For some reason I actually showed up at a required district-wide in-service

A soap-opera-long weekend for quarterbacks played out over the weekend in the NFL. Tony Romo was great, and Big Ben threw for over 500 yards, including winning the game on his last throw. Matt Moore of the Panthers threw for a Christmas special 299 in a win over the Vikings. Peyton is who we thought he was, Vince Young is better than we thought he was, Flacco remains unflappable, Donovan underappreciated, Brady is falling back to the pack, but who is JaMarcus Russell? Cape off, out of the doghouse and off the chain late in the fourth quarter, the biggest, most out of shape, double hoop-earring wearing, Mohawk-headed quarterback to ever lead a game-winning touchdown drive in a 20-19 win over the Broncos. The Broncos are in Philly Sunday, Dec. 27, where they have no chance, absolutely none, not on any given Sunday, not ever.

IMHOTEP CHARTER - Many years ago, for some reason, I actually showed up at a required district-wide in-service in Cape’s littler theater. Dr. Jawanza Kunjufu, a noted African-American author, activist and educator, was there to rattle some cages. He told the group that young black boys have trouble in school because they are mostly taught by white women who want them to act like little white girls.

And later he asked, “Who was the father of medicine?” and I volunteered Hippocrates, ready to go joke side with “moat learning,” but I was corrected as a young black man in the audience said, “Imhotep,” and of course he was right because Dr. Kunjufu said he was.

I joked that it sounded like a contagion requiring disinfecting of the locker room. Imhotep, I quickly learned, was an Egyptian pharaoh and physician, and therefore Africans invented medicine and built the pyramids and my only question was, ”Do they know that, because looking around, I don’t see any Egyptians in here although we can all walk like one.”

I had a flashback when I was checking out Philly.com and saw that Imhotep Charter defeated Frankford in a basketball game and was two-time AA defending state champion. Honestly, I never knew a jumping Egyptian in basketball or track and field, but I am going to start looking.

HANK GATHERS REC CENTER - Imhotep Charter is in East Germantown, and while reading a story on the team by Ted Silary of the Philadelphia Daily News, I saw where one of the players lived at 25th and Diamond, across from the Hank Gathers Recreation Center. Find the movie “The Final Shot,” the Hank Gathers story, for inspiration, and thankfully it has nothing to do with black children being raised by white people. Gathers is from Dobbins Tech along with his teammate Bo Kimble. Gathers died on the court March 4, 1990, from heart arrhythmia while playing for Loyola Marymount, coached by Paul Westhead. Twenty-fifth and Diamond was the best outdoor basketball in the world back in the day. Losers go home for two days. I played on the court in a winners-stay game against a team that included Chet Walker and Wilt Chamberlain. I dipsy-doodled and over the left shoulder banked lay-up in Wilt’s neighborhood, simply asking him “what?” and several trips later my weak junk was smacked so far it required two transfers just to change bus routes.

MASONRY CREDITS - I saw enough bricks thrown up last Friday night between junior and varsity boys during the Sussex Tech at Cape basketball games that players should have received a credit in masonry. Enough bricks to construct a one-room school house. With few exceptions, there are few good shooters in high school basketball. Players don’t square up, don’t follow up and many shoot shots from the palm of their hands – flat trajectory, side-spinning, Kmart rubber ball-looking ugly shots.

SNIPPETS - Warren Duke Perry has retired from his job as a guard with the recreation program inside Sussex Correctional Institution and is now coaching the JV boys team at Sussex Tech. “Duke” was a basketball and track starter at Cape, graduating in 1978. Cape will play at Sussex Central Tuesday, Dec. 22. The Golden Knights are 0-4 on the season; this matchup comes on the heels of Cape beating a winless 0-5 Sussex Tech team. Indian River is also 0-4, and you can throw in 0-4 Delmar, how about 0-7 Delmarva Christian? What up? Twenty games played by five schools totaling no wins?

I was inside the Redskins press box Nov. 1, 1999, and stood for a moment of silence in remembrance of Walter “Sweetness” Payton who died at 45 from liver bile duct cancer. The silence was prolonged and solemn and very powerful. Walter Payton was one of the good guys. A moment of silence occurred around the league before last Sunday’s games for Cincinnati Bengals’ Chris Henry, 26, who was riding shoeless and shirtless in the back of his girlfriend’s pickup truck beating on the cab before being pitched to the road or did he simply jump?

Everyone seemed sorry, but sincere reverence for the moment was a bit forced, which always happens when careless choices and wild behavior results in a person’s death. Most men I know admit to several stupid and wild behaviors in their past that they had no business surviving, but bad luck strikes swiftly if you push the good.