The summer of my discontent

Some of these "me only" summer practices took place in the gym in the basement of Old Main on the Mercyhurst College campus. Garvey had given me his home phone number some time before (I remember that number to this day) and when it became evident that we would be working together regularly over the summer, he gave me the number at which I could reach him at Mercyhurst. I called and a woman I assumed was his secretary, it could have been the switchboard, patched me through to his office. We would arrange for a date and a time for me to come up to the college and work out.

At first, when I would arrive, I came up the stairs to his office to let him know that I was there. Later, he told me to just come into the building and go straight downstairs to the gym where he would come down and meet me at the appointed time. The gym itself was reached by descending the staircase just inside the building's entrance. At the bottom of the steps, you could see what were the last few steps that led you down to the opening to the sunken gym floor that began under the basket at one end of the court. After playing my whole life at St. Johns, which had a wood floor, I was surprised that a college would have such a dungeon for its court, all-girl school or not. Being in the basement, it was dark, with no windows, and had a hard black or dark bluish-purple tile floor, from which the ball dribbled with a dead thud. Definitely not wood. It was cramped, had no built-in seating or room for any other seating to speak of, pillars along the side of the court, behind some of which there were small rooms recessed into the right-hand wall. Hidden behind cheap accordion-style sliding doors, these little rooms housed stacking chairs and the like and this was where I underwent my strength and flexibility "treatment" (see "Carpe diem", June 2, 2005), and paddlings. Needless to say, the acoustics in the gym were absolutely terrible. I had a difficult time trying to hear the instructions Garvey was yelling to me and at times this only added to his frustration.

The practice sessions were similar to those I have previously described. Lots and lots of drills. Driving to the basket from different angles and using alternate hands and releases. Shooting from the corners, the wings, and the head of the key. Foul shots. ("Put more arch on the ball! You're shooting a line drive.", he would tell me, pronouncing the "ch" in "arch" like that in "chocolate".) Dribbling and ball-handling drills where I raced the length of the gym, right-handed, left-handed, or alternating back and forth. Sometimes we used chairs and trashcans to make an obstacle course through which I would weave back and forth. And of course, the drill in which I chased a caromb, or Garvey rolled the ball to the perimeter, and I retrieved it, took one dribble and launched a jumpshot, sometimes going to my left, and sometimes to my right. These practices were similar to the ones that I've already talked about, including goals for the drills, time limits, and "raps" for failure.

I did OK on the various stationary and lay-up drills, but I had considerable trouble beating the set times when it came to ballhandling. The more I pushed, the more I did something stupid like dribble the ball off of my foot. Other times I simply could not get through the obstacles fast enough. On this particular day I quickly racked up three "raps". By the time we reached the drill where I chase-dibble-shoot, I was shot. Repeatedly my shot was off to the side or short. A sure sign of fatigue yet the drills went on until Garvey's disgust with me was such that he abruptly stopped me mid-drill, accused me of giving up, and told me to get off of the floor. He was disgusted with me. I was gutless. Weak. A baby. A waste of his time.

I had accumulated what seemed to me to be an extraordinary number of "raps" despite my effort. Although in reality it was only five or six, I couldn't bear the thought of it. I had worked my ass off and given everything I had until there was simply no more. When Garvey took me behind one of the accordion doors and into the little room for my paddling, and told me to drop my trunks, I balked. I cried. I whined. And I begged liked I hadn't done in a long time. This had been one of the most grueling workouts I had ever had and the idea that I would get beaten for my inability to reach some arbitrary goal, despite the fact that I had worked as hard as I possibly could, infuriated me. I resented it. And I resented him. I resented the power he had over me.

After the first couple of whacks, in anticipation of the crack of his hand on my ass, I straightened slightly to lessen the blow, and he grew furious with me. He had had enough. He told me that I had a choice to make. I could either finish taking my paddling, like a man, or I could end it right here. But if I did decide to end it, he was through with me. No more help, no more headache treatment, no more strength treatment, no more anything. He would cross me off his list and I would be on my own. No more special practices. No more help. No more special consideration. I would have to take my chances just like the rest of "those guys". I didn't know what to do. I saw daylight at the end of the tunnel but the tunnel led away from my dream and all that I had worked for. I certainly wasn't prepared to make such a big decision right there on the spot, despite my immediate feelings. So I reluctantly bent over and let him grab my balls and resume hitting me until he was done. Today there would be no strength or flexibility session but before I left the ultimatum was repeated, loud and clear. I either got with the program wholehearted, meaning regular "treatment" and regular one-on-one practice, or get used to being just another guy on the end of the bench.

Why did I put up with this abuse if it made me so angry and so resentful? Why? I don't know. I was torn. I didn't really understand what was going on. It would be some time yet before I started to put the pieces together. At this point, I was trying to succeed in a gung-ho basketball program and thought that if I went along with Garvey's regimen, unorthodox as it was beginning to seem, I could indeed not only succeed, but truly be something special. That's what Garvey said. He was Dr. William P. Garvey, afterall. As I've said before, the thought of sex, let alone abuse, had not really entered my pre-teen mind. It was not easy to compartmentalize which parts of this program were legit and which were manipulative, or abusive. I couldn't see the picture and therefore couldn't draw the line. I trusted his motives and his intent. If anything, I was questioning my own heart. I was beginning to think, no I now believed, that I was weak. I was too soft . I was a baby. I was thinking that I didn't have it in me to make the most of this tremendous opportunity. To do what I assumed those who had gone before me must have done to reach the point I only dreamed of. I didn't have what it took to be a "money ballplayer". A winner. I started to believe that I was, as Garvey chided me, a loser. It hurt and I didn't know what to do. What more could I do? I had to try harder. I had to.

My teammates, and the older ex-players, had picked up on some things, too. As secretive as I had tried to be about this special attention (fearing this very result), they started to tease me about being Garvey's pet. If they only knew, I thought. About more than special practices. About more than "raps". About "treatment". About "treatment" in Garvey's bed. Now I realize some of them did. There were those who had gone before, and those who would come after. At the time though, it was just me. To me, it was just me.

Coming soon: Ball-handling drills

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