Nash's background is middle class. I have no idea whether he got a scholarship to attend SMU although he probably did.

I do recall that he was forced to sit out a whole year of BC high school competitive basketball when he switched from Mt Doug to SMU after the beginning of either Grade X or Grade XI. He sucked up that ridiculous decision and moved on too.

One other quick point. The award Nash has won two years running is for the Most Valuable Player - not the 'best' player in the NBA. He richly deserves the honour but it would be unfair not to note the distinction.

"Upper middle class" is definitely stretching things a little. And yes, I'm pretty sure he was at SMU on scholarship.
As for

, I think this is over-dramatizing things considerably. Most kids in Canada who dream of playing hockey, rural or urban, do so because, well...they want to play hockey. One just has to look at the depth of hockey in small towns where many pros (NHL or otherwise) return to their home towns after active careers to settle down. We're not talking escaping the shanty towns here...

The notion that poverty or a challenging childhood form a nutricious soil-base for player development is mostly false. Mine is a hockey perspective, I should point out.

Boys from single parent households were (and are) much less likely to play organised hockey. And if they did play, their dads were likely not at the rink with them, a clear disadvantage. And they never went to power skating lessons. And summer hockey camp, etc.

If we examine Canadian hockey, we find that very few players came from truly humble beginnings.

Having lived in Victoria for a few years growing up, and having gone to school with Steve and played soccer with his brother, they were no more "affluent" than we were. They were a solid middle-class family, nothing more, nothing less. What I don't find mentioned in the article is how they had to essentially start from scratch after immigrating from South Africa.

ps. did you even interview Steve or anyone in his family for this article, or did you just poach quotes from other sources, mix it in with a few quotes from Gasol, and call it a day?

Possibly Steve deserves the MVP award. Possibly he doesn't.

Basketball needed a shot in the arm and what better way than to tell the American public that white guys can play the game too?

Before I'm beheaded for a racist remark, I'd just like to say that the American owners (mostly white) have made the game into such a pain-in-the-ass, football like, format that I can't believe anyone would sit through 4 hours watching it.

The reason a game lasts an unbearable 4+ hours is the sometimes ridiculous time-outs. A team can be up by 5 points and a time-out will be called with 2 seconds left to play. It regularly takes a half hour to play the last 5 minutes of a game.

Pullleeease - have mercy!!!!!

Jack's:

That is why they should just play a 5 minuite game and be done with it!

I also think that if you are 6 feet 6 inches tall or taller that helps! Some people call the NBA players freakazoids based on their physical size!

An NBA game takes 2.5 hours to play, give or take five or ten minutes depending on the foul calls. Where do you get 4 hours from? It may feel like it to you, but trust me, it's nowhere near that length of time.

Yeah, the issue of Pau (or Pow!, as I like to call him) wanting to be a professional basketball player is more likely due to his being 7 feet tall. Nash, however, is listed at 6-3. He's no 6-3, more like 6-1, if that. The NBA notoriously exaggerates heights. Always take away a couple of inches to get a player's real height.

The common perception is that the NBA is full of "freakazoids", but there tons of short players. I think basketball is the only sport that includes people of all sizes. Muggsy Bogues was a very good player in the league for over ten years (he retired a couple years ago) and was only 5-3. He's the smallest, but the league has plenty of players under 6 feet tall. How many soccer or hockey players are either that short or taller than 6-6? If you're good in basketball, it doesn't matter what your height is, what your race is, or your wealth (Bill Laimbeer's parents were millionaires).

And yes, I think Nash got a scholarship to SMUS after leaving Mt. Doug in grade 11.

Hunh. I always thought that Nash played for Shields at UVic .

hannibal
He got a scholarship to Santa Clara and played his college ball there. He may have been coached by Shields on the National Team.

