"3000 years of beautiful tradition, from Moses to Sandy Koufax -- you're goddam right I'm livin in the past!"
Sorry... I'm not Jewish, but that line just seemed too perfect given my pseudonym.
I'm not sure what you're talking about, but, in the next pick up game you play, post up behind the three point line (NBA if you have it) in the left corner. Fake a turnaround, and then pivot to the left and release a left-handed (nb: you can't try this if you're left-handed) skyhookish sort of shot. If you don't shoot an airball, you're slightly more likely than you have been otherwise to win the game. Don't ask me why it works. It just does.
I'll try that. It should endear me to my teammates. But no way do I buy your feigned ignorance. Every Jewish boy shoots the unblockable running hook. I'm just asking: nature or nurture?
nature or nurture?
Doesn't being God's chosen people sorta render that question beside the point?
Interesting point. Don't you think the real chosen people would have been gifted with, say, the tomahawk dunk, instead of the running hook?
Will you buy my unfeigned ignorance? It might well be that, placed into a basketball-like environment, I would naturally express this behavior, whatever it is—but I bet it would be blockable.
Jews like myself, generally being of the type that can't jump, and don't want to get their big shnoz any bigger by getting a ball blocked back into their face, shoot this shot out of necessity.
Maybe they are saving the TomahawkDunk(K) for the arrival of the real Messiah.
My favorite Jewish basketball player is Bruce Lefkowitz, who played for Penn in the late 1980s. There's just something about the idea of a 7 foot Jewish center that puts a smile on my face. Plus all the opposing Ivy League fans would chant "BRU-CE, BRU-CE" (two syllables) at him. And then I found out later that one of my good friends is his cousin. Usual caveats: I'm not, a bunch of my friends are, etc.
(BTW, there's a website jewsinsports.org. Who knew?)
I believe the Tomahawk Dunk is (U) Pareve.
#9 is awesome.
We seem to have a few votes for nurture, but I'm still wondering about the secretive ceremony wherein little Jewish boys are taught this nose-saving maneuver.
I think it's nature. My dad's not a jew.
Plus, if we had a super-secret ceremony, everyone else would have copied it. For proof, see the bris.
OT, but ouch: http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/03/04/chimp.attack.ap/index.html
He lost two points of the Jewish Cross: testicles and nose. At least the chimps didnt take his wallet or pocket watch.
This is quite bizarre. I'm a hybrid (NY Jew father, Kentucky mother), and my jr high / high school basketball success in the South I've always attributed to my Kentucky-side uncles' prowess at the game. My one father basketball-playing memory (he had no interest in the game) was until this very moment buried. And it is of him on our carport basketball court, awkwardly dribbling across the key (think: eyes firmly on ball, ball bouning as high as his shoulder, dribbling hand perfectly flat and stiff) and attempting a -- running sky hook. Bank, swish.
I never nurtured that move, exactly, though I did have pretty effective running left-to-right move that was really only slightly different. Perhaps my modest success came via Queens, NY rather than Harlan County, KY.
Geez, that's almost poignant, phred. Glad to be of service.
Are you sure this isn't a dastardly Shi'a Islamobasketballist plot to get MOT to identify themselves for your SMERSH-like plans?
Why would I need to do that when the Jewish comments so obviously look Jewish?
Now that's funny. If you come up with a clever-yet-not-appalling way in which comments might look Jewish (along the lines of the "with distinction" bit), I'll send you a dollar.
Well, us jews were stingy with our words. And then phred messed it all up. if we said basketbawl, would that help?
This is eerie. I do shoot that shot. I do bank it more often than not. And no one taught me. Perhaps it's close to the cohen gene on the Y chromosome.
Sherm "Shlomo" Douglas also had that shot.
If this were a more innocent, long ago time, we could talk about what a sneaky shot that is. As a Muslim, I've only ever shot it ironically.
If Jewish identity is inherited matrilineally, then wouldn't your mother have to teach you the shot? No, trust me, that follows.