex Rodriguez, but he was trying to be somebody. The one time Vinny made an out, he lifted a fly ball that almost scraped the right field fence on its way down. After the out, he walked past a number of parents, past a group of young girls playing catch, past the 12-year old announcing the game, all the way to the man I assumed was Vinny's father.

"We could have used a hit there," Vinny said, almost pouting. I suddenly remembered he was just ten years old.

"It's fine, son," the man replied. "You put a charge into that one. Even the best hitters only hit .300."

The game was still going on, and Vinny's teammate hit a line shot into right-center. The single probably could have scored a runner from second, but the Angels third-base coach held up the stop sign and the runner, understandably, stopped. Vinny called his coach's name and a mischievous smile enveloped Vinny's face. The coach looked over and Vinny windmilled his arm, telling the coach he should have waved the runner home. Then Vinny laughed like Adam Smith's invisible hand was tickling him relentlessly, and the coach followed suit.

The game ended and Vinny's team beat their opponent, the Falcons. He and his relief pitcher combined to pitch a one-hitter. They celebrated by playing a brief game of pickle with somebody's little sister. The opposing starting pitcher, named Anthony, struck out eight batters; he also pitched out of the stretch with runners on base even though nobody was allowed to steal. I spoke to his father after the game -- Anthony just wanted to use the same mechanics as his heroes. That's why he threw curveballs, too, and sliders, and that's probably why he grabbed his right pant leg in between every pitch.

In the fifth inning, a player named Nate struck out swinging at a pitch six inches above his head. His father sat near me and remarked, "Oh, no!" Nate briefly looked shaken by his feeble swing and disastrous at-bat. But when I looked back a few seconds later, he was already smiling and chanting, "We want a double" to one of his teammates.

The game ended and most members of both teams stayed to watch a game being played on an adjacent field. The visiting team went ahead by two runs in the top of the last inning. But the home team responded with a home run. Then another. The game was tied. Three of the Falcons, whose loss eliminated them from the tournament, were eating hot dogs outside the right field fence. Two more were eating sno-cones. One of the hot dog eaters sprinted across the outfield after the second home run. Yes, he sprinted across a field during the middle of a game he wasn't playing in. The outfielders didn't know how to react. Neither did the boy's parents.

The second game continued into extra innings. The visiting team launched two home runs and collected six runs. The home team went down in order. I spoke to both coaches after the game. The winning coach noted his team's poor pitching. The losing coach couldn't stop smiling.

"To hit two home runs to tie it, that's every kid's dream," he said. "These kids are playing great. I'm really proud of them."

My flat tire and the NBA lockout did not enter my mind once all evening.