Yea, G that is what I was thinking.
I remember Shields being interviewed on Nash's first MVP award .
I assumed wrongly that Nash had attended Uvic being is that is his home town and all .
Thanks

Grw...
OK, I used to tune in when the game was scheduled to start say... 1PM.... then you have about 1/2 hour of analysing by basketball experts - then 2 1/2 later I'm waiting for the game to end in order to watch "60 Minutes". The clock at that time says anywhere between 5 minutes and 15 minutes left - which takes about 1/2 hour for the last 5 minutes.
So I'm a liar for about 10 minutes!!

How many basketball games have you watched that take only 2 1/2 hours? - and be honest!

Unfortunately I used up a lot of space in my previous post to explain the length of a basketball game - to a person who obviously has never watched a professional basketball game on television - or if he did - he may have fallen asleep and lost track of time.

Thousands, most likely. Maybe you were watching a double-header and didn't realize it. I've watched every single playoff game this year and am just settling down to watch Detroit-Miami. It "starts" at 5. Of course there's a few minutes of pre-game stuff, but you can't count that. I'll time it for you tonight. Should be over sometime around 7:30.

You probably don't know this, but NBA boxscores include the time of game in real time, that is the time it takes from tip-off to final buzzer. Yesterday's Suns-Mavs game took two hours and 33 minutes.

It usually takes approximately one hour to play the first half. Factoring in the 15 minute break at halftime, that means it only takes 15 more minutes, give or take, to play the second half, with the more frequent time-outs.

I don't expect you to like basketball or the NBA. Either you do or you don't, and no amount of explaining will make you like it or me hate it. But at least get your facts straight.

They just had the tip-off. Time on my computer is 5:15. Barring overtime, the game should be over around 7:45.

I love basketball too, although only playing it, not watching it. Even at 61 I still dribble the ball a half mile or so down the sidewalk to the basketball court and shoot hoops sometimes.

But watching a bunch of other guys doing it. I just can't imagine why anybody would ever do that. There's so many fantastic things to do; so many places to go; so much to study and read, and just to think about. We only get 75 years or so. Why waste it watching other people play games?

Don't get it. Any explanations?

I don't think explanations will help. You either just like it or you don't. Why read what other people have written, admire what other people have painted? Sure, it's probably a time-waster, but an even bigger one is the internet and forums like these!

First quarter just ended. Time stamp: 5:41. Hmm, less than half an hour. You still think it's going to last another 3.5 hours???

Second quarter went from 5:45 to 6:18.

Fourth quarter just started and it's 7:10. Looking forward to that two-hour final quarter...

Final buzzer goes off at 7:37. That's two hours and 22 minutes.

Jack's asks:

One more.

Face it, compared with soccer, where the actual playing time is 90 minutes and every game, (barring overtime or shootout) is finished in 2 hours, the 48 minutes of playing time in B/Ball which stretches to 2 hrs 20 minutes is ridiculous.

Again, it all depends on what you like. Personally, I'd rather watch something I think is exciting for three or four hours than something I think is akin to watching paint dry for 90 minutes.

My memories of Steve Nash go back to the 90's, when the pub I attend had six of those old huge satellite dishes. The staff was very good at prowling the skies.
At that time Steve accepted a scholarship to Santa Clara University in California.
We were able to dial into all the Santa Clara games.
His parents came into the pub, with their friends for every game, for years.
We regulars are huge Nash fans.
His Mom was in yesterday at the pub, even though she could have watched it at home on regular TV.

grw
each to his or her own of course. Just that I, like Jack's, find B/Ball to be particularly frustrating with all the interruptions - and with playing time of only 48 minutes it seems somehow insulting to have to spend all that added time on the couch to see less than an hour of undeniably discontinuous action.

It is an advertisers dream. One can't help but think the modern game may have been designed around the idea os selling stuff more than televising the action. Nash and the Suns have created a game that is much more interesting that the sport used to be, that I will admit. By introducing some of the finesse and ball-handling skills which had, previously, only been a feature of the Harlem Globetrotters, they have improved things a great deal.

You'd think grown men could actually play a full hour though, wouldn't you - it seems a rather childlike effort for adults to knock off so soon after starting. Get rid of 50% of the time-outs, start actually enforcing the travelling rule and lets see what the game looks like then.

