Breaking Out
The fall of ‘83, my first year of U16, was going to be my breakout year. Henry and George (my superstar teammates) prepare to be impressed, I told myself.
I played with them previously when I was in the sixth grade playing with seventh and eighth graders. I wasn’t as big, quick or fast as the other kids. In fact, I was the worst kid on the team. I didn’t have much skill and wasn’t a great decision maker. You might say, I was the kid standing in the corner at the junior high dance.
But I was in eighth grade now and I finished with puberty’s delightful journey. I was the first one in my grade to grow armpit hair. I sprouted lovely tufts of facial hair that looked a bit like junipers in the desert. I was even ahead of the Greek and Italian kids. I needed some Turkish classmates for competition. By age 11, I was sweating profusely. No one wanted to cover me in basketball, especially when I was on the “skins” side. I was the first kid to proudly display acne.
One memorable day, a friend of mine, Grant, asked me to pluck out a particularly long and unruly facial hair and give it to him. Always a generous and giving kid, I did as he asked. A few minutes later, Grant and another kid performed a one-act play for our class about a doctor, played by Grant, who was treating a young boy’s robust nose pimple. The pimple they had constructed was huge, the size of a turnip. Taped onto the “turnip”pimple was my unruly facial hair. Doctor Grant addressed the boy, “Son this is serious. Your pimple has a large hair on it. What they call a Harrington hair.” Grant ran his fingers across the hair while making the face of someone smelling formaldehyde. The play ended with the dramatic popping of the zit, and Grant skating, slipping and falling into puddles of pus (in this case yogurt) covering the floor. The class went wild. Needless to say, the play was a success, huge success.
That was sixth grade, when I had the hair and zits but not the muscles or endurance. But by eighth grade things were looking up. I could grow a full beard, keep opponents away with my offensive body odor, father a child and move pretty damn quick on the field.
In fact, I was no longer standing in the corner at the junior high dance. I was actually starting some of the time. I wasn’t a Henry or George, by any means, but I could play, I could defend. I could chase, tackle, kick, bite, claw – in other words, do what’s necessary to win the ball. In reality, I wasn’t a dirty player, but I could be quite annoying on the field, which fit my off-the-field personality perfectly.
Given my newfound success and increasing confidence on the field, I determined it was time I try out for ODP (Olympic Development Program). The process started with tryouts for a local, or regional, team. If you made the team, you played other regional teams from around the state. From these groups of players, evaluators selected 18 players for the State ODP team.
Our regional coach was Hans. Hans, as you might guess, was German, but not your typical German. That is, he wasn’t frightening. At our first tryout, held indoors, he opened with a speech to about 50 kids, including a number of kids from my Tosa Kicks team and our cross-town rival Tosa City. The Tosa City players, probably at the suggestion of their coach, wore their Tosa City uniforms. The Tosa Kicks players, emulating our slob of a coach (Jim Moynihan), wore whatever.
“Today is the first of three tryouts,” Hans began. “The next two, weather permitting, or maybe even weather not permitting, will be held outside. Now I see many of you are wearing your team uniforms. Very nice. Your shirts are tucked in, your socks are pulled up, your shin guards are inserted properly, very professional.”
Should I have worn my team uniform? I’m thinking. Mr. Moynihan didn’t tell us that. I’m going to get cut because I look sloppy and unprofessional.
“Now for the next tryout,” Hans continued, “I expect you to dress like an individual – because I am not interested in clones. I want players who can express themselves. I want players who break the mold, who have a mind of their own. I want self-expression.”
Music to my ears. He was a rebel and wanted rebels. I was a rebel. Mr. Moynihan was a rebel. There would be no goosestepping in this German’s platoon.
We began with a series of athleticism tests focusing on change of direction. I surprised everyone, including myself, coming in fourth in the figure eight sprint. A Tosa City player and, of course, Henry and George, placed ahead of me. Nevertheless, I was feeling pretty good. I always felt like I was one of the quickest kids in my grade level, but never on my soccer team where I was always one of the youngest.
Puberty was paying off. Don’t get me wrong, I still had random hair growth and glowing zits forming seconds after I slammed down a Mountain Dew, but I also had abnormally large quadriceps and calves for my age. Unfortunately, my arms looked like Turkey Basters and my mid-section just-risen dough ready for the oven. But in soccer, quickness kills. Whatever I lacked in skill and soccer knowledge, I was making up for with quickness and tenacity.
