Sports Are Amazing
Sportez Currie
Until the lion learns to write their own story, tales of the hunt will always glorify the hunter - African Proverb The ConTextos Authors Circle was developed in collaboration with young people at-risk of, victims of, or perpetrators of violence in El Salvador. In 2017 this innovative program expanded into Chicago to create tangible, high quality opportunities that nourish the minds,,expand the voices and share the personal truths of individuals who have long been underserved and underestimated. Through the process of drafting, revising and publishing memoirs, participants develop self-reflection, critical thinking, camaraderie and positive selfprojection to author new life narratives. Since January 2017 ConTextos has partnered with Cook County Sheriff's Office to implement Authors Circle in Cook County Department of Corrections as part of a vision for reform that recognizes the value of mental health, rehabilitation and reflection. These powerful memoirs complicate the narratives of violence and peace building, and help author a hopeful future for human beings behind walls, their families and our collective communities. While each author’s text is solely the work of the Author, the image used to create this book’s illustrations have been sourced by various print publications. Authors curate these images and then, using only their hands, manipulate the images through tearing, folding, layering and careful positioning. By applying these collage techniques, Authors transform their written memoirs into illustrated books.
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Sports Are Amazing Sportez Currie
It’s funny my name is Sportez and I can really play baseball, basketball, football and track & field. I might can even play soccer if I tried.
I’ll never forget the day I cried about playing baseball (my first love) when I was 5 years old. All the home boys were older than me and I had to be 6 years old in order to play, so I went to their practice every chance I got. One day I just came home crying to my mom telling her how bad I wanted to play. The next day she called around trying to figure out who the coach was until I told her it was one of the home boys' dad. So she talked to him letting him know I was interested in playing.
Since I was too young, he told her I can be a Waterboy. I can’t remember too much, but before you know it he saw I had a nice arm on me and started sneaking me on the field. After that year it was on and poppin for my baseball career. Year after year I was getting home run balls and big trophies until I got to middle school. I put my baseball career on hold and started my other loves.
When I say other loves, I’m talking about basketball, football, and track. My middle school didn’t have a baseball team. Sad, right? Although they didn't, it didn't stop me from being active. Basketball has always been one of my favorites. I also started off young, playing around the neighborhoods with my older kinfolks.
So when I got to school I’d be more advanced than the other kids when we played during recess. I always won trophies and medals through elementary and middle school because of how good I was. Thing about middle school, if you weren't good at tryouts you wouldn’t be on the team. The coach did three cuts and I passed all three with ease.
At first, I was a little nervous because it was my first time having to let the coach see if I was good enough to play for his team. Growing up I was used to my mother having to pay a fee just so I could play on a team but I still did my thing. I was officially a Tiger, not only for basketball, for football as well. It’s funny how football was kind of my least favorite but I was good, like really good.
I started all three of the sports early but football is the one that got a lot of my memories. As I'm beginning to tell you how it started I'm kind of feeling some type of way. I used to be the youngest and littlest one of my group of people I used to hang out with. Every weekend we’d play backyard football at one of the homeboys' houses or anywhere there was a field. It was so nice to be my size and age, somebody had to tell my mom to sign me up for peewee league.
Since I was too young to play tackle I had to play flag. It used to be hard for the other team to take my flag off my waist. The coaches from the other team used to try to recruit me for the next season. Same thing happened when I was old enough to play peewee. The parents from peewee league thought I was too old to be playing because of the way I used to do their kids. I'm telling you I was that good.
Then for some reason they didn’t let six graders try out and I had to put football on hold until I got to the seventh grade. Once 7th grade hit I was suited and booted. I noticed a huge change about myself when I got on the field with the other kids. I had grown taller than most of the kids I used to play flag and peewee with. I most definitely hit a growth spurt and came out on top. That's pretty much how middle school sports went for me. I was busy and not getting in any mishaps.
When I hit the growth spurt I had to change the position I was used to playing when I was in peewee. I didn't like it at first because being a running back was all I knew growing up. Now I had to be groomed to play WR (Wide Receiver). Instead of knowing what pocket to hit, I had to learn how to catch the ball and learn routes. See being a RB (running back) you mostly get the ball handed off to you or tossed to you, sometimes you might get it thrown to you but not that often.
WRs have to do certain routes and get open so you can get the ball thrown to you. Once I got the hang of being a WR, I liked it and cherished it. My team was pretty decent; we won a lot of games. Since most of us were coming from pee wee league, we had to be groomed to play Middle School Football, so we didn't go all the way like everybody thought we would.
As for high school I can't say the same. Like I told you before I never really hung out with dudes my age growing up. They would always have me by a few years. So pretty much everybody knew me. I never had to worry about anybody playing freshman jokes with me. One thing I did have to worry about was jealousy. I never knew how to handle jealousy well growing up because it seemed like my dad was jealous of me. Even though I’m his seed it was like he envied me for having nice things and being a good athlete.
They'd have freshmen going against Varsity at the end of practice and I made sure I was one of the freshmen to make his Varsity team look like shit. Every kick return I was running it back, every route I ran was fast, and every ball thrown to me I caught it. He was so pissed off that his Varsity team was getting their asses handed to them. He made them bear crawl and ended the day. Camp was a good experience even though it only lasted two days. After camp was over we started getting ready for our freshman season.