As for football (soccer), it's an acquired taste I guess.

Steve Nash is truly a class act!
His brother, Martin Nash, has also been an important part of soccer in Canada (with the Whitecaps and the National Team).
I have always enjoyed watching Martin play soccer as he is a very gifted playmaker!

This is one family that has contributed to sport in a positive way!

Also, it should be noted that Steve Nash publicly spoke out against the "War in Iraq".
I guess he's pretty smart too!

Kevan Hudson
Suncheon, South Korea

Now that he's a well known celebrity, it makes him an expert on computers too!
hahahahahahahahaa!
Ethics, Stevey. Look into what you endorse from now on!

g; there's a simple solution to that. tape the game and watch it later. i've been doing it for years, and it makes it so much nicer not to have to watch all those ridiculous commercials. the same goes for the nfl.

elliot
Good idea. Problem is, somebody always tells me the score before I get a chance to watch the game.

What was this point of this article? Sounds like Nash was just your average middle class suburbanite, not a Rockefeller. All pro atheletes are just driven to succeed, are hugely competitive and focussed on the prize. Economic background would seem to be hardly a factor - except the richer kids could actually afford the leisure time activities: equipment, fees, transportation, lessons, etc.

the point of this article was pure nonsense. advantaged people don't have drive? typical lefty spew. perfect for the tyee.

elliot
I don't even think it was a real point.

Nash, at least in the American context is a left winger. He also gives a damn about people - irrespective of their colour or financial background. I don't think the 'financially advantaged' part of the essay ever got off the ground because the author didn't actually get to know much about Steve Nash.

Left and Right wing have nothing to do with it.
The MVP is going to have to be pretty good with both 'wings' if the Suns' run isn't going to end today though.

Why is this significant? Who cares. He is an entertainer pure and simple.

Because wearing a T-shirt protesting the Iraq war on television in the US and saying one's reading material is the Communist Manifesto is left-wing in the American context, obviously!

Americans especially look to sports heroes as role models. I guess you missed that lecture when you getting your MBA, cutter. Lots of commentators in the States have also tried to create a black/white issue in respect of Nash's performance and the awards he's won. It is, perhaps, a little too subtle for you.

Nonetheless, it is a poor article, as others have noted repeatedly .

The clock stops for free throws and out-of-bounds and any time the ball isn't actually in play. Makes sense to me. As for the time-outs, I actually appreciate them so I can get up and do things without having to miss the game. And late in the game they help build suspense. You wouldn't have all those great endings if they didn't call time-out and design a play. It's called strategy.

This is pure civic pride speaking. The NBA has had lots of teams like this, from Magic's Lakers to the run-and-gun Nuggets of the 1980s.

I'd like to see a couple fewer time-outs, but it doesn't really matter to me. As for the travelling, there are plenty of travelling calls. Most times I watch a game with a non-basketball fan, they scream about travelling but they're just wrong. Two steps can look like travelling to the uninitiated, but it's not. There are just as many missed travelling calls in high school and university than there are in the NBA. The players are pros and are much better, so there won't be as many travelling violations.

grw
Obviously I disagree - especially re the travelling infraction. I realize you think you're an expert on the subject (given the posts above) - but I assure you you're not the only one who knows something about the game. Notice how often American "dream" teams are called for travelling and palming the ball when they play in international tournaments. NBA officials are as complicit in the business model and promotional ethos of the game as the owners and the commissioner are, in my view.

If they actually played a full 60 minutes - the minimum for any real athletic contest for adults - especially a game where the omnipresence of the time out makes one wonder if the players have any more stake in the on-court activity than NFL players do in a sport where nearly every play comes in from the sidelines. Played according to the current rules a full hour would mean that games would seem interminable.

If you don't think the Suns (and before that the Mavericks) style of play has improved the league and encouraged other teams to play with more finesse I don't think you've been watching the game for very long either.

