Courtside Conversations

By Amere May

A guide for athletes & individuals who've struggled to Win after Loss. Whatever your own experience of grief is, it is important that you find ways to express it so that you don't become stuck. I can testify to being stuck after my dreams of going to the NBA were cut short.

• Language: English
• Publisher: True Vine Publishing Co
• Release date: Apr 28, 2022
• ISBN: 9781956469301

Book preview

All athletes know what it is like to take some heavy losses before they can enjoy their victories. They go through a rigorous process of sharpening their skills, strengthening their bodies, and acquiring the discipline of working hard and maintaining a healthy lifestyle. 

Most athletes would agree that training for competitions is not a walk in the park. In fact, it is safe to say that their training experiences are some of the hardest phases they need to brave before they can find themselves in a position to win. And while many desire to win, not everyone gets to do so, and the cycle of training harder repeats itself all over again. Losing a game, in the end, is harder than many cycles of training combined. 

Amere J. May, Sr. knows all too well how challenging it is to take all the losses before experiencing a win as a former basketball athlete. Like most athletes he, too, struggled with the reality of losing to better opponents and contenders. And in basketball, losing comes in various forms - from playing as a team to failing to get the desired draft  result. The same plight is also a reality among football and baseball athletes all across the world today. Amere, however, found a way to transform his losses into a story of victory that he hopes young athletes today can learn from.

I lived my story. I know what it means to suffer from a loss and still be a champion, he revealed. 

This book shares my unique experiences and my story of triumph over losses. The book is a Guide For Athletes & Individuals Who’ve Struggled to Win After Loss. 

After all the hard work, we wake up and our career is over. It may be over before one had planned - oftentimes due to circumstances beyond the athlete’s control. They suffer from a loss. No one enjoys being told that they're not good enough, but imagine the looks on some of the faces of athletes when they got word that they had been cut. Much like losing a job, when a great athlete gets turned away from a team, he can either use it as motivation to get better and play with a chip on his shoulder, as most do—or wilt away into obscurity, he added. 

It is my desire to give readers a clear picture of the realities of being in sports and desiring to be a professional athlete. I cited that in men’s basket-ball, for instance, there is only a 0.03% chance of landing a professional career. Statistically speaking, this means that among the 156,000 male high school senior basketball players, only 44 will get the opportunity to be drafted into the NBA after college. Among the 127,000 female high school senior basketball players, only 32, or 0.02%, will have the chance to be drafted. Football, on the other hand, has a slightly better percentage than basketball. With more than 317,000 high school senior players being drafted, 0.08%, or 250, get the chance to be drafted. 

"The sport with the most professional opportunities is baseball, with high school players having a 0.4% chance of playing professionally. Though still far less than 1%, the number of opportunities within baseball’s professional development system helps to increase this percentage. Baseball drafts about 600 NCAA athletes from the 6700 college seniors each year, a number that is far higher than any other professional sport and which represents a need to feed its large farm system.

Through A Guide For Athletes & Individuals Who’ve Struggled to Win After Loss, I hope to empower young athletes to acquire a mindset of positivity by understanding how the sports industry works. Helping them see their losses from a better perspective is something that I hope will transform their trials into stories of victory in the end.

TO MY WIFE, KENYA, WITH WHOM I HAVE SHARED the journey of life and ministry. Thank you for your encouragement, love and patience through another book project.

To my wonderful children and grandchildren, thanks for your love and support. Especially to my two sons - Amere Jr and Armani May.

I also would like to express my appreciation to Abundant Faith Worship Center in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Lastly, to my parents Walter and Christine Simpson, thank you for your love and support you’ve given me all these years, Choice Blessings.

www.AmereMay.org

www.AmereMay.org

www.AmereMay.org

www.AmereMay.org

www.AmereMay.org

As much as we expect loss, when it happens, it still catches us off guard. For example, we are born to one day die, and we are taught this at a very early age. However, the occurrence of death hurts in a way that cannot be articulated or explained by anyone.

Much of what you read in this book will be my personal account of coping with loss. I can’t say that I have always done a good job of handling losses, but I have learned a few things along the way that have certainly aided me through the process, and which I think will aid you as well. 

While it is true that people require air, food, water, clothing, and shelter in order to survive, we cannot forget to add victories and relationships - because it is a rare person who is able to thrive in the absence of wins and intimate relationships with other people.

Grief is a process filled with emotions that we experience when losses occur and important relationships are abruptly interrupted or have ended, either through death, divorce, relocation, theft, destruction, or something similar. A related term, ‘bereavement’, has different meanings for different people, but all meanings refer to the grieving process. While some view bereavement as a specific subtype of grief that occurs when a loved one (usually a spouse)