Like I told you with Coach P, he really didn't cut people, he'll let you cut yourself off the team. So our Freshman team was pretty deep and pretty good. We were predicted to win state (our Senior year). We were winning every game. So Coach P was trying to recruit me to varsity. I remember saying “I'm good, Coach.” I wanna stay with my team, in a laughing manner. He looked at me and said, "Varsity is your team and I'm starting you next game." He was serious as a heart attack. I said "I'm good, Coach, I don't wanna play with Varsity until our season is over with." He looked me dead in the eyes and told me, "Since you don't wanna play Varsity, I’m going to suspend you until you make up your mind."
He fasho made me miss one of my freshman games until I agreed. We ended up being 61. We lost our championship game. After that I was starting on Varsity.
When I scored my first touchdown on Varsity, Coach P was jumping up and down like he won the super bowl. Shit I think he was happier than me. I looked at it like we still lost but that was him knowing he was grooming me to be the man for next season. Varsity season ended and I was happy because they sucked that year. The seniors were leaving and Coach P was planning for the next season. I was planning. I was getting ready for basketball season.
High School Basketball was fun and competitive. Just like Middle School Football, we had three cuts. I passed all three with flying colors. We had a decent freshmen team just like we had in football and the Varsity was trying to get a few of us to play with them ASAP! Lol. That's when the jealousy kicked into overdrive. When I started playing with Varsity, I started getting more playing time than one of my used to be home boys. He was on the team before me and I guess he felt obligated to get more playing time than me on Varsity. So one day we had a few words on the bench while the game was going on and almost got to the point where we were almost fighting. Like I said before I never knew how to deal with jealousy growing up because of my dad.
Growing up my mother always told me my dad was no good. A part of me believed her and a part of me I didn’t. As I think about it, he never really was there unless I reached out or told my mother to get in contact with him. I hardly remember getting gifts from him growing up, but I do remember getting some white and green Jordan Retro 14s. That’s when I was in elementary at the time, but as I grew I never just got anything as good as the retros. I never just really cared about material things from him, I felt like I needed him to be a father. Like showing up to school programs, basketball, baseball, and football games. I need him to be there like the other kids' dads.
When I got older I learned a lot of things by myself he probably should’ve showed me or talked to me about. It used to get to me sometimes and it still does to this day. I said to myself maybe he just ain’t built to raise or teach somebody special like me. Maybe his dad wasn’t the father he was supposed to be to him so he was trying to be the same way. Who knows? One day I might get a chance to see why he couldn’t step up as a man and take care of his responsibility as a father.
Meanwhile me and my former homeboy were steady into it. So it was to a point I rather fight than trade words back & forth, but it didn't get that far that day. After that game where we were going back and forth, I thought the situation was over with. We had another game and my used to be homeboy wasn't there. I asked one of my guys and he told me he had transferred to another school. I didn't think too much of it, I just figured he left because of the playing time. Until one day one of our rivals threw a party, me and a few of my guys went. I realized it was a problem that night. Me and my guys wasn’t there for five minutes and bout 20 dudes slide up on us trying to start some funk. My old teammate stepped in to say something. He was with the 20 dudes trying to start it up. If my kinfolk wasn’t there to stop it, I don’t know what would’ve happened.
So after that incident at the party, me and my guys drove back to our side of town. On our way back I got pulled over and got my first ticket ever. SMH. But I was happy to be back on my side of town. Ever since that night it has been bad luck for me. Instead of trying to talk and handle the situation I ended up buying a gun with my Christmas money. A couple weeks after purchasing it I got caught with it. I had to do four months in a group home. This was at the point in my life I thought it was over with sports. My mom used to come see me on every visit day I had and tell me how good my basketball team was. I was happy for my team but disappointed I wasn’t with them, plus I had to miss the season because of my sentence. The group home I was in was in the heart of North Memphis; it was secure with a gate around it.
They had a basketball court outside and a game room inside. The game room was decent but it was the basketball court that brought me back to life. The group home also let some of us go to public school and I was one of them. Since it was too late to get on the basketball team, I ended up trying out for their baseball team. This was my first time playing since middle school and I still had it in me. The coach loved me, he wanted me to stay another year but I was home sick. So after my four months were up I went back home.
When I came back home everything was still the same except for football and baseball. The football team had a new coach and the baseball team had a new coach. Also the football team had a different offense set up, so I wasn’t interested in playing, so I just stayed focused on basketball. I knew I was going to help take the basketball team to State when I was in the group home. After basketball season I tried out for baseball. I made the team but didn't get any playing time because the other kids' parents invested more money. SMH. So I got off the team and went to track and field.
I wasn't really into track but since the track Coach was my assistant basketball Coach, he thought it was good to condition during off season for basketball. Even though I wasn’t into track, I was good in long jump and 4x4. My track team was good as well. My class as a whole was the shit when it came to sports.
That one year I did track, I went to State for both events and came out on top.
I wrote about sports because that's what kept me going and out of trouble growing up. I have achieved a lot more things since then, this is just the beginning. I still have more parts in my life I want people to know. Until Next Time!!!
Until the lion learns to write their own story, tales of the hunt will always glorify the hunter - African Proverb