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Back in 1995 I used to work for the University of Chicago and had to do some outreach work in the Robert Taylor Homes Public Housing Developments .... One day while going from door to door / building to building checking kids Shot records , I decided to take a short break and stumbled into two shortys playing a serious game of 1 on 1 basketball in the blazing hot sun . They both viciously put each other in a mix by displaying nasty handles and I loved every bit of it ! After the game I introduced myself to those shortys .... The one the was bright Red name was Lil Reel and the other kid was the future Dunbar HS All City / All State basketball player Jason Straight ..... I told them I
STRAIGHT FROM THE NBPA
# Scripture by : Lefty B . Boyd
“ JUST GROWING UP IN THE ROBERT TAYLOR HOMES . YOU AUTOMATICALLY GET THAT NEGTIVE TAG ...
was starting up a summer league and I wanted them to be my back court .... And from that day , a young J-Straight took off by becoming a student of the game while learning and implementing the correct way to use that thang . We got Jason Here today to drop some hoop science on what are some of the things that made him happy and successful with in this thing of ours we call Basketball .
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LOOKING BACK , WHAT ARE SOME OF THE KEY ELE- MENTS THAT GOT YOU WERE YOU ARE TODAY ? Just the toughness of my environment growing up in the Robert Taylor Homes . You automatically get that negative tag on your back that you ain ’ t gonna be nothing in life . And the key thing for me was overcoming that negative tag and doing the right things to come out of that situation . As a kid I never knew how big the Chicago game was . It ’ s was like Chambers / levels you had to go through . First you had to go through the streets and park districts before you get to the high school level . Then it ’ s the different sides of Town . You have to go out West and play . Then over East . Then out south and Up north .... Going through all of this is what helped me . The toughness of going through all those chambers in one city . This prepared me well for future levels to come on and off the court . WHAT LESSONS DID YOU LEARN FROM GROWING UP IN THE ROBERT TAYLOR HOMES ? The projects taught me how to prioritize and knew what I wanted to get out of the ball . I just ed it as a vehicle to other opportunities like traveling ..... Lefty you was the first to take me out the hood to play basketball . I seen that this game was huge and I didn ’ t want to go back to back to live my life forever in a situation like I was in . So I made priorities and stuck with them . AS A KID WHAT METHODS DID YOU USE TO WORK ON YOUR GAME ? I used to train at Foster Park with their Small Fry group . But what stuck with me during those times was the
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