Inner City Basketball: From the Blacktop to the Hardwood
Each summer the sounds of sneakers on the blacktop and basketballs hitting the pavement can be heard throughout New York City inner neighborhoods. Prior to the bright lights of Madison Square Garden or any other famous National Basketball Association (NBA) arena, NBA superstars such as Kevin Durant and Isaiah Thomas played under the lights of street poles on blacktop. In fact, most players that eventually make it to the NBA developed their skills at a young age on the likes of blacktop and outdoor pickup games.
“There are so many things that you see in the NBA today that people go crazy over, that actually originated on the blacktop when we were doing it as kids,” said Richard “Pee Wee” Kirkland, who was a legend at Rucker Park in the early 1970’s. Furthermore, there are a lot of NBA players who are excellent one-on-one players, and credit growing up in the inner city for those skills. You can definitely tell which players grew up playing gritty basketball in the inner city because of the way they attack on the court, as well as by their toughness. “Pickup” games are when anybody assembles a team together and starts playing basketball. Sometimes in the inner city resources such as basketball hoops, lines, etc. are scarce, so players have to improvise. Throughout the city it is not rare for one to see garbage cans or crates being used as basketball hoops.
It didn’t matter if teams wore the same colors, jeans, t-shirt, no shirt; all that mattered was that one was on a team, and they were set to play “next.” Many of the players who made it big will admit that they weren’t allowed to just jump right into an outdoor game and start playing. Sometimes they weren’t picked on a team, or they were only allowed to play half-court basketball. This was until they developed their skills and made a name for themselves in the neighborhood.
During the summer months it is quite common for aspiring basketball players in the inner city to wake up when the sun comes up and play pickup basketball all day. They would travel from court to court throughout their metropolitan cities and basically make a name for themselves by playing each court’s best players. Once in a while they would scrape up a few bucks and go to the gas station to buy a soda and a sandwich on their way to the next neighborhood, but most of the time they played with minimal food and water. For a lot of players, it was situations like this off the court that developed their toughness on the court. “People travel to the Rucker from all over the city and most either take the train or walk from court to court. The train station is directly in front of Rucker Park so it’s the first thing people see when they get off,” said Matt Armstrong who actually visited Rucker Park in Harlem, New York this last fall.
The 1940’s were the first time that tournaments were introduced to the outdoor basketball scene. Different divisions such as “college,” or “professional” were created to level the playing field in those tournaments and allow for players from all over to play competitively. Stars such as Julius “Dr. J” Erving, Wilt Chamberlain, Brandon Jennings, and Stephan Marbury have all tested their skills at the Rucker Park. Current NBA players who grew up playing at the Rucker and in NYC are Kemba Walker, and Lance Stephenson. A ton of talent plays on outdoor courts in inner cities and college scouts have actually started visiting some of the well-known outdoor courts across the nation in an attempt to recruit some of the young emerging players. Outdoor playground courts have gained an immense level of notoriety for producing high level basketball talent.
Each year inner city pickup basketball changes more and more. The game went from playing with laundry baskets and garbage cans nailed to street poles, to now having organized city tournaments that feature future college and NBA players at outdoors courts such as Rucker Park. Before future NBA stars get to experience the comforts of multi-million dollar arenas, most first experience the tough non-forgiving blacktop that we call playground basketball.
