My mom is a little half-Japanese woman who loves to read, run, and drink tea. She never played organized basketball or had hoop dreams. But by way of marriage, she’s attended hundreds—maybe thousands—of basketball games.
After decades listening to my dad yammer about backdoor passes, and years of leaving work early to drive me to practice, she never developed so much as a semblance of interest in the game. I don’t think she could tell you what a backcourt violation is. She went along with the sometimes absurd basketball ventures simply because she knew we liked it.
Her selflessness extended beyond spending weekends in humid fieldhouses, though. My mom was generous in our community, gifting teachers and service workers at every turn. And in the 28 years I’ve known her, I’ve never seen her start and finish a TV episode. All her free time was spent nurturing her family.
That unselfish quality, however, did not translate to her basketball parenting philosophy.
Our local paper, The Hartford Courant, published box scores the morning after high school games that included the game score, player points, free throws, and three-pointers made. There was no recognition for rebounds, assists, efficiency or any defensive metric.
Therefore, my mother, an academic by nature (she’s been a professor at UCONN for twenty years, still couldn’t get me accepted), saw no value in statistics omitted from the text.
She encouraged me to score, and score only— at times in disregard of my team. Before and after games, she’d repeat the only basketball advice she would ever give me, “I only care about your box scores.”
My text messages only go back to 2017, but the phrase was first uttered somewhere around 2010. And as you can see above, she’s remained consistent through my men’s league career.
I’ve never seen my mom play a game of basketball but I like to imagine if she did, she’d have a fiery JR Smith alter-ego that calls for ISOs, pulls from the logo, and talks shit.
So if you’ve ever been looked off by me in favor of a stepback, it’s not my fault. It’s my mom’s.
Solid gold, shooter! An incredible tribute to a wonderful mother. Your tones and deftness at coming full circle are so enjoyable to consume. Looking forward to my guest appearance on your pod!