The Sixth Man

by John Feinstein

Clearly, he had some kind of thing against football players. Alex was beginning to wonder if all high school coaches in all sports had to prove they were the boss by making it clear you had no power whatsoever.

  “Coach, I’m fine with it too,” he said, becoming aware that both Jonas and Coach Archer were waiting for him to say something.

  “Good,” Coach Archer said, standing up to indicate the meeting was over. “The JVs practice at 6:00 a.m. because both the boys’ and girls’ varsity teams have the court after school. Be here at 5:45 tomorrow and report to Coach Birdy. He’ll be expecting you.”

  Alex’s head was spinning. To get here at 5:45 he’d have to be up by 5:00 and out of the house on his bike—in the cold—by 5:20. He couldn’t ask his mom to get up that early to drive him. If Jonas was thinking the same thing, he didn’t show it.

  “We’ll be here, Coach,” Jonas said, suddenly becoming the spokesman for both of them. “Thanks for the opportunity.”

  They shook hands and turned to go, Jonas practically pushing Alex through the door. Once they were away from the gym and heading to their lockers, Alex exploded.

  “What is his problem?! The JVs—at 6:00 a.m.? Football heroes?! He’s worse than Coach Gordon, and I didn’t think that was possible!”

  “Easy there, big fella,” Jonas said, smiling—which made Alex even angrier. “We won’t be on the JVs very long. The guy wants to win, right? You’ve played pickup with Gormley and Holder, right?”

  “So?”

  “They’re the two best players on varsity. They better than us?”

  “Not Gormley. Holder’s good. But he’s not a guard.”

  “Exactly. Coach’s gonna need us, and he knows it. He’s just trying to be a tough guy. I’ll bet you our next trip to Stark’s that we both play Friday night.”

  “Deal,” Alex said. “But if you’re wrong, I’m ordering a second burger—and fries.”

  At lunch that day, Alex began to think he might lose his bet to Jonas.

  He and Jonas were sitting at their usual table with Christine. Christine had sent him a text Sunday night saying she’d had a good time on Saturday. Alex resisted the urge to ask if she’d sent the same text to all the guys she’d danced with. He simply replied Me too—and then wanted to kick himself the minute he’d hit send. Was that the best he could do?

  Alex and Jonas were filling Christine in on their meeting with Coach Archer when Matt Gordon, carrying a vanilla milk shake, walked over and sat down.

  “When did you start drinking milk shakes?” Alex asked.

  “I’m not an athlete anymore,” Matt said. “Might as well enjoy myself.”

  Matt had been suspended by the Pennsylvania High School Athletic Association from participating in any varsity sports for the rest of the school year.

  “You’ll be an athlete again; you know that,” Alex said. “Come on.”

  Gordon grinned. He was one of those guys who was impossible not to like. He was funny, self-deprecating, and a natural leader. Alex thought of the line he’d heard his dad use to describe Patriots quarterback Tom Brady: “Girls want to be with him; guys want to be like him.”

  And then he couldn’t help but think of Matt dancing with Christine….

  “For now, I’m happy to be a non-athlete,” Matt said. “If I never see a weight room again, it’ll be fine by me.”

  They were quiet for a moment. Matt changed the subject. “So, you guys ready to start hoops practice this afternoon?”

  “Ha,” Alex laughed. “Not exactly.”

  He filled Matt in on their meeting with Coach Archer. Matt was shaking his head and laughing by the time he was finished.

  “I give it a day for you to get with the varsity,” he said. “Two, because he’s new and still trying to prove he’s in charge.”

  “You sure?” Alex said. Jonas was grinning like a cat that had just swallowed a canary.

  “Have you seen who’s on our team?” Matt said. “Goldie, I’ve never played with either of you guys, but I know you’re better than what we’ve got. We won seven games last year. The good news is that nobody on the team graduated.”

  He paused. “That’s also the bad news.”

  They all laughed.

  “So you think we’ll play Friday night?” Alex asked.

  “Bet on it,” Matt said.

  Alex shrugged. “I already did,” he said, glancing at Jonas, who had apparently just swallowed a second canary.

