Sitting on the wooden bench at the court he used to play at in middle school, Campbell watches the teens run up and down the black hard top. Dressed in a grey sweat suit and Nike Air Force One’s, the 6-foot-tall Campbell has the build and appearance as if he could be asking, “who’s got next.” Instead, Campbell feels the need to do some teaching, and shouts out to the boys that they need to be concentrating on dribbling with both of their hands.
Matt Campbell, 21, has a beef. For Campbell, the issue at hand is not a personal vendetta, but more like a fundamental difference of opinion for something that he takes passionately. Basketball happens to be Campbell’s passion, although his problem with it, at the moment, has nothing to do with the likes of Kobe Bryant or Steve Nash.
“As I see it, most of the kids nowadays don’t want to have a complete game,” Campbell says. “They get taught the fundamentals, but that’s not as appealing to them as the one-on-one showboating, which can only take you so far.”
The sport of basketball can be looked at as being a relatively simple game. It makes no difference whether it’s inside a gymnasium or on the playground; the essence of the game is based on teamwork and fundamentals, and meant to instill positive values about discipline and overcoming obstacles.
In its present day form, basketball has many different faces, and one of the more controversial of those is the genre of street ball. By definition, the term street ball is not a literal reference to playing the game out in the streets, but rather a name attached to a style of basketball, which has its roots traced back to the playgrounds of New York City in the early 1970’s. This particular style of basketball is a fast-paced game based on fancy dribbling skills, hyper-alert passing and spectacular high-flying dunks. The elements of athletic artistry on the basketball court can be seen as a form of expression for street ball players, similar to that of an unrehearsed freestyle performance by a hip-hop emcee.
To the basketball purist, street ball is merely an updated version of the Harlem Globetrotters. Instead of the staged comedic basketball theatrics, which were made famous by Globetrotter legends Curly Neal and Meadowlark Lemon, it is now shown on ESPN and involves players with catchy nicknames like “Hot Sauce” and “Sick Wit It” performing their signature routines. Those who scoff at its authenticity may complain that the true spirit of the game is lost in the showmanship and individualism that drives the appeal of street ball. Instead of developing a play through a series of screens that rely on movement, street ball players are more intent on showcasing themselves by pulling off a four-step slam dunk or making their opponent look silly with a dribble off their head.
“There’s a certain level of respect for the game that’s missing in street ball,” says Pete Kadlec, a longtime San Mateo hoops player who follows both college and professional basketball. “The rules aren’t all that enforced in street ball, so it’s not a real game, but more like an exhibition of skills.”
Back in the early 1990’s, the genre of street ball was less clearly defined in its role to that of organized basketball. The popularity of the NBA, which was fueled by the success and marketability of Michael Jordan, garnered most of the attention from the basketball community while street ball remained relatively entrenched in an underground environment.
In the wacky world of reality television, ESPN and the sneaker company, And1, are business partners in their promotion of street ball through its successful hour-long weekly program, And1’s Mix Tape Tour. The show, which debuted on ESPN in 2001, is a direct extension of the And1 Mix Tapes Series, which became popular around the street ball and hip-hop communities in 1998 and 1999. These videotapes, which were mostly shot at New York City’s Holcombe Rucker Park, the “Mecca” for street ball, feature raw footage of some of the early players like Rafer “Skip To My Lou” Alston and Anthony “Half-Man Half-Amazing” Heyward.
“Those And1 Mix Tapes are what kind of got me into the whole street ball thing,” says Campbell, who played varsity basketball at Lincoln High School in San Francisco. “That was the first time I’d had ever seen players pull off a lot of the trick moves they do.”
Marketed by ESPN as a reality-based program, the “And1 Mix Tape Tour” shows its viewers the day-to-day lives of the street ball players, who travel from city to city showing off their unique brand of basketball. If a player from an opposing team is good enough, like what happened with “The Professor” in 2003, the And1 crew will give them an opportunity to prove they’re worthy of being an official team member.
