ryflan47
01-29-2007, 01:57 PM
My father knows Kareem Abdul Jabaar, and KAJ has signed some basketballs for my little sister who LOVES basketball. He's texted her congratulating her after basketball games, and he is a great person. He offered to speak at my little sister's school, regarding black history month, and to talk about his new book "On the Shoulders of Giants".
Today was a great day, to say the least. At about 10:30 am, I left school to go to my little sister's school (my old middle school), and the assembly started at about 11. Kareem went on to talk about growing up in Harlem, all of his influences, and his college and professional careers. The dude was 6'0" in 8th grade!! He's very well educated, and extremely articulate. He was kind of overwhelmed by the welcome that he received with all of the people staring at him and stuff, but he was a very generous person. At the end of his speech, which was about 25 minutes long, he gave the 5th through 8th grade students the opportunity to ask him questions. Most of the questions were funny like "What kind of car do you drive?", but the funniest by far was when some little kid asked him who would win in a 1-1 basketball game, him or Magic Johnson and his response was "Well, Magic's fat, so I would win."
After the Q+A session was over, and all the students went back to class, it was just my family, Kareem, his rep, and the VP of NBA sales or something like that. He took a picture with my family, which I will post once I get the opportunity, and he even signed my shoe! I'm going to frame that shoe and never wear it again. He's one tall dude though. 7'2" is not an exaggeration. Kareem was a great guy, and I believe that the speech will be aired on NBATV tonight between 10 PM and 2 AM. Lastly, I got to ask him after everyone left what it was like to play for Wooden, and his response was that Wooden was a great coach because he always valued education over basketball. Damn, that was sweet.
Today was a great day, to say the least. At about 10:30 am, I left school to go to my little sister's school (my old middle school), and the assembly started at about 11. Kareem went on to talk about growing up in Harlem, all of his influences, and his college and professional careers. The dude was 6'0" in 8th grade!! He's very well educated, and extremely articulate. He was kind of overwhelmed by the welcome that he received with all of the people staring at him and stuff, but he was a very generous person. At the end of his speech, which was about 25 minutes long, he gave the 5th through 8th grade students the opportunity to ask him questions. Most of the questions were funny like "What kind of car do you drive?", but the funniest by far was when some little kid asked him who would win in a 1-1 basketball game, him or Magic Johnson and his response was "Well, Magic's fat, so I would win."
After the Q+A session was over, and all the students went back to class, it was just my family, Kareem, his rep, and the VP of NBA sales or something like that. He took a picture with my family, which I will post once I get the opportunity, and he even signed my shoe! I'm going to frame that shoe and never wear it again. He's one tall dude though. 7'2" is not an exaggeration. Kareem was a great guy, and I believe that the speech will be aired on NBATV tonight between 10 PM and 2 AM. Lastly, I got to ask him after everyone left what it was like to play for Wooden, and his response was that Wooden was a great coach because he always valued education over basketball. Damn, that was sweet.