With LeBron James surpassing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s all-time scoring record yesterday, and securing his name in the debate of who was the greatest to ever play the game of basketball, I considered that this might be a good time to mention my possible one-on-one games with him in the summer of 1997. The truth is, I don’t know for sure that it was LeBron James because he would have been only twelve-years-old at the time, and hadn’t achieved any notable fame beyond his circle of friends at that point in his life.
With that said, in the summer of 1997, I made my annual “pilgrimage” back to my home town of Akron, Ohio. Unlike most summer excursions back to that part of the country, on this particular summer I was home for the entire time as I was in the midst of a divorce and I took on a summer gig at Davis Printing in nearby Barberton working in their prepress department.
On one particular late afternoon/early evening, my parents were having a discussion that was starting to turn into an argument, and I just didn’t want to be there to take sides for whatever unfolded. So, I grabbed my basketball from the garage and headed to Reservoir Park in nearby Goodyear Heights of East Akron to shoot some baskets. As a kid growing up, we would often go to Reservoir or Davenport Park to play basketball, tennis, softball, or just hang out, so I thought it would be fun to visit one of my old “stomping grounds” as an adult of 37-years old.
The courts were vacant when I arrived and after about 20 minutes of shooting around on my own, a young, but tall teen on a bicycle circled around the court and started shooting baskets in one of the adjacent courts. I remember thinking that at any time, more kids of the same age would soon show up and join him, but that never happened.
Instead, he made his way over to my court and asked if I wanted to play a game of one-on-one.
I remember a sense of surprise coming over me to discover how young he really was when he was right there in front of me—like, not even a teenager—yet, he towered over me at around six-feet tall. I didn’t flinch in his offer thinking he was probably some clumsy young kid that hadn’t adjusted to his new size and I would simply out-hustle him even if he had the height advantage. Keeping in mind, that I was never a good basketball player, something told me I could somehow teach him a thing or two.
As it turned out, he might have been young and oversized for his age, but I never detected anything from his basketball skills and foot work that struck me as clumsy. Further, he ran circles around me. So much for out-hustling him too.
He easily defeated me in the game, although I don’t remember the score. I might have made three shots to whatever he tallied to win.
As a courteous gesture, he asked if I wanted to go for another game. Even though I knew I was no match for him, I took him up on the offer with the hope that he wore himself out in the first game. Again, I was wrong on this account, but now there was no element of surprise in the second beatdown.
I don’t recall doing any better against him in the second game, but once the drubbing had ended, he announced that he had better get home before it was too late. That was an easy out for me, because I would have hated to tell him that I was not interested in a third game of humiliation under the guise of basketball.
As he walked across the court to his bike, I said, “Hey, what’s your name?” As he turned around to answer, a hot rodding motorist screamed down nearby Brittain Road, and all I heard from the kid was “James.”
I didn’t consider what I didn’t hear, so I simply said back to him something generic like, “Take care James and be careful on that bike.”
I don’t think I ever mentioned that day again—or for years after—except to tell my father the next morning over coffee that some young kid made a fool of me on the basketball court at Reservoir Park. That would not have been news to him.
Years later, like many Americans, I came to hear and know about this basketball phenom from my hometown of Akron, Ohio named LeBron James, but that one-on-one game at Reservoir Park in 1997 never crossed my mind. It was only when I learned much later that as a young kid, James would ride his bicycle all over Akron looking for pick-up games wherever they could be found. Suddenly that uneventful pick-up game in 1997 that was barely worth mentioning slapped me hard across my face.
I immediately started researching everything I could find about his adolescent years. Born on December 30, 1984, Lebron James would have been about twelve-and-a-half years old in the summer of 1997. At that age in his life, he was about six-feet tall too. Was he riding his bike around Akron as a 12-year-old? It’s hard to say. I know if I had been doing the same at that age, I wouldn’t have told my parents. I wish I had studied his face more because in looking at images from his youth, I can’t say I remember his face as much as I remember his moves.
To this day, I continue to ask myself, “Is it really possible that I had a brush with greatness in a couple of one-on-one basketball games with King James himself?”
If it was LeBron James who truly schooled me in basketball on that summer day in 1997, it must have been a slow day for him. I like to think that he was on his way home from some earlier, more intense pick-up games, and there I was—an easy, non-threatening opponent—as he cruised by Reservoir Park. In short, I was the perfect cool-down activity to end his day before arriving home.
mdt1960 
You should’ve dunked on him while you had the chance, baller. Nice work!
LikeLike