  At first Alex thought he was dreaming that his alarm was going off. After all, he’d only been in bed for a few minutes, so he must have been dreaming.

  But the buzzing sound persisted, so he opened his eyes and looked at the clock next to the bed. It read 5:00 a.m. Then it came back to him. He had to get to JV basketball practice.

  He groaned, pulled himself up in bed, and wondered if he had time for a shower. Nope. He groaned again and got up. Twenty-five minutes later, having had a quick bowl of cereal and a hot chocolate, he was on his bike and on his way to school.

  It was still pitch-dark, and he was wearing a glow-in-the-dark orange jacket and a white helmet. Alex had checked on his computer before leaving and had learned that the current Philadelphia temperature was seventeen degrees but that it felt like six degrees with the windchill. Whichever, it was unbelievably cold.

  It was 5:42 when he chained his bike outside the back entrance to the gym. As he did, a car pulled up, and Jonas jumped out with a big smile on his face.

  “You got a ride from your mom?” Alex said. “Cushy.”

  “She insisted,” Jonas said, shrugging. “She has to be at work at seven, so she’s usually up by five-thirty anyway.”

  Alex’s mom was working part-time as a substitute teacher but usually in the junior high, which didn’t start until quarter after eight.

  They walked in the back door and headed for the basketball offices. They found a young African American man, maybe twenty-five or thirty, waiting for them.

  “Right on time,” he said, smiling. “I told Coach Archer that any player who shows up on time for a 5:45 meeting is someone we want on our team. I don’t think I’ve met either of you, but I know who you are. I’m Alan Birdy. I work in the counseling office, but I’m also helping out Coach Archer this season since I’ve got some basketball experience.”

  “Where’d you play?” Jonas asked.

  Coach Birdy grimaced. “I played high school ball across town at Chester, but please don’t hold that against me. Then I played a little at Drexel.”

  Alex wondered if Coach Birdy had “led” Drexel the way Coach Archer had led Virginia Tech.

  “I like Bruiser Flint,” Alex said, thinking of the always-wound-up Drexel coach. “But I think he might be a little bit crazy.”

  Coach Birdy smiled. “Oh no, he’s not a little bit crazy. He’s a lot crazy. But I loved playing for him.”

  They all laughed. Alex liked Coach Birdy right away—almost as much as he had disliked Coach Archer.

  “Follow me,” Coach Birdy said. “Let’s get you some practice gear.”

  The door opened and several kids Alex recognized from pickup games came in.

  “You got twelve minutes, guys,” Coach Birdy yelled at them. “Most of the others are already in the locker room. You better hustle.”

  Alex and Jonas followed Coach Birdy, who had now picked up his own pace, in the direction of the locker room.

  As it turned out, there wasn’t that much to be briefed on.

  “We had three days of tryouts,” Coach Birdy said. “We worked on defense, the two-three zone. Offense is just as basic: pick-and-roll stuff. Big guys come out to set screens, and little guys shoot off the screens or look to pass inside. You two know how to do that?”

  They nodded as he was handing them red shorts and red practice shirts that said CHESTER HEIGHTS on the front and WINNING IS AN ATTITUDE on the back, right above the number.

  “What does ‘winning is an attitude’ mean?” Jonas asked.

  “That was John Chaney’
s slogan when he coached at Temple, and I always liked it. Big Temple fan.”

  “But you went to Drexel,” Alex said.

  Coach Birdy shrugged. “They offered me a scholarship,” he said. “Temple didn’t.”

  Alex and Jonas changed and walked onto the court just before six, where they found twelve other players warming up. Alex recognized most of them—all freshmen and sophomores. He guessed there wasn’t much point sticking around if you were still on the JV team as a junior. Alex grabbed a ball and managed about a half-dozen warm-up shots before the whistle blew and they all moved to the center-court circle to meet Coach Birdy.

  “Okay, fellas, thanks for showing up so early,” he said. “To be honest, this is the only time we can get the gym, so if you want to play, you’ll have to get used to it.”

  Everyone nodded—sleepily, Alex thought.

  “We have two guys here who didn’t participate in tryouts. I’m sure most of you know Myers and Ellington.” He pointed first at Alex and then at Jonas. “They have a semi-legitimate excuse for missing tryouts—they were trying to win a state championship in football.”

