The Whittler

He forces all of his players to attend an hour-and-a-half study hall every afternoon, with tutors looming over them. He runs them ragged if they cut a class and refuses to speak to them, even if they're in the NBA, if they stop pursuing their degrees.

"Sure," says Paul Gibson, "a lot of people argue that he's racist, that he's selfish, that he's pushing for a rules change that'll help him recruit 6'10" black kids and win basketball games. But look at the kids he takes under Proposition 48. They're not the Jason Kidds. They're not highly sought players. He takes guys who aren't going to make a great difference in his program. It puts so much pressure on him to prove his point, to get them to graduate. He takes on all the problems of their backgrounds. He's totally involved. It beats him up. It wears him down. By the end of each season, his eyes are drooping and the bags under them are getting deeper and deeper, until you wonder how much more John can take."

I just want to stay in the bedroom sometimes. A place where there's no more horror. I can't hear too many more problems, because I'm a sponge. And the pain of people who suffer blisters me raw inside. I'm just not sure anymore. Seventeen-year-old blacks shooting babies.... Crimes with no motive, no meaning, no remorse. What am I gonna tell kids, what do they have to look forward to? They have no dreams today. Dreams are shattered.

You know, when you're young, it seems like so many things goin' on in the world. When you're old, seems like just two things happenin'. Birth and dyin'. My sister, my brother, my stepfather, my mother.... I buried than all in the '80s. Why am I the last one left? Is it because the worst is waiting for me? Or because I 'm privileged? Am I left here to be special? Or to be tortured? I don't understand.... I'm just gonna disappear someday. I know myself. I'm nothin' but an exclamation point, and one day I'm just gonna shout it out...Excuse me!...while I disappear.

He climbs out of bed. It's game day.