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Phil Henderson Circa 1989

Kick it!

The passing of Jerry Buss is sad, but we’ve been expecting it and it comes without shock…And yes, he is the greatest owner in sports history.

But when I woke up this morning and read “The TEN” and saw that Duke’s Phil Henderson had passed, now that shocked me. Being anti-John Thompson and Georgetown back in the day, I remembered Henderson’s dunk on Alonzo Mourning…and was thrilled to see it on YouTube again.

I don’t know if he was a good guy or a bad guy, and reports don’t even disclose how he died, but I remember that dunk. It was great. College basketball at that time, to me, was better than everything else. (Including the NFL)

Henderson was athletic, a good shooter, he was smart, how he didn’t make an NBA roster with all the garbage that has been swilling in and out of the league the last twenty years I’ll never know.

For the sports masses though…he has a moment, the dunk, that will always be remembered.

Another, of the multitude, of great things about sports. One moment can live forever. This is where local coverage becomes so important. Forget about the NFL, the NBA, or MLB…think about the moments we see locally that far too often recede into history, only to become lore, myth, and distorted over time.

I’m speaking at APU again in a couple of weeks and one of the things I always share in the journalism class is that they are historians. That no matter how small, how trivial, minor it might all seem we are recording the history of a moment in time.

I can go another 1,000 words on the things I remember seeing…how about you?

Thank goodness there is so much filming going on to record what’s happening now.

(Note to Larry Cecil: You said you had some 30 year old film for me to see)

Does anyone remember the last five minutes of San Gabriel-Arroyo in 2011?

How about Andy Guerrero running power for the Matadors against San Dimas the following week to lock up a finals date?

Monrovia’s Blake Heyworth to Anthony Craft to start the third quarter against Paraclete this past December?

Rosemead’s Joe Silva making three consecutive defensive plays to beat El Monte in 2001?

Anything Desmond?

West Covina surviving the first five minutes of the third quarter against Bonita in the 2010 CIF finals?

Brandon Martinez to Memo Silva to beat Rosemead in 2011?

There are so many things to appreciate…and one moment can last forever.

Sports are great…what a drag it would be to write about politics, music, or even movies…

Politicians screw up and they pay no consequences, but if the safety bites on play action then he’s got His Arroyo Baldness in his ear.

You can work hard, try hard, and be diligent but unless you got the pipes or the God-imbued talent, no one will ever hear your music…but anybody, any size, at any school can strap it up and make memory that will last forever. Don’t believe me? I have a clear memory of Carlos Polanco weaving his way through Gladstone defenders before bursting down the sideline at Citrus College for Mt. View in 2002. (The Vikes were 3-7 that year)

At the theater you can see the same buddy movie, the same coming of age movie, the same addiction movie, the same mentally challenged movie of triumph, and the same sports movie over and over again. The struggle and the ensuing montage being paradigms of the sports film…but if you watch a game long enough you might learn the value of the OBP versus the batting average…You might see “power” run out of a spread formation…you might see touchdown passes out of the Wing Z, or is that Wing T?

Sports are great…Except for family there is no place we would rather be. Because even on a Thursday night, out in Glendale, with Hoover playing Blair you might see something that you will remember forever.

That’s all I got…and all because of a player I haven’t seen on the court for 23 years. That is the power of a moment.

The Dude abides…

507

Genesis 8:22

Contact Joe at joe@midvalleysports.com

Follow him on Twitter at @joet13b