  There were a few laughs at that. Coach Birdy continued: “Okay, so we’ll start with some stretching, then we’ll run, and then do some five on five. I’ll work the new guys in along the way.”

  Twenty minutes later, Alex and Jonas stood and watched as Coach Birdy told five guys to turn their T-shirts inside out so they would be white, while five other guys continued to wear red.

  “You guys both put on white,” he said quietly as he lined the players up to begin a five-on-five drill.

  Coach Birdy matched the two biggest guys—Richie Corman, who was about six eight, and Trey Coleman, who was a couple inches shorter—against one another. Neither could catch a pass, much less score. Alex focused on the two guys playing point guard: Ricky Lorenz and Frank West. Lorenz seemed to have a decent jump shot. West handled the ball well and had some quickness, but he didn’t look to shoot the ball at all.

  Ten minutes in, Coach Birdy turned to Alex and Jonas. “Myers, go get Lorenz. Ellington, you get Thompson.”

  Alex wasn’t sure who Thompson was, but a reed-thin kid jogged off the court as Alex and Jonas came in.

  “Red ball,” Coach Birdy said.

  The red team had a new point guard whom Alex didn’t know. Coach Birdy handed him the ball, and he took a few dribbles toward the top of the key, glanced to his left—where Jonas was in the passing lane—and then glanced right, in Alex’s direction. Alex stayed back, giving him room. As soon as the point guard turned to pass to the wing, Alex jumped into the passing lane and intercepted the ball. Before the point guard had a chance to stop him, he was gone, down the court for an easy layup.

  As he banked the ball in, Alex remembered a quote he had once read from the great coach Bob Knight: “The best play in basketball is one on zero. If you have two on zero, someone might be tempted to pass and mess the whole thing up.”

  The whistle blew. Coach Birdy, hands on hips, was walking in the direction of the point guard.

  “T. J., you just learned lesson one of playing the point,” he said.

  Coach Birdy turned and looked at everyone else. “What is lesson one of playing the point?”

  There was a second of silence and then Jonas answered: “Don’t telegraph your pass.”

  “Exactly,” Coach Birdy said. “You have to look off the defender. It’s like a quarterback in football—right, Myers? You never just throw the ball to someone. You look one way, then throw the other. Got it?

  “Good play, Myers,” he added. “White ball.”

  He flipped the ball to Alex. A couple seconds later, after making a ball fake as if to pass to Jonas, Alex slipped between two noticeably slow defenders for another easy layup.

  Coach Birdy blew the whistle again for another lecture on basics: stop the basketball first and foremost. The defenders had let Alex’s fake take their focus away from stopping him en route to the basket.

  On the next play, Alex passed to Jonas, who swished a quick three-pointer.

  Lorenz came back in to play point for the red team soon after that, and its offense ran better. There were no more easy steals, and the reds’ defense picked up. Still, Alex felt as if he and Jonas were the two best players on the court.

  With the digital clock in the corner of the gym showing 6:53, Coach Birdy said, “Okay, guys, we’re going to play full court for five minutes, running clock. Winners shower, losers run. Start with the ten on the court; I’ll sub you other four in.”

  He flipped the ball to Alex. “White ball. You can inbound from midcourt.”

  Alex did as instructed. Richie Corman, who had been able to make a couple of baskets in the half-court drill off passes from Alex, took the inbounds and gave the ball back to Alex. They moved into their offense. Alex found Jonas in the corner. Jonas shot-faked, got around his man, and had an open lane to the basket. But as one of the outside defenders tried to drop down to stop him, he flipped the ball to Alex wide-open at the three-point line.

  Alex stepped right into his shooting motion, the same one he had practiced with his dad in the driveway in Boston hundreds of times. The ball swished, and Alex began to backpedal on defense. Seeing that T. J. wasn’t paying much attention as he inbounded, Alex stopped, sprinted forward, and easily stole the pass for a quick layup and a 5– 0 lead.

  “Wake up, Johnstone!” Coach Birdy barked. T. J. came out again, replaced by West. With West and Lorenz playing together for the reds, they were able to make the mini-game competitive.

