Saw Dray, Dominic, Nick & Caron at Tyson's Corner

[fishercob]

Mods feel free to merge as is necessary.

I had a lunch meeting at CPK at Tysons today. After we finish, I stroll through the food court around the corner to see Dray and Dominic paying for some junk food an CInnabon. Both had big red sugar drinks and some other empty calorie. I said "Dray, let me buy you guys something healthy," with a smile.

He told me he was a vegetarian, so he had to eat stuff. Right. They looked like such kids. The way they were dressed (baggy sweatsuits, big chains, baseball caps), their body language, etc. I walked away thinking this is the new Seven Day Dray? Hardly confidence inspiring, but there's no law saying look or act a certain way off the court. I saw them walking back in the other direction with Nick a few minutes later. I had been surprised he wasn't with them initially. My other quick observation was that Dray hardly looked any taller than Dom. I'm not buying the 6'11" listing.

So I continue on with my stroll/errands, and sure enough I see Caron walking down the hall with a guy a recognized from a couple vids on the Wiz website. some sort of relative/manager or both. So walked up to him and said hello, and stuck my hand out for him to shake. As soon as I did that, I pulled it back b/c I know a lot of celebs have a thing with germs and especially w/H1N!, I wouldn't blame him if he wasn't shaking hands. He says "no, it's cool, reaches out and shakes my hand."

We chat for a minute and he gets real quick that I am a huge fan of the team and know my stuff (he was surprised I knew the opener was at 8:30 tomorrow). My impression of him was just night and day from that of the "future three." I felt like I was talking to a man. He looked be directly in the eye when we spoke, stood up straight, etc. And dude, he looked THIN, in a good way. I've seen him up pretty close a few times before and he always had more chub to his face.

I told him how much I enjoyed rooting for him and appreciated his contributions to the area. He seemed to really appreciate that. I then told him that he needed to knock some sense into the kids and get them to stop eating junk food; I assumed he knew they were at the mall. He was confused, though. After I explained that I had just seen Dray and Dom at CInnabon he started laughing and shaking his head.

Just thought I'd share....

[nate33]

Thanks, fishercob. Good story.

[nate33]

That does bring up a good question. How do you teach these overgrown teenagers to be men when all they do is hang out with other overgrown teenagers?

We need to chain Blatche to Butler, Young to Jamison and DMac to Haywood. (The vibe I get from DMac is that he isn't quite as childish and Young and Blatche, but WTFDIK.) It's also mildly interesting that McGee wasn't with them.

We know that McGee seems to be fairly computer savvy judging by his youtube mixes. Might one extrapolate that he may be a bit brighter than the other three youngsters and maybe he doesn't enjoy the same pasttimes as they do? (I say this out of pure speculation. I have never met any of them and I readily acknowledge that making character judgements based on youtube savvy and sugary drink consumption is totally unfair.)

[closg00]

Great-stuff Fish. I wonder if Dray is really Vege? The junk-food might explain Dray's poor conditioning and lack of muscle.

[LyricalRico]

We know that McGee seems to be fairly computer savvy judging by his youtube mixes. Might one extrapolate that he may be a bit brighter than the other three youngsters and maybe he doesn't enjoy the same pasttimes as they do? (I say this out of pure speculation. I have never met any of them and I readily acknowledge that making character judgements based on youtube savvy and sugary drink consumption is totally unfair.)

McGee could be socially awkward, thus the time to perfect YouTube mixes. Of he could just been home recovering from a 12 hour X-Box-Live binge.

[fishercob]

closg, I think Dray was being sarcastic with what he perceived as some random short white guy telling him what to eat. I doubt he's vege. I don't really blame him for that. At that age, I'd have done the same thing.

To nate's point, you can have them hang out with vets. You can pay them like adults and treat them like adults in many other ways. Bottom line is that it simply has to come from within them. I believe that.

A friend and fellow poster here reminded me that Magic Johnson had two titles by 23. The compulsion to be great is burned on to your DNA or it isn't. I mean Dray got frickin shot, and was still out late at night in a place he shouldn't have been looking to buy some pussy.

The bright side with Dray is that he's talented (and cheap) enough that he's still valuable if he doesn't reach his potential. He doesn't appear to have the will to be an all-star, but we don't really need him to be. It's frustrating, because he does have the talent to raise the team to another level. But you have to let him get there (or not) on his own. And it seems like he's headed in the right direction, Cinnabon aside. Hard to extrapolate too much from a 60 second encounter too.

We shall see.

[Chocolate City Jordanaire]

fisher, there's a thread on the General NBA discussion board, IIRC entitled "The Caucasianization of the Pacers". Has to do with the players the Pacers have traded away or acquired since the brawl with the Pistons years back. Your post just reminded me of the image of players Bird seems to be acquiriing. If they're not white players, they're very conservative black players. (If those guys were wearing jeans or slacks and a tee shirt or polo shirt, would that have been more acceptable/reassuring? I'm thinking they probably hadn't been too long from practicing.)

fish, your post also reminded me of David Stern's dress code. Very debateable, but the man was trying in his way to improve the image of the league by holding the players to a corporate dress standard.

