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| Fenerbahçe Spor |
I squinted at him and agreed. Coach knows what he's talking about. I'll just let him do his thing.
So here I am, researching what this all means. (Die-hard basketball fans can move ahead to the last paragraph.)
My son is not going to be seven feet tall.
So, if he wants to achieve his dream of playing for his school team, he needs a strategy.
A scaled down European Big strategy, to be precise.
To inspire him, I looked up some Turkish teams for a role model. There were plenty, but I picked Fenerbahçe's Forward, Number 7, Ömer Onan. (I may be biased because he was born in Mersin, our Turkish home town.) He's in the middle of the front row in the team pic, and at 6'4", you can see he isn't even big for Euro Big.
The most important point: He's on a great team and he's got game.
How great is this team? Check this out:
NBA Europe Live: Fenerbahce Ulker beats Celtics in debut against NBA
Ömer Onan gets mentioned a few times, and he's quoted in the end.
Now my son was trained to be a 5 - Center, right next to the basket, in the paint. He's taller than most kids around here, but if he tops out at 6'4" or 6'5" as the doctor predicts, he will be too short. Even Euro Big starts at 6'10" for a Center.
Coach now has him playing 4, Power Forward. A similar role, but Euro Big PF starts at 6'8".
So hopefully he'll work up to a 3, Small Forward. Euro Big SF starts at 6'4". Just right. (Feel a bit like Goldilocks here? I do.)
Says wikipedia:
The small forward position is considered to be perhaps the most versatile of the main five basketball positions, due to the nature of its role, which is sometimes similar to that of a power forward, and other times more resembles the role of a shooting guard. The small forward and shooting guard positions are often interchangeable.
Versatile? That is music to my ears.
He'll have to work harder on his shots, and I see years of training ahead, but it's his dream. I want him to fulfill it, no matter how many nights I'll spend on a cold, hard bleacher.
Is the moral of the story to be a big fish in a small pond? Maybe. My guess is you go where they feed the fish. And this applies to writers too - big press, small press, vanity press:
Follow your dream.
Ömer Onan gets mentioned a few times, and he's quoted in the end.
Now my son was trained to be a 5 - Center, right next to the basket, in the paint. He's taller than most kids around here, but if he tops out at 6'4" or 6'5" as the doctor predicts, he will be too short. Even Euro Big starts at 6'10" for a Center.
Coach now has him playing 4, Power Forward. A similar role, but Euro Big PF starts at 6'8".
So hopefully he'll work up to a 3, Small Forward. Euro Big SF starts at 6'4". Just right. (Feel a bit like Goldilocks here? I do.)
Says wikipedia:
The small forward position is considered to be perhaps the most versatile of the main five basketball positions, due to the nature of its role, which is sometimes similar to that of a power forward, and other times more resembles the role of a shooting guard. The small forward and shooting guard positions are often interchangeable.
Versatile? That is music to my ears.
He'll have to work harder on his shots, and I see years of training ahead, but it's his dream. I want him to fulfill it, no matter how many nights I'll spend on a cold, hard bleacher.
Is the moral of the story to be a big fish in a small pond? Maybe. My guess is you go where they feed the fish. And this applies to writers too - big press, small press, vanity press:
Follow your dream.
2 comments:
I hear you about the cold, hard bleachers. My boys were all into baseball--little league and high school. And one even did umpiring too. And it was worth it. (Though I'm sooo glad it's over.)
Okay, so you see how terrible I am--I didn't even KNOW there were numbers assigned to these positions in basketball! :D
But now I'm confused. So Euro Big is BIG? I was thinking it was small... I think I was distracted by the numbers. LOL! <3
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