Civic pride has nothing to do with it. Another thing that is offensive is the abysmal quality of the commentary - Marv Albert and his clones – who all sound exactly alike.

Withal they are almost as off-putting as that character who calls the Raptors games and screams 'Raptors win, Raptors win, Raptors win' half a dozen times or more whenever that rare eventuality occurs.

Anyway, you have fun. I'll gladly forget basketball from here on in and watch the World Cup with real pleasure, less time invested per game and many fewer offensive adverts.

I have only seen this brought up on one show on ESPN. Who are these "lots" of commentators?

Figure skaters due their thing for like 5 minutes a set. Hockey players play in shifts, so they actually only play 5-20 minutes each. Boxing matches can last 30 seconds. Obviously you don't get b-ball.

And btw soccer has more corporate adverts...even on jerseys. Me? I'm all for it. I love the game and I understand that business makes the world go round. You can't have your cake and eat it 2.

Figure skating is an individual, at most pairs, not a team sport. Boxing is an individual sport - don't you get it?
They can advertise all the want on their shirts - adverts in B/Ball and hockey stop the action - the same five players aren't on the court for 48 minutes - football (soccer) allows minimal substitution - most players are on the pitch a full 90 minutes. Who said anthing about cake.

What the heck is wrong with the Tyee these days? Are things really so good in BC that this site cannot snivel and whine and tell me the skyis falling? Get with your leftie programme! I have absolutely nothing to laugh about when this kind of fluff is published. Can't you people think up a conspiracy or two? Sheesh, dull!

the lefties are confused wm. times really are good and gordo the evil one hasn't thrown everyone in concentration camps. only the idiotic bctf is stuck in the mud.

The fact that you put soccer in brackets shows you're pretencious and annoying.

Working Man and Elliot, its funny, everyone I talk to mentions how good our economy is doing and how much work is out there. Talk to any painter, plumber, electrician, etc. Business is booming.

Cutter
The fact you are pretentious and annoying shows you are Tax Cutter 99. Among the people you talk to I'm not surprised. Keep fiddling!

You can't even manage a civil discussion about sports.

"You can't even manage a civil discussion about sports," says Alcibiades without a hint of irony! Good one.

Alcibiades wrote:

Who's an expert? I just happen to love the game and watch lots of it and have opinions on it. That doesn't mean others aren't, obviously.

Do you have stats to back this up and compare them to other teams? Yeah, I didn't think so. And what about the fact that NBA players come from all over the world now? So the Argentinians and Serbs and Russians and Germans don't palm and travel when they go back to their national teams? That all the college players who graduate to the NBA suddenly palm and travel after not doing so previously? In the last Suns/Mavs game, there was a palming call, not to mention several travelling calls. I see just as many missed travelling and palming calls when I go to a UBC game or high school game. They get some, they miss some. It's the nature of the game.

You won't find me disagreeing with you here! There's lots to hate about NBA reffing.

Well, I simply don't understand this. Nor do I understand your explanation to Tax Cutter 99. Baseball is a team game. They don't play one hour. There's not even a clock. Volleyball is a team game. No clock, no one-hour limit. Ditto cricket. Or maybe those aren't "real" sports? So you define "real" sports as any team sport that plays for one hour? Why? I'm honestly confused.

{QUOTE}If you don't think the Suns (and before that the Mavericks) style of play has improved the league and encouraged other teams to play with more finesse I don't think you've been watching the game for very long either.

I haven't, compared to lots of people I know. I've only been watching since 1979, but that's enough to have some perspective. The Suns (and even the current Mavs) have improved the league because I like that style of ball. I know people who prefer a defensive style of ball. Every team has to play a style that suits their personnel. And there are enough teams and styles to suit different preferences. Always have been. Of course, when the old Nuggets, who played an uptempo style, were losing, it doesn't help. Only winning teams get the publicitiy. Detroit plays an ugly, defensive style and the Suns play a beautiful uptempo style. One style isn't winning out and changing the whole league.

continued...

