White Men Can Jump

[Commando]

Lots of papi fut and Horse in pros clothes. Full court reserved for P-day.

[Surfah]

Review this thread and you can read all about the Uncle Ricos on this board. Imagine the guys currently serving they will blow this up.

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

We would have 3 on 3 tournaments every week on my mission. Our MP loved basketball (he joined the church after being invited to play for the ward team that ended up going to the all-church tournament where he heard Joseph Fielding Smith speak at a banquet). So he allowed anyone serving in Denver metro area to leave their zone on P-day to play ball at the Littleton Stake Center which was right next to our Mission Office. We would organize brackets on a chalkboard and play all day. Occasionally our MP would pop in and shoot hoops with us. He had a bit of an old man stroke but he made a lot more than he missed. My mission didn't have any ballers though. I was one of the better players if that tells you anything. We did have a couple volleyball players who could jump out of the gym but they never played basketball and would whine to set up a net on one half of the court.

[Shaka]

We did have a couple volleyball players who could jump out of the gym but they never played basketball and would whine to set up a net on one half of the court.

This describes the South African missionaries. We North Americans would dominate the gym at the ward house for at least two or three hours hooping it up while they stood around whining.

[Art Vandelay]

I served in Wash DC South, which is very compact geographically. My first MP was a harda** and completely strict about rules (my 2nd MP not so much, thus why he was sent home early), except when it came to basketball. He allowed us to play full court, and we would have all day zone against zone tourneys. In one area I played on a team with 4 guys who all played college ball before their missions. We would play every P-day and usually one night a week at the local pickup spot. It was tons of fun, and some of the best ball I've ever played.

[wuapinmon]

I was in a zone with two 6'9" missionaries, one 6'4 missionary, a lightning fast kid from the US Sub-20 soccer team, and me, unafraid to take a charge from anyone on earth. We won a lot of games on P-days at La Sabana park (see the photo below). We'd go and take over one of the courts, and play all comers, for hours. We'd lose on occasion, mostly because of me; there was this one kid from Limón who none of us could touch. He was dunking over the tall guys on our team, and he was about 6'1". I scored an average of a layup per game, but I was mostly used because my 5'1" Guatemalan comp was so short that he was actually scared when he played, so I was the alternative to him or the sister missionaries.

[Shaka]

You know this is serious when Jim Rome shares the vid on Facebook.

[WashingtonCoug]

Soonercoug and I would stop and play bball with the Russians all the time. Soonercoug can ball. He can't jump though. We also played a high school team and a college team. The college team brought refs and their home team fans showed up. We signed autographs after the game.

[cougjunkie]

Soonercoug and I would stop and play bball with the Russians all the time. Soonercoug can ball. He can't jump though. We also played a high school team and a college team. The college team brought refs and their home team fans showed up. We signed autographs after the game.

Soonercoug was a pivotal piece during a run to the stake championshp back in his days as a red devil or so I am told by mutual friends of ours.

[smokymountainrain]

Soonercoug was a pivotal piece during a run to the stake championshp back in his days as a red devil or so I am told by mutual friends of ours.

Was this a run to the Stake championship or the State championship?

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Matt Christensen, who played at Duke, served in my mission (Frankfurt, Germany) at the same as I did. We were in the same district for about four months, and on p-days he always just wanted to play ball at the military base within our district boundaries. There are a ton of brothers in the military and they loved coming and playing against him. Even though he ended being around the 8th guy at Duke, he was soooo much better than everyone else. It was like watching a rec league team dominate a WNBA team -- it was that big of a difference.

After our experience with Ziggy, I hope missionaries keep on balling. Instead of "Fresno, California spanish speaking" I wouldn't mind some guys getting "Birmingham, Alabama, basketball playing" mission calls.

[jay santos]

It was like watching a rec league team dominate a WNBA team -- it was that big of a difference.

lol

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Here's the non-1999 version of the video.

[Sizzle]

Anyone else play ball in missionary clothes on their mission? In Korea, you don't see a lot of bball, but occasionally the kids are playing it on an elementary school playground. Usually dirt fields with a hoop with no net. At least that's how it was 20 years ago. Once we stopped and shot with the kids. A crowd gathered. Crowds always gather in Seoul Korea. I did a few dunks and a crowd of 100 kids shouted and cheered for me like I was a rock star. Good times.

Yup. My first area we had a group of 8 gringo elders and of the 8, 7 of us could play. We played the city team on a hardwood court, which was a rarity, and beat them soundly. It was a lot of fun.

I also remember a couple of teenage kids wanting to play is at the church park. The rims were supposed to be 10' but were closer to 9.5' so I was able to dunk. We played them 3 on 5, with one of our 3 being a Latino Elder and absolutely smoked them.

The most fun, though, was the day we stumbled on a Sandlot where the kids were playing baseball. They had an aluminum bat which was absolutely unheard of. We watched for about 10 minutes and it was apparent they had no clue what they were doing as they were trying to hit the tennis ball swinging with one arm. I asked if I could play and caught the first good pitch perfectly and sent it about 250 to 300 feet, with the ball flying outside of the field and over a nearby house. It was priceless watching every jaw drop and get called "Sammy Sosa" while rounding the bases. I earned instant cred with the kids when I showed them how to swing with both hands on the bat. We tried to make our way back down to play again but never saw them playing.

[Harry Tic]

For some reason, this song is stuck in my head.

[clackamascoug]

These missionary stories remind me a certain Elder on my mission who played football for Alabama. He was from Newport Beach and fancied himself a golfer. One p-day he wanted to go golfing, and I said sure, no problem. We traded companions for the day and he and I borrowed golf clubs from some members, and we set out. I shot a 37, and he shot a 39, and you would have thought a LDS Missionary would have taken it better. If President Monson were there he would have said, "Words were spoken, not all of them allowed."

I'm pretty sure that 100% of the people here would be familiar with the name of which I did not speak.