Box Out!

Today's pictures will be crappy. For legal reasons, I believe that's best for all parties potentially concerned.

Win or lose, it can be pretty tough to watch kids play sports. In short, team sports offers a forum for kids to learn a few of life's simple and key lessons. But there's a million ways to fuck it up.

What's going on is that it's time once again for some elementary school girl's basketball. At team 'X', girl's from the same school sign up, show up for practice, and they play. For some, it's primarily a social club; something to do with their friends. Other girls are into it a bit more and have a decent knowledge of the game. Either way, all you have to do is sign up and you're on the team.

At organization 'Y' they pool from a variety of schools. There are tryouts and consequent cuts. They build a team. They've mounted a concentrated effort to win.

Have a look at exhibit A:


Yes, I know - crappy picture. But look at the arm on that girl there. #45 seems to be making herself about as tall as she can get, but she isn't quite up the to forearm of The Wall there in light blue. Yes, those girls on D should learn how to box out, but frankly, the best she can do in this situation is just punch this other girl in the gut, take the foul, and make Big Blue shoot two from the line.

Here's Wally (background) getting herself real low, but still a whole head above #5. Hey, whatever. The tall girl gets to play, too, right? I'm sure she enjoys the game, even if that's partly because it's easy for her. (She was taller than my nephew who plays varsity football.) I just don't know that, as a parent, I'd be cheering quite as hard for her when the score has reached 46 - 8 and she stands there getting her own uncontested rebound like six times in a row until she finally gets one through the hoop. But maybe that's just me.



So what can you do, really? You've got one guy putting together a team to win games, and you've got another guy getting girls together because some them wanted to play basketball. The difference, I suppose, is that there are some girls who aren't on Team 'Y' because Coach didn't think they'd be any help.

And that's a way to fuck up winning.