  With the whites up 12–7, Alex dropped back on defense and saw the clock was under a minute. As Alex set up in his spot in the zone, he noticed someone standing at the far end of the court, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed.

  Coach Archer.

  “Nice of you to come,” he murmured, and got into position, looking for his next chance to make a play.

  The final score of the mini-game was 17–11. Alex had eight of the white team’s points, and Jonas had six. As Coach Birdy gathered everyone at the center jump circle, Alex noticed that Coach Archer was gone.

  “Good first day, guys,” he said. “You all worked hard. Whites, hit the showers. Reds, you’ve got some suicides to do with me before you go. See you all here at six tomorrow. Myers, Ellington, hang on one second before you go.”

  He told the reds to run two suicides. The seven kids lined up. Coach Birdy blew his whistle and they took off. No one was running that hard. If Coach Birdy minded, he didn’t show it.

  He turned to Alex and Jonas.

  “You two are clearly playing a level above these other guys,” he said. “Coach Archer was here for a while, so I’m sure he knows already, but I’m going to recommend you both be at varsity practice this afternoon. You think you can handle a second practice in one day?”

  “Yes sir!” they both said.

  “I’ll send you a text to make it official,” he said. “So sneak a look at your phones in between classes. Now hit the showers.”

  They did, both grinning from ear to ear.

  “That wasn’t so bad after all,” Jonas said as they quickly dressed to make first period on time.

  “Coach Birdy seems like a good guy,” Alex said as they hustled out the door.

  “Just think—if the other assistant is a good guy too, we’ll have a majority,” Jonas said. “Two good guys, one bad guy.”

  “Let’s give Coach Archer a chance,” Alex said. “Maybe we judged him too quickly.”

  He felt energized as he headed to class. It was, he knew, the adrenaline of success.

  Alex, Jonas, Christine, and Matt were halfway through lunch when Alex’s and Jonas’s phones began buzzing at the same moment.

  Alex was just starting to read his when he heard Jonas say, “You gotta be kidding.”

  The text was from Coach Birdy: Sorry, guys. I spoke too soon. Coach wants to keep things as they are for now. See you tomorrow morning.

  “What i
s it?” Christine asked.

  In response, they each showed her their phones.

  “I’m not playing JV,” Alex said. “For one thing, there’s no one, and I mean no one, on that team who can play.”

  “The two guards aren’t bad,” Jonas said.

  “And Jonas is pretty good too, right?” Christine said helpfully, causing Alex to give her a look.

  “Take it easy, Goldie,” Matt said. “I talked to Steve Holder in math class. He says he thinks Archer wants to give the older guys a shot to play. He thinks we should win pretty easily on Friday, since Wilmington North is pretty bad. It will give them some confidence.”

  “Wilmington North is worse than us?” Christine asked.

  “We’re not that bad,” Matt said. “But we’ll lose to Mercer next week without some help.”

  Alex had played against Mercer in the opening game of the football season. Sort of. He had come in to kneel down on the final two plays of the game, with the score 77–0, and been knocked cold by a Mercer player who was angry that Coach Gordon had run up the score. The kid had called the next day to apologize and mentioned that Mercer was considerably better in basketball than it was in football.

  “Well, if you don’t get switched, I’ll be doing a story on it for the Weekly Roar,” Christine said.

  “You might be accused of bias on that one, Christine,” Matt teased.

  Christine actually reddened a little, which Alex took as a good sign. “Why, because I went to one dance with Alex?” she said. “Anyway, do you think I’d have much trouble getting players on the varsity and the JV to tell me Alex and Jonas should be on the varsity if that’s the truth?”

  Alex was pretty sure Christine could get any boy in the school to tell her almost anything. Partly because she was beautiful. But also because she was a really good reporter. Her father was a newspaper editor and had been a reporter for a long time. Christine wanted to follow in his footsteps, and she seemed well on her way.

  “I’d hold your fire, Christine,” Matt said, finishing off what Alex assumed was his now-daily milk shake. “Coach Archer will probably make them get up at sunrise for the rest of the week and then put them on varsity next week when he really needs them.”