How the Ball Bounces: The History of the Rockport Celtics Vol. 1

By Eric DeWolfe

Imagine growing up in an ethnically diverse, poor neighborhood with little hope for the youth that lived there.

Eric DeWolfe doesnt have to imagine having grown up in South Rockport, Texas at a place known affectionately as Mexican Park. Most of these residents of Rockport were of meager means and some even on public assistance. DeWolfe and his friends had a hard time envisioning a better life.

But everything changed when the city built a small basketball court at the park in front of his house. It didnt take long for him to form his own team.

As a huge Boston Celtics fan, DeWolfe named the team in their honor. He could include or exclude whoever he wanted, but he rarely exercised his authority. Team members were all close friends from the South Side neighborhood in Rockport.

With only a hoop, ball, and dreams of transforming themselves into Magic, Bird, Jordan or Robinson, these kids would transform their mundane lives into lives worth living. Some would grow up and even get out of the neighborhood, but others would not.

If youre a huge basketball fan who wants to relive your younger days and celebrate a love for basketball that youve kept into adulthood, then youll be inspired by the highs and lows in How the Ball Bounces.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Dec 31, 2016
• ISBN: 9781532011023

Eric DeWolfe

Eric DeWolfe earned a bachelors degree in political science from Texas A&M University in Corpus Christi, Texas. He is a secondary social studies teacher in South Texas and a huge fan of the Boston Celtics, The Ocean Blue, and Michael McDonald. He and his wife, Gayle, have three boys and live in Corpus Christi. This is his first book.

Book preview

Contents

Preface

Foreword

Introduction

Ch. 1:   1988

Ch. 2:   Mexican Park

Ch. 3:   1989

Ch. 4:   1990

Ch. 5:   1991

Ch. 6:   Run Chris Run/Fighting

Ch. 7:   *1992

Ch. 8:   Prison and Death

Ch. 9:   *1993

Ch. 10:   Best Player-

Ch. 11:   *1994

Ch. 12:   Pizza Hut

Ch. 13:   1995

Ch. 14:   Favorite Teams/Players

Ch. 15:   1996

Ch. 16:   1997

Ch. 17:   1998

Ch. 18:   1999

Ch. 19:   2000

Ch. 20:   A World Beat

Ch. 21:   2001

"

This is my swan song…I’m gone, gone"

Bruce Hornsby- Swan Song

Preface

I have personally worked on this book as a hobby for around 20 years. Constantly adding to it, I believe I waited so long to actually publish it due in part to not wanting it to end and there always was more information each year that needed to be added. Now that it is complete I need to thank those who have been an important part of my life while this book formed and my life changed.

First I want to thank all my past and present teammates for the memories, sweat, smiles, hustle and loyalty they gave for the team. I have nothing but admiration for each of you, good or bad at any given time in life, you still gave your all. Secondly I want to thank those who raised money on the go fund me site I set up to try and get this book published. All the following gave of their own money, in some occasions they gave twice. Bethany Keola, Jennifer Reynolds- Hopkins, Harry Balls, Reno Vega, Phone cord strangler, Black Bart (Scott seawrite), Tabitha Palmer, Anonymous, Leah Ramirez (2), Dina Hill, Joe Solis, Sarah Breedlove, Hollie Johnson, Gretel Bardin, Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, Stacy Hartsell, Brooke Reed, David Iles, Khanh Nguyen, Eric Cormier, Alexis Gooch, Justin Hargrove, Sarah Acosta (2), Brandon Drake, Makayla Leedahl, Nancy Lechner, Thomas Ennix, Erika Santa, Kaley Rea, Stephanie Minica, Seth Caylor, Houston Albert, Josiah Anderson, Michele Nothvogel, Alvin Arispe, Phong Nguyen, Lindsey Waldhelm, Carin Shuford, Jamie Flores. This book would not have happened if not for the help each of these people in getting the funding for the publication. Words cannot express my gratitude.