Matt Wong, 22, became a fan of street ball around 1997, when he says there was a new influx of players into the NBA who brought with them a flashier, and more street ball-oriented approach.
Wong, who was 12 at the time, remembers him and his friends, on the playground, trying mostly in vein to master Allen Iverson’s crossover, and some of the other moves they saw at the time. Wong recalls the freedom and newness that the street ball game provided them, in comparison to that of organized basketball.
“The dribbling tricks and alley-oops that you see from the street ball players on television would get you taken out of the game by your coach,” Wong adds. “But street ball lets you have the ability to be as creative as you want to be.”
Brooklyn native Bill Jones, 43, is a cousin of And1 team member Troy Jackson, who is better known through his nickname, “Escalade.” Jones, who attended Boys and Girls High School when the legendary Dwayne “The Pearl” Washington was there, has been playing and watching New York City Street ball since the 1970’s, and says that it’s the sponsors who are making the real money, not the street ball players.
“These street ball players are supernatural in their talent, but they can’t get it all together to make it any farther, like to a good college or the NBA,” Jones says. “Most of these kids who play are taken from poor areas, and any little amount of money is a lot to them.”
Jones, who recalls seeing some of the early street ball pioneers at Rucker Park like “Pee Wee” Kirkland and Joe “The Destroyer” Hammonds, says that the typical New York City street ball player is more talented than most, but slips through the cracks because of wasted opportunities, and getting caught up in the hustle of the streets.
“They aren’t classified as ballplayers,” Jones adds. “They’re entertainers, because that’s what New Yorkers want to see.”
Campbell claims that the credibility of street ball has taken a big hit because of its foray into the cable side of entertainment. For an art form to remain pure, Campbell contends, it needs to distance itself from being a diluted, corporate-generated product, which is more digestible for the masses.
“Now whenever I watch the show, it’s just a bunch of drama between the players,” Campbell says laughing.
Which poses the true question: In the year 2007, is street ball a viable entity that should be taken seriously by those in the basketball community, or is what we see on television simply hoops-junkie entertainment; a self-promoting squad of good playground players surrounded by a lot of media hype?
Louis Soria, a San Bruno resident who says he stopped watching the And1 program but appreciates the athletic talent of street ball, believes the answer probably lies somewhere in the middle of those two schools of thought. One reason street ball is finally considered more legitimate, Soria says, is because one of its own made it to the NBA, and is playing better than ever.
The player Soria is referring to is Alston, who got his famous nickname at the age of 14 with his high-stepping dribbling skills at Rucker, and is now the starting point guard for the Houston Rockets.
“Rafer Alston is the exception, but you don’t see him doing any street ball moves in a real game,” Soria says.
Soria and a group of his friends get together every Wednesday night at a San Bruno church for a weekly pickup game, which on this evening is relatively street ball free. There are a few no-look passes and the occasional between the legs dribbling, but nothing that would warrant the label of street ball. With the game knotted at 18, Soria does a stutter-step move on his defender, drives halfway down the lane then finds his teammate, Eddie, on the wing, who hits the 15-footer to win the game. No excessive moves or high-flying dunks, just plain and simple basketball.
In what could be called a reversal of roles, the average pickup basketball game without any of the street ball moves, may now be looked at as more of an anomaly than ever.
Wong says that he thinks the street ball game does have some value to it because of the fact that it gets the younger generation into basketball, regardless of the style of play. He also says that what you see today from the street ball players is some amazing stuff that even NBA players aren’t able to do.
“I think comparing street ball to the NBA is like comparing the Arena Football League to the NFL,” says Wong. “In both street ball and the AFL, there’s a lot of speed and athleticism to go along with the high scoring.”
Basketball fan Tim Cohen, who first saw the And1 Mix Tapes around seven years ago, says that he thinks it's funny how serious the And1 players take themselves. With nothing really at stake, Cohen says, the dramatic element to the street ball game is practically non-existent.
“It’s sad, but I still watch re-runs of the program sometimes late at night,” Cohen says.
