A Decade of Dreams: The Jerry Sims Story

A Decade of Dreams: The= Jerry Sims Story

By Jerry Sims, as told to Will Davidson

= ;

CHAPTER 1:=

&= nbsp; As the WBA was beginning it’s 10^th season, the realization tha= t my basketball career was coming to a close, I began to look back at my life in= the WBA, and I came to the realization that I have spent the last decade living= my boyhood dream.

&= nbsp; I can still hardly believe that it all started out for me 10 years ago. I was working out for the “old league” when that tragedy hit and the league went under. I was in a very bad place in my mind after that. I had no idea what was going to happen or what I was going to do. Ever since I playe= d my first high school basketball game for the Murray Spartans, I knew that this= was what I wanted to do with my life. That reminds me, in my senior year, we had this pudgy little kid as our ball boy. I = swear, by the way he waddled around chasing after the loose balls, you never would have thought that little ‘beach ball” Brad, would end up playing Pro Ball all these years later!

&= nbsp; Anyways, as I said, I really didn’t know what I was going to do, when I heard = about this new league that was forming. Then after I h= eard about all the troubles that they had starting up the league, with teams fol= ding and a ton of players that had signed up for the first draft dropped out, I = just wasn’t sure that this was going to last. A friend of mine, Pete Bento= n, talked me into signing up for the tryouts before that first draft. I just figured that it beat bagging groceries until something better came up. Here= , I was, 25 years old, working at the Quick Sack on State Street, stocking shel= ves at night with no goal to better myself, so I went for it, if only half-hear= ted.

&= nbsp; I did really well in the workout camp before the draft, but I was kind of surprised when I wasn’t one of the first players picked. It wasn̵= 7;t until the 19^th overall pick that I was picked by the team from <= st1:place w:st=3D"on">Berlin, the Gala= xy. The team didn’t even send a representative to the draft! When Commissioner Reynoso called my name, I wa= lked to the podium to meet... nobody. This brought all my fears to fruition. If = Berlin didn̵= 7;t offer me that nice chunk of money to sign with them that season, I don̵= 7;t think you’d be reading this now.&nbs= p; They didn’t even send someone to meet with me in person; they = sent me the contract thru the mail! They didn’t even use registered mail, = AND they didn’t provide return postage! I had to fork over the $13.49 to = send the contract back to them (registered mail!)

&= nbsp; I showed up for training camp in lousy shape after wasting a big chunk of my signing bonus on partying and celebrating my future stardom. That stardom n= ever did quite reach my early expectations, by the way. Well, I soon enough found out that I wasn’t the only one out of shape. Most of the team was fee= ling the same way I did, especially since we barely even saw the coach. He came = and went as he pleased, and we were left to coach ourselves. Since I was the team’s first pick they all came to me to be their so-called leader, b= ut I didn’t even know any of these guys at all, and most of them were even older than I was! Bobby Shiel= ds was our shooting guard, taken in the 4^th round. He was all heart and= had tons of spirit. Too bad nobody else on the team did. He sort of became our = team leader and was a great guy, but as a team we weren’t much to cheer fo= r. Surprisingly, we played around .500 that season and Bobby was even voted to= the all-star team. Things were not exactly running smoothly but we were coping = with the fact that we were left to run the team ourselves, until we all got hit = with a huge shock; the team was being sold!

&= nbsp; We didn’t know what to think at first, but when we met the new owner and coach the day after the sale was announced, we realized that these guys wan= ted to win. When they bought the team, we were in the middle of a 6 game losing streak and heading into the final stretch of the season. The coach scheduled double-practices for the first few days, which were off days for us and mos= t of us had some serious partying planned. Those plans were quickly scrubbed. For the next three days, we had light work-outs and hours and hours of films to watch. These films were of every one of our losses throughout the season, a= nd films that I didn’t know even existed that were shot during the prese= ason workout camp. The coach compared how we were playing in those losses to the= way we played when we were actually playing for something. He got us focused and got us all on the same page. Suddenly, everyone wanted to play, again. Ever= yone wanted to win. Now, we didn’t exactly have the best players in the league, and most were only in it to play for a couple of years as they were already well past their prime. Management did manage to pick us up a nice p= oint guard prospect from the London= team, and we were heading into the post season with Henry Jordan running the offense.

&= nbsp; Most of you probably know about Henry. He was a bit of a showboat back then, more worried about hocking his brand name shoes, the Flair Jordan’s, than = he was about actually practicing with the team. He often missed practices and never did live up to his potential. He was able to hang around the league f= or about 7 seasons, but was only a starter with the Berlin teams in his first 3 seasons. <= o:p>

&= nbsp; We played New York in the first round of the playoffs that season. We went in as the last seed= and the underdog throughout the playoffs. The N.Y. coach had talked a lot of tr= ash at our expense during the end of the season, but coach had us prepared well for that series and we won it easily in 5 games. I know, I kn= ow.. 3 games to 2 games doesn’t sound like it was = easy, but the games we won were blowouts. In the second round, we took London to 7 games = before we fell. We were even in the last game up until the buzzer went off. It was pretty heart breaking, but considering where we started the season, it was pretty amazing.

Jer= ry’s Career Stats: http://www.pt-spo= rts.com/wba/careerstats/198.htm