I see athletic people who don’t have a clue how to play the game

PINK - “I’m coming up, you better get this party started.”

Many know him as the basketball official “Mears,” but friends know him as “Pink” as in Pink Lloyd, a play on words for Pink Floyd, because landscaper Lloyd Mears don’t need no education but he does have a degree from Delaware. Lloyd is straight out of Georgetown, a school not known for producing track stars. He is on the all-time list of 400-meter runners at Delaware having run the open 400m in 48.8 back in 1973. And the mile relay team of Mears, John Flickenger, Pete Sukalo and Bob Stowe still holds the school record of 3:14.2 set in 1972.

LONG DIVISION - Cape is a Division II school in the sport of track and field and cross country. All other sports either compete in one division statewide like basketball, baseball, softball, lacrosse, soccer, field hockey, volleyball and swimming or Cape is Division I like in football and wrestling. Division I is determined by Henlopen North and South, except for track and cross country where the top 15 schools enrollment-wise are DI; all other schools are Division II.

What sports do you think have the best balance of good talent across the board in the state of Delaware and which sports are soft and therefore gaudy records are inflated and these teams aren’t as good as they think they are? I nominate hardball as the toughest place to make a living - just lots of good teams. Swimming and soccer are also first class in Delaware.

PLAYGROUND BASKETBALL - Young basketball players don’t learn the game on the playground anymore because there is little to no space dedicated to playground basketball and all that comes with it which usually means hardcore unemployable surly thugs. And so the game is learned in more organized and less improvised surroundings. So why do players from the American side come with so many more bad habits than foreign players?

I don’t really follow the NBA regular season, but in the playoffs there are sure lots of white players that learned the game in Europe or South America - just fundamentally tough guys right out of a James Bond movie. Mostly what I see at the high school level in my travels are athletic people who don’t have a clue how to play basketball as a team game.

PANELIST- Two things I’ve never been - one is a well-respected panelist and the other is a consultant. No one has ever turned to me for advice they were willing to pay for and I’ve never been a member of a panel, although I’ve been ask to find panelists like from the world of health and fitness.

I think monthly sports forums held at the high school would be fun. Panelists could discuss all kinds of issues related to youth and scholastic sports and beyond, and I could put this all together because I know more experts than any person I know that is not me.

SNIPPETS - Kai Maull, former Cape athlete, is on the all-time list of long jumpers at Clemson University having jumped 25-7 in 1999. Sonja Friend is on the all-time list at William and Mary having run the 800 meters in 2:09, 1000m in 2:53 and mile in 4:53. Sonja’s marks were accomplished during the 1992 and 1993 seasons.