COLUMN: ‘Trotters’ combine comedy and skill
High-flying plays above the rim, arguing with the referees, some light-hearted trash talking and the blaring of the Village People’s YMCA over the arena’s sound system. Sounds like a typical collegiate or professional basketball game, right?
Wrong.
When the Harlem Globetrotters take their show to various basketball arenas across the country, the word typical is thrown out the window. Instead of a normal basketball game, a Globetrotters’ game features comedy, entertainment and fan participation,to go along with a display of athleticism and skill on the court.
You don’t need to be a basketball fan to enjoy a show put on by the Globetrotters. Although they have been putting on similar events since the organizations’ inception in 1927, fans are always subject to a Forest Gump box of chocolates: “Ya never know what you’re gonna get.”
The same can be said when the “Trotters” came to Logan to play fellow exhibition team the New York Nationals Friday at the Spectrum. For those who have followed the Globetrotters over the years, the New York Nationals is the same organization that was once the Washington Generals.
While a Grobetrotters’ game doesn’t feature many aspects of basketball ardent fans are accustomed to, the game’s entertainment value makes up for this. The players go out of their way to ensure the audience gets involved (little do some people know how much of a part they will play).
Just ask Logan resident Becky Garner. When Trotter team jester Matthew “Showbiz” Jackson approached her while she was seated on the first row of the students’ section, Garner said she thought Jackson was going to shake her hand. That is until Jackson took her purse, prompting her to come out on the Spectrum floor.
Little did she know she would end up dancing with Jackson and fall victim to one of his cagey bets. In this particular wager, Jackson bet Garner he could guess where she got her shoes. If he was wrong he said he would give her some money, but if he was right, she would owe him a kiss. His answer: “You’ve got your shoes on your feet.” What a smooth operator.
Before the night was over, the Globetrotters would drag two more people – this time young children – from the audience to take an active part of the show. Another way the players would get the fans involved was by playfully yelling at the refs and then blaming it on the audience, and by pretending to sneeze while a New York player was at the free-throw line and blaming it on the audience.
Although laughter and various comedy acts were a big part of the evening, this didn’t detract from the players’ athletic ability. We’re still talking about players who were stars in college – some of which have experience playing professionally. The amount of preparation the Globetrotters put into their set plays and tricks with the basketball must be enormous.
From gravity-defying dunks by Michael “Wild Thing” Wilson to the ultra-quick and fancy dribbling ability of Curley “Boo” Johnson to the sleight-of-hand passing skills exhibited by all the Trotters, it was quite a site to behold.
Many of the Globetrotters’ ally-oop dunks seemed to be out of the same mode of the Larry Bird/Michael Jordan McDonald’s commercials from the early 90s. You know, the one’s where Bird and Jordan would have a shooting contest in which the loser would buy the winner a Big Mac.
In these commercials, Bird and Jordan would match each other shot-for-shot, drilling baskets that would sound something like this: “Over the bridge, off the Sears Tower, two inches from an unsuspecting cat on 17th Street, through the gymnasium window, nothing but net. With the Globetrotters it was more like this: “Around the back, between a New York player’s legs, off of someone’s head, off the backboard, nothing but dunk.
Perhaps the most enjoyable part of the event, aside from an overabundance of difficult well-choreographed tricks, was “Showbiz” Jackson’s understanding of basketball at Utah State. While mock arguing with a referee over how many free throws a Globetrotter player would be shooting, Jackson said to the ref, “What school did you go to? UC Irvine?”
He obviously must have known a little something about USU basketball to pull that out of his sleeves. I would have loved to have seen the reaction of Jerry Green, Adam Parada and the rest of the Anteater players when Jackson threw that one at the crowd.
One thing is for certain: Only Ebenezer Scrooge wouldn’t have been entertained by this bunch. Watching a Globetrotters performance will always be one to remember, even if you’re not a basketball fan.
Jason Turner is the
assistant sports edior
at the Statesman. Comments can be sent
to Tputzo@hotmail.com