Finally I want to thank my Beautiful wife Gayle who has been so positive with me over the many years, always pushing me to follow this dream. She has been my love for 22 years. That is 22 years of tournaments…. Many she attended out of love for me, not to watch streetball players over and over and over…… I want to thank my boys Jakob, Grant and Seth for coming to see dad at tournaments since they were babies. They have gone from sitting in amazement at their dad and his teammates playing to just making sure whatever hotel we were staying in had a pool, To actually playing in Tournaments. They keep me young and are always positive. Lastly I want to thank my parents Clifford (kippy) and Shirley DeWolfe. Though they are both in heaven now, they were the positive force behind any and everything I ever tried in this life. I always knew they would have my back, they never said negative comments or slowed me in anyway. When I explained long ago about writing this book, my dad mentioned who’s gonna read it? I hope many dad, but if not, then I still did it and you are in it. I love both of you and miss you.

Eric DeWolfe

February 2016

Foreword

(2016 version)

Introduction:

M y mentor, my coach, my right hand man, my reliable best friend, all describe ONE great guy, the writer of this book, Eric DeWolfe.

Eric and I go way back, over 25 years back. We have gone through some good and some bad times, but the most important thing is, we have stuck by each other’s side through it all. He has taught me a lot about basketball. I have always been my worst critic. There were times when we lost some basketball games that really got me down. Eric always told me, Keep your head up, you played a great game Thomas.

Eric has recorded almost all of our games since the 90’s. He used the tapes to show us our mistakes not only as individual players, but as a team. Having Eric as my mentor and coach has made me what I am today. I thrive for excellence in everything I do. As you read the book you will understand the reason why we are called, The Rockport Celtics, its more than just basketball to us…

Thomas doodie Ennix

Rockport Celtics since 1994

January 2016

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Introduction

T o all you basketball fanatics out there this book is for you. For the rest of you who might have bought this book just through curiosity, I’m sure you will be quite surprised with the goings on at tournaments and the Ins and outs of a streetball team over the course of over twenty-five years. You will be introduced to many different feelings, personalities and memories shared between teammates. You will experience life through my eyes and the stories I tell of my teammates over the years. I know if I would have ever found a book like this to read I would have snatched it up, but there are none out there that truly document a team so deeply over such a number of years. Now there is and I hope you enjoy the journey that brought me from a high school senior to college graduate to educator and husband and finally father. I changed from a skinny teenager to a man. Gained and lost loved ones. The teammates I had the pleasure to know and play with and their lives both good and bad. To say that the group was a strange bunch of guys is to say the least. The memories that I have acquired from all these people over all these years, places and people will be with me for all time. All in all I was blessed with some really good memories, while having to deal with loss and deceit, suffered from opposing players and my own teammates. Overall the ride has been a good one, All of these are wrapped up in a story of happiness, friendship, strife and the true love of basketball. The most important thing I hope to get across is that these stories are all true, no Bullshit is included! And away we go……….

CHAPTER 1

1988

Top movie: Rain Man $172 million

Top song: Faith by George Michael 4 weeks at #1

T he team was formed in my mind while riding in the back of my parents van on our journey home from a visit to Massachusetts during the summer of 1988. The whole idea came together after I had purchased a small notebook in Alabama. I started writing in it out of boredom of the road and because it just starting flowing out of me. I truly had no idea that I would still be writing about the team 28 years later and four handbooks would be full before I stopped writing down information about the team. The whole idea was to just jot down what happened in the way of basketball games out at the park in front of my house with my friends. Who knew that it would grow into such a detailed description of life.

I arrived home that summer and decided to form a team of basketball players that I knew and hung out with. Though none of the players even liked the Boston Celtics, (who I am a fanatic) except for Scott and that would be short lived, the one thing we all loved was basketball. I however wanted to be like Red Auerbach (the patriarch of the Celtics) and have my own team. I formed it and I had the power to include or exclude whoever, but rarely did. The members were all close friends of mine, mostly from my south side neighborhood in Rockport. There were some whom I was friends with through school and the first was a guy named James Hopkins. He was about my height but a bit stockier. He had an 80’s mullet of brown curly hair. He has a serious southern drawl when he talked. He truly sounded like someone you would imagine out of an oldie movie about the South in the civil war. James loved the Lakers and as a Celtic fan, it drove me crazy. At this stage it was still the Lakers in the West and the Celtics in the East. I ragged on him and he on me. He had more room though due to back to back championships in 87-88. The bulls of Jordan still had not won anything and the Kobe Lakers and Duncan Spurs of the future were not even yet on the horizon . Chops,(I to this day have no reminders as to why I game him this nickname) as we called James, was from North Carolina and was a descent player from the outside and had a great inside game and like I have said, one hell of an accent. His Parents were divorced and he was living with one of his sisters in a trailer in Rockport. I remember He did a lot of babysitting for his sister so whenever he got a chance to come over, I was there to pick him up and let him have somewhat of a normal teenage life.

