Ch. 2
Charles Barkley came back for one reason and one reason alone — a damned ring. Everyone held it against him, everyone talked about it and had for decades. “Oh, Chuck, you were a great player, but it’s too bad you didn’t get a ring.” If it wasn’t about the ring, it was about his weight, and he couldn’t do much about that after his playing days (other than starve for damned commercial endorsements).
He had tried to beat Michael Jordan in his prime, and failed. He had tried to join up with Hakeem and Clyde, and failed. If he was honest — and he was many things, but especially that — the last five or so years he had in the NBA were depressing as hell. Never enough. Never good enough.
He had fallen into a bit of a depression, drank, ate, generally screwed around in the final years of his career … he just didn’t have the will to fight it off anymore. Why bother playing when someone else was going to win the damned thing anyway?
It had taken him years away from his career to realize his mistakes. His pitfalls. His damned nonsense that cost him a title. If he was just smarter and a lot more dedicated, he could have won the whole thing at least once. If he had taken care of himself, he could have lasted long enough to win a ring … he looked at a guy like Karl Malone and though, yeah, Karl was a workout psycho, he also kept at it. Day in, day out. Same routine.
This time it would be different. This time, he was going to get that ring. This time, he wasn’t going to sit idly if management *ucked up. No, it was a different age and he had far more power as a player now than he ever did before. This time, he’d make sure that things went his way and he’d start first by taking care of his damned self, and then wrecking anyone who got his face.
But before he could torture the league, he had to go through torture himself.
The shrill of a loud whistle cut through the air and his trainer, a former Olympic volleyball player (and a damned fine looking lady too) strolled on over, hands on her hips, smirk on her face. “You good?”
Sweat pouring him off like he had decided to take a shower and hop out halfway through, Charles willed himself to stand up straight. “*uck, Lucy, you gonna give a fat kid a break?”
“You’re not a fat kid anymore.” She playfully poked at his stomach. “We got you under 250 for the draft and now we need to build your core. You get your core right, you’ll be right a long time.”
“The only core I wanna see is the core at the center of a caramel apple.”
She shook her head and pointed at the medicine ball beside him. “Let’s go again.”
For a brief moment, he considered telling her off and walking out. Back in his first rookie year, he had tried to eat himself out of Philly — they had picked him anyway in the draft. It wasn’t exactly a shining moment. Over his subsequent career, he had endured all sorts of insults — racial, physical, any kind — and had taken all kinds of *hit from players, coaches, fans, media, and executives alike.
They all thought of him as a fat slob and sure, he might have been that the last few years of his career. He was definitely that on TV but there he didn’t need to pull down 20 boards a night for his team to have a shot at winning.
He had a second chance now. He was sure as hell he didn’t deserve it, but he would make the most of it as long as he had it.
Taking a deep breath he picked up the medicine ball, felt every muscle in his body tense for an incoming dose of pain, and nodded his head. “Let’s get this *ucking done.”