Emil

Emil was a nice kid. Like a lot of confused teenagers, he was a little bit odd. I was in the in crowd cuz I'm really cool, and I'd say Emil was in there too. I guess that doesn't say much about Richmond Heights High School's class of 1988.

I kid. Emil was actually very likable. Except for one day.

Our basketball team would practice right after school, and we always finished with the figure-eight drill. If you didn't play organized basketball, you don't know what this is because it's incredibly useless and not something you'd ever see in a game.

Basically, the team forms three lines of four guys along the baseline. The guy in the middle starts with the ball, and he'll pass to the guy on the right wing and follow the pass. These two guys, and the guy on the left wing, are doing this while running up the court. The guy on the right who just received the pass then throws to the left and follows that pass, and so on down the court.

When the trio passes halfcourt, the next group starts. And you usually have two basketballs going at once, so when one group finishes, the ball gets thrown down to the next group in line waiting their turn.

I forgot to mention this; Emil thought he was John Elway.

So I'm on the left wing, flirting with Lissa Latina. The girls' team would come in and get their shoes on and stretch before their practice that immediately followed ours. I was looking off to the side when I heard someone yell my name. I looked up but it was too late.

Elway had thrown a perfect strike, a bullet, that must have had SONAR lock on my genitalia because from 90 feet away, he whizzed that basketball with all his might and it hit me square in the balls.

When I peeled myself off the ground 15 minutes later, amid the cackling of the Richmond Heights High School girls' basketball team running their pre-practice warmup laps around the outside of the court, I felt like my balls were in my stomach. It's an often-used expression, but it really did feel that way. I remember it like I remember how I got home last night. OK, bad example.

I can't remember what happened after that, but I probably scored 47 the next night on my way to all-American honors and a life full of fame, money and women.