Go Sherm -Reply

[Ryan Falcone <FalconeR@nvg.com>]

Roger,

Thanks for posting that article.  Sherman Douglas was one of my favorite
"post-Big Three, 1980s salad days" Celtics--it's nice to see some GOOD
news about NBA players for a change.

Ryan



>>> "Belanger,Roger" <rbelange@foxboro.com> 12/18/98 11:51am >>>
Thought you all might enjoy this.

Roger B.

Not all NBA stories are sad ones this year
DECEMBER 17, 1998 

by MICHAEL WILBON  The Washington Post

WASHINGTON -- When the teachers and staff members at Abram Simon
Elementary
School in Southeast Washington told their students that the man who
would
help provide Christmas -- NBA veteran Sherman Douglas -- was just like
them,
from a similar D.C. neighborhood just around the way, the kids didn't
believe it. 

"They don't believe a successful pro could come from this kind of
environment," Ed Epps, the former all-Met basketball player who directs
the
school's athletic programs, said. "You know how desperate these kids
are to
hear, 'I grew up just like you, I didn't have a silver spoon in my mouth
either.' 

"Those little kids who were too young to know that he played at Spingarn
High School in Northeast after attending Hines Junior High in Southeast
and
they have a hard time believing he grew up like them, this is a very big
deal to them for him to be here." 

In the tiny gymnasium inside Simon Thursday, Douglas did more than just
let
students see him. He helped some of the school's poorest youngsters
have the
kind of Christmas they otherwise could only dream of. 

When Mimi Kirstein, one of the members of the Washington Hebrew
Congregation
who volunteers at Simon, called Douglas to talk about some kind of
holiday
presentation, Douglas said, "Can I provide gifts? What kind of help do you
need?" 

And in one week's time, school program assistant Monique Rouse, Nikki
Mock
(another volunteer from Washington Hebrew Congregation), Kirstein,
Epps and
other school staffers and volunteers had planned a Christmas
celebration.
They invited boys basketball coach Mike Hibbs, who brought three of his
players from Potomac, Md., to conduct a mini-clinic. 

Douglas purchased 120 regulation basketballs, plus stocking stuffers as
gifts for the kids. You think a basketball wrapped in Christmas paper isn't
a big deal? It's almost unthinkably important in an environment where one
mother, in order to meet Kirstein after school, had to take three buses
from
her job at D.C. General Hospital while pushing a double-stroller. 

Douglas knows all this. He wasn't the poorest kid on the block, but he
didn't have that much to spare either. He knows, even if only from the
neighbors and friends, what a sparse Christmas feels like. An
11-year-old
fifth-grader named Derrick Peterson looked admiringly at Douglas and
said,
"This is the most exciting, best gift I could have for Christmas." 

The sports world has been a little short on heartwarming stories lately,
but
this is one. It's a story of how sports can be used to accomplish
something
beautiful that otherwise almost certainly wouldn't be done. Kirstein and
Mock go to Simon regularly to read to students and help however they
can. 

On Thanksgiving, with Rouse helping to identify the people most in need,
they provided the resources for approximately 60 families to have a
Thanksgiving Day dinner. For Christmas, they were looking to provide
similar
holiday assistance and were hoping a professional athlete would lend
support. They're lucky Douglas, their neighbor in Potomac, has not a
pretentious bone in his body, and more time than he'd like. 

Douglas, not surprisingly, downplayed what he was doing Thursday.
"I've got
so much time on my hands," he said, referring to the NBA lockout. "I'm
already sitting at home thinking, 'How can I be more productive?' One of
the
things about the lockout is that I can spend more time than usual this time
of year with my 4-year-old daughter. It's the first time I can see her in
her school (Christmas) play. It means I could be here, too. And that
means a
lot to me to be able to do this." 

Douglas isn't a first-tier star in the NBA, but he's a primary hero in the
streets of Washington because, as Epps said, "He's regular people, he
doesn't try to big-time anybody, he remembers where he came from, and
he's
accomplished a whole, whole lot." 

And he gives. He was beloved when he left Spingarn for Syracuse;
NBA stops
in Miami, Boston, Milwaukee and New Jersey these last nine years
haven't
diminished the admiration. Because Douglas hasn't diminished the time he
spends giving of himself around here. 

"I grew up in this environment," he told the gymnasium full of kids,
suddenly quiet. "I really wasn't that good a basketball player at first. I
practiced to get better. That's what I did when I was your age. It's just
like doing your homework. You want to be a good jump shooter, you
practice,
right? You want to be better in math or English or science, you study. . . .


"My high school coach told me after my first year at Syracuse when I
was
homesick, 'Sherman, there's nothing on the street corner for you.' I'm
proof
that whatever you want to do in life, you can do, no matter your
background
or financial difficulties, no matter who you are or what people think of
you." 

Neville Waters of the D.C. Sports Commission, who as Santa Claus
helped
distribute Douglas' gifts, said, "Your heart goes out to them because as
Mimi said, 'That, in many cases, may be the only gift that kid will see this
Christmas.' And I couldn't help but be affected by their faces beaming
and
smiling. Man, you can't replace that feeling in those kids." 

Douglas knows that, too, which is why he participated in the first place.
That's why his summer camp, in Northeast Washington, is free of
charge.
That's why his camp is part basketball, but part math and English tutoring,
plus drug awareness instruction. The bigger the stars become, the more
necessary it is for kids like these to know they can actually touch
someone
like Douglas. 

It hasn't been a good autumn for NBA players in general. But Sherman
Douglas
is one of the reasons we all have to be careful about generalizing.
There's
never been anything selfish or greedy or presumptuous about him. I've
known
him for 14 years and never seen him with an entourage, never seen him
be
anything but accommodating to a fault. 

Nobody asked him about the NBA lockout Thursday, and indeed it wasn't
the
time or place. Everybody at Simon Thursday knows that sports helps
children
realize hope for something as basic as a Merry Christmas. But Douglas,
the
staff at Simon elementary, the volunteers from Hebrew Congregation and
most
of all the appreciative kids gathered along the sidelines in the school gym
also understood that throwing a ball in a hoop was the least of
anybody's
concerns on a day filled with so much that was good