For the third tryout, most of our team traveled in one van. At the end of the tryout, Hans announced the team. We all knew George and Henry were shoe-ins. At U14, Henry was the fastest kid around and a prolific goal scorer. George was the second fastest; when they raced each other over 30 yards, Henry would win by at least five yards. At U14, I was around 10 yards slower than Henry in a 30-yard race. By U16, the gap had narrowed, but not by much.
Henry reached puberty without a blemish — nary a pimple or weirdly protruding hair. It was as if he had stepped out of childhood directly onto a runway surrounded by supermodels sniffing his fragrant cologne. Girls loved him and he knew it. In other words, he was the guy I would never be, but wanted to be. And to top things off he was a nice guy, which was really annoying.
George, on the other hand, was becoming the best player on the team. Where Henry’s athleticism was beginning to stall, George was coming into his own. He was agile, flexible, quick, fast, and could dunk a volleyball. Henry sometimes said really nice things to me like, “Hi Harry.” George, on the other hand, never said a word. I remember eye rolls and nasty looks when I turned the ball over – which was often. He might offer some game time instruction, but other than that I didn’t exist.
Are you beginning to sense I didn’t like George? I didn’t, but that didn’t keep me from wanting him (and Henry) to acknowledge my contributions to the team. I believed that if I made this ODP team, they would have no choice but to recognize my talents.
Hans began his announcements. “Henry and George are on the team.” I swear that’s what he said, Henry and George, like they were one person. “Mike, Timmy…”--the names kept coming. OK, It’s fine, I told myself, So I didn’t make the team. I just have to keep working hard, challenging myself. But c’mon the fourth fastest guy in the figure eight race should be a shoe-in. But then again, the fourth fastest guy in the figure eight race has no vision, a left foot that kicks like a broom, turns the ball over too much, dribbles with his head down and on that serve he attempted his leg performed like a slinky toy. But please recall that the fourth fastest guy in the figure eight also tackled ferociously and never stopped running. Isn’t he a guy you want to play with? Well, not if he can’t get the ball to a teammate and runs around the field like someone just lit his shorts on fire. “Franz,” Hans announced. Oh sure, of course, he’s German, blah blah, blah. And then (drum roll please), like a missive passed down from St. Beckenbauer on the wings of Rudi Voller,[1] “Rob Harrington.”
Woo, hoo. I wanted to start running in circles swinging my shirt around my head. I wanted to bump and grind with a corner flag. I wanted to run up and down the line of players laughing in the face of everyone who might have doubted me. I wanted get on a cell phone (not yet invented) call my parents and yell, I made it. I made it. But I didn’t move a muscle, never cracked a smile. Just another day on the pitch for young soccer prodigy Rob Harrington.
My Tosa Kick’s teammates and I, including Henry and George, made our way to the van. I sat in the back while their royalty, Henry and George, sat directly in front of me in the bucket thrones. This was, obviously, a meaningful moment for my more prestigious teammates and me. We were partners, compatriots…who knows, maybe buddies. Won’t be long before they start calling me on weekends. We’d go out and raise some hell, complain about those scrubs on the bench. Yes, I had arrived.
As I sat there basking in self-congratulatory radiance, George leaned over to Henry and whispered, “This team must be a joke – Robbie made it.” Henry shot George a half-head-turn-eyebrow-raise-he’s sitting-right-behind-you look, and George quickly said, “Just kidding Rob.”
Maybe I should have said something extremely clever and biting like, “Up yours, George.” Maybe I should have punched him in his lie-spewing ignorant mouth. Maybe I should have said,” Oh, George, no need to explain, I understand sarcasm when I hear it; we’re teammates and friends and that’s how teammates and friends talk to each other.”
But I didn’t say anything, just sat there stewing in my own anger and humiliation. Nevertheless, though I didn’t realize it then, I know now that something clicked for me at that moment and from that day forward, I never cared what guys like George thought about me. Fact is, I was on the team.
[1] Franz Beckenbauer is the greatest German player ever. He Captained the German national team to a World Cup Title in 1974. Rudi Voller won the World Cup with Germany in 1990. He had a really cool mustache.