The guys you're talking about are 23 or 24 and have been playing a kid's game for big money. What exactly would make them go Wall Street and don Brooks Brothers? Their contracts are guaranteed. Need they dress for success?

I do get where you're coming from, fish. I say EG might have inferred about maturity level and such at draft time.

[fishercob]

I bet that's am interesting thread, CCJ. Caron was wearing sweats too. He just carried himself differently. It's not that he was any more white and the kids were more black. He was a man, and the F3 came off as boys.

[miller31time]

We seem to have a tendency to talk about Andray as if he is one of the few players who has massive potential and a problem of fulfilling it.

But I'd argue that many, many NBA players like him. Nearly every team has an Andray Blatche. The NBA has so many incredibly talented players. "Drive" tends to be one of the biggest factors in determining who's a star and who's a scrub (all IMO of course).

[dlts20]

Well come on guys, we also cant discriminate. It means nothing how these guys are dressed or act off the court. Lets not forget that these really are young men in the hip hop culture who play video games, go to clubs, and wear what young hip hop men wear. It doesnt mean nothing negative. Lebron dresses the same way when he's out and acts like a kid when he's around those guys he grew up with but when he's doing something in the NBA wether its a game or a presser then he's savy. I do agree that these guys have to grow up and be men but from all that weve heard, they have made legitmate changes.

When youre talking about Caron, youre talking about something different because he's a married man and has been very mature for a long time. Drey is still younger then NY & Dom but we seem to think that he's a few years older. Theyre young but theyre getting there. Even Gil acted like a kid until now

[pancakes3]

and really is there a difference between acting like a hip hop "kid" and a college "kid"? binge drinking, loose women, drug use, loud music, and poor diet are universal. all of my friends, recent college grads, hold down a professional job during work ours but once that weekend hits (and the occasional happy hour) we're out getting housed off domestic beer and middle shelf shots, making it rain as best we can.

the only practical difference between nick young and me is that he's got more cash to blow than i. you cut me a 7 figure paycheck and i'll be out there playing the role of a weed smoking fornicator just as well if not better.

miller brought up drive. drive is extremely underrated. do we wake up in the morning thinking "i'm going to be the best damn accountant/consultant/banker/scientist/engineer this world has ever seen!" ? or do we get up, do a decent job, then take the money and indulge in our personal satisfactions?

kids being kids argument aside, i do think these guys are taking unnecessary risks. part of the rationalization of their hefty paychecks is that the payment comes in bulk now because there isn't job security down the line. the other part is that they perform a task that very few others can. finally, is that it is predicated on athleticism. if they want to cash that check, they probably should live healthier since it's an integral part of their employment. if i work at a computer all day, i dont want to go out putting my fingers at risk in my spare time. by the same token, dre shouldn't be out jeopardizing HIS health either - be it gunshot, vd, alcohol poisoning, or poor diet.

[20MexicanosIn1Van]

miller brought up drive. drive is extremely underrated. do we wake up in the morning thinking "i'm going to be the best damn accountant/consultant/banker/scientist/engineer this world has ever seen!" ? or do we get up, do a decent job, then take the money and indulge in our personal satisfactions?

I think you fortified Miller's point. Since most of us don't have that drive, the few that do really see the benefits.

[dobrojim]

at the autograph thing on meet the team night we got sent to the table
with Grier (rip), Javale and DeShawn.

JaVale wasn't that personable not that he was rude or anything.
His hands BTW are frickin huge. Watch when he catches the ball
sometime (yeah I know a lot of NBAers have huge hands). The length
of his fingers was freakish.

DeShawn was actually the nicest of the 3. Not being a big fan of
his but still wanting to say something positive, I just told him to
stay healthy.

[Zerocious]

Great-stuff Fish. I wonder if Dray is really Vege? The junk-food might explain Dray's poor conditioning and lack of muscle.

all we know for certain is that he is Vagi-tarian, iirc

[fishercob]

Memory lane.

[Higga]

We should have a thread talking about all the Wiz or ex-Wiz we've seen in person. I personally have run into:

-Jerry Stackhouse at a Starbucks when I was in Middle School. Dude drove a nice Cadillac. Didn't approach him though.
-Jahidi White when I was really young at the airport coming back from the Caribbean. Nice guy, took a picture with him.
-Michael Ruffin at Fair Oaks Mall. His wife is/was hot. Good guy.
-Caron Butler at a bar. He bought everyone a round. Awesome dude.
-Larry Hughes at the club after a Wiz playoff game(which he attended as a spectator). He was piss drunk and was raving about how he missed D.C. and was gonna return next year.
-John Wall at a Redskins preseason game in 2010. I yelled out JOHN WALL and did the Wall flex thing he used to do. He nodded and smiled.

[W. Unseld]

Calvin Booth at my buddy's wedding who was a walk on on the Penn State basketball team. Nice guy, every single bit of 6'11" if not more.

[nate33]

I routinely play basketball with Calvin Booth's cousins. One of them is my neighbor.

[bondom34]

Calvin!

Brings back some good memories for me .

[ptptpt]

Only Wizard I have ever been around was Rip Hamilton. I was doing volunteer work at the YMCA and he came there. It was two other Wizard players but I can't remember. lol. Got to play hoops with the kids and everything. Fun day.