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James (Circa 1989….mullet years)

One night we were out driving around in the summer of 1988 along Fulton beach road. All of a sudden lights were on behind us and we noticed it was a patrol car. We both were sober and just riding around to burn time in a small town. Chops was nervous, as was I. I pulled over to the side of the road, James asked what we had done. I told him I had no idea why we got pulled over. Of course being young, the anxiety of a traffic stop was rising by the second. It was not just a cop but a state trooper. He came up to my side of the car and put his flashlight right in my eyes. Let me see your drivers license son. I took out my license and insurance. He took a long look, handed them back and then said get out of the car. I did not piss myself, but was quite scared, and for no good reason. What you doing out here on the road at night? The trooper said. just cruising around, seeing who is out I said. Where are you going? said the trooper. Just driving around I said. I said where are you going boy, the trooper replied with a raised voice. uhh, I am just riding around I answered with some worry in my voice. Where are you going? He said again. I was lost at this point and then he put the mag light right up to my left eye, I was totally blinded by this. Where are your glasses? I froze for a second trying to figure out how he knew I had glasses. Then I remembered he still had my license. It showed I had corrective lenses. I just started wearing contact lenses sir. So where are you going? Again the same question. I looked into the back window of my 1979 Dodge aspen.

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I could see a bit out of my right eye and that Chops was looking back at me with a very scared look. did you hear me, WHERE ARE YOU GOING? Finally it hit me, Home? I asked very quietly. Good, good the trooper said, finally getting the answer he wanted. By this time we had been on the side of the road around 10 minutes. He had someone in the front seat. I was beginning to see a bit out of my left eye. Out of nowhere I looked at him and being unafraid asked why did you pull me over, oh, your license plate light is out, you need to have it fixed the trooper replied. At first I was a bit pissed, all this over something so small. I asked him if I would be getting a ticker, he let me know that I would not but that I needed to leave now. He gave me back my license and insurance card and let me go back to my car. As I entered it, I looked at Chops and he gave me a look like WTF? The trooper came up to my side as I started the car and said so where are you going? James started to say something and I just said HOME over Chops. As we pulled away onto the dark road on the bay, the trooper’s car followed us. We were on the other side of Rockport in the small town of Fulton. He followed us as we found out way back to Highway 35 and continued to follow us until we pulled into my parent’s driveway at 10:30 pm. They finally dove off after seeing us go inside. I don’t have many memories of Chops and I, but I do remember that night like it was yesterday.

Then I added Scott Seawright, he was like a little brother. Skinny as an Ethiopian, He practiced endlessly at the Mexican park. He was getting better than any of us would ever be day by day. We just did not see how much he improved until it was too late. He was a natural lefty and had the ability to get to the rim and score over us on a range of inside moves. He also had some of the best ball handling I have ever seen. He truly controlled the ball, but had a scorer’s mentality when he had the rock in his hands. But an attitude was coming to the surface too. He could be very selfish on and off the court. We all just told him to stick it or shut up. We had no idea how his path would change as his game grew. That is for later in the book. In a way it was like watching a close member of your family find excuses to screw up their life and there was nothing you could do about it.

Another addition was the shaker or Parrot, but mainly David Iles as his parents named him. Dave was a bit of a nervous guy, we met in drafting class in high school. We both had a love for basketball and that is the reason for many of the friendships in this book. David was an all right guy. He wanted to be a cowboy, was in 4-h and raised and killed rabbits. The weird part was that he listened to rap music, instead of country. Now at this period in time, rap was still growing as a source of music. You had the Beastie boys break out in 1987, RUN DMC was still hot, but it had not become the big seller as it eventually would become. So now when you see a white kid with a dually driving around and blasting Lil Wayne, or Eminem and dipping. David was the original.

He was an all right ball player. He could not really drive, or post or shoot from the outside, but he could play ok basketball and we were friends oh and he was a huge Rockets fan (Of course I ragged on him about the 1981 and 1986 finals against the Celtics).

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David circa 2015

Finally there was Brad Beck who was only with us through the end of the summer and then moved all of a sudden and I never spoke to him again. Although he