I like Marv. I even like his clone Kevin Harlan. And I really like some of the colour commentators, and dislike others. Especially good are the halftime guys, Ernie, Kenny and Charles.

I couldn't agree with you more! He is awful. But I never miss a Raptors game.

Adverts? Okay, you're British, in which case you weren't being pretentious when you said "football (soccer)". Anyway, I will have fun watching basketball this year and next year and the year after that. But you have fun watching your World Cup this year and... well, in 2010?

Trying to talk sports with a leftie is just beyond me. I've never seen anyone at a Canucks game at a Che Gueverra T-Shirt. ut anyhow, I don't think discussing sports in the leftist context is discussing "sports" at all. Instead it's discussing erroneous things like ho "insulting" the advertising is.

There's a reason why guys like Terry Bradshaw, Howie Meeker and Don Cherry are successful sportscasters.
The only leftist sportscaster I can think of is James Carville who hosts a show on XM (and I can't even get it on my Canadian XM reciever).

Politically, more athletes have run on the right, than the left. The right has Steve Largent, Jim Bunning, George HW Bush (played 1st base for Yale), former CFLer JC Watts, Gerald Ford who played college ball, Otto Jelinek, Lynn Swann, Jack Kemp, Matt and Tim Hasselbeck, the Governator, Curt Schilling, Derek Jeter, Joe Torre and Don Mattingly, Al Leiter, Tom Glavine, Mike Piazza, Carlos Beltran, Nolan Ryan, Craig Biggio, Jack Nicklaus, Karl Malone, Roger Staubach, Ernie Banks, Jason Sehorn, Frank Thomas, Charles Barkley (who wants to run in Alabama), hell even Daniel Igali. And by the way, Jackie Robinson even worked for Nelson Rockefeller as a special assistant in 1964 and was a Republican.

This isn't chest thumping on my part. But since this is about sports and politics, and someone mentioned Nash's leftist stance as being significant, I thought i'd throw it out there, why are so many athletes on the right?

grw
I rest my case, with respect to having a civil discussion - which, I'd say you and I have had. The cutter gentleman, if you'll take a moment to check back and look at what he actually wrote above us here, is quite another matter. No irony intended there either.

Baseball, like cricket, is a special case and would make a good cure for insomnia anytime.

The best way to watch baseball is on a warm afternoon with a slight breeze and a cold beer in hand.

Marv Albert, is I suppose, an acquired taste. I can never see (or hear) the man and that other fellow (whose name escapes me) who sounds to me as if he is imitating Albert's style, diction and timbre without remembering David Letterman asking him, live,'Why'd you bite her, Marv?'

As to the travelling, I have no statistics - just the observation that, during the last Olympic games, the Americans were called for the infraction very much more frequently than their opponents were.

As for basketball in general, I still hold very strongly to the belief that it would gain much from a reduction in the delays that I, speaking solely for myself, find extremely annoying.

Thanks too for the kind acknowledgment that making a distinction between the game known as football (except in N. America) and soccer was not the observation of a pedant.

Personally, I hope the Mavericks do win, despite my distaste for Mark Cuban. :-D

Tax Cutter 99, now you're just talking crap. Again, I'd ask for statistics, not just a list of athletes on the right. Because you could just as easily give a list of athletes on the left. It's pointless. (By the way, Barkley is no longer a Republican.)

Yeah, I see what you mean, Alcibiades.

As for Cuban, as much as I can't stand seeing him cheerleading (or pouting) on the sidelines, I think he's great for the game. More owners should care like he cares. He also maintains a blog and will write you back if you write him with a legitimate comment or question.

grw
He, Cuban, is certainly colourful. I think I noticed somewhere that he had written, on his blog, that he sees the stock market as nothing more than 'a Ponzi Scheme or chain letter (not) ... an efficient market.' Pretty much sums up my view too.

Maybe he'll have more to say about that when the championship is over.

Such drivel. As the masses argue and fight over inconsequential stuff, the rich continue to rape and pillage the planet.