Basketball Champions- NBA and a TALL TALE!

 As we enter the NBA championship season, I enjoy bragging about our Milwaukee Bucks. This has been "my city" since BEFORE we had an NBA team. Then, with combinations of great coaching (Larry Costello), player-leaders (Lew Alcindor/Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Oscar Robertson), and team effort, this newbie team won the whole shebang, the NBA championship in 1971. Despite some strong years in between, including memorable players and teams, it was exactly fifty years later, in 2021, that the Bucks (Fear the Deer!) won the whole dang thing again for the second time. Led by MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo, it was teamwork and spirit that turned them around after losing early games in the final round. 

What does all that have to do with picture books? Well, Milwaukee's history with basketball runs deep, players do best when they have big hearts that match their outsized talents, and winning matters, but it isn't everything. A picture book that can convey the value and story of such things will win hearts, too. And one way to hook readers is to find books that match their interests. I shared winning picture books that capture the action, spirit, and edge-of-the-seat- excitement of  basketball and championships HERE. Some of the most popular picture book biographies feature stars of the NBA, past and present. 

Charly Palmer has created stunningly powerful art, but this is his debut as a picture book author. He takes on a similarly inspiring and engaging picture book that takes a sidestep from these others in several ways. First, his focus is not NBA or even NCAA players, teams, and championships. Instead, his story was inspired by the amazingly talented and big-hearted street-ball stars who never made it to the NBA. He chose a slightly fictionalized account of a team, a rivalry, and a character-compilation to celebrate in a legendary way. 

Farrar Straus Giroux, 2022

Palmer delivers a winning account of GRAVITY, one of several remarkably talented teammates. It will win over readers of many ages and interests. His helpful author's note at the back includes the specific names of truly memorable players from city lots and local teams across the years. Among them are two dedications: One to Richard "Deep Water" Brown, and the other to Milwaukee's own Albert "Spoony" Hall, who, like most of the others, never made the "big time" teams but were so unforgettable that their stories of greatness deserve the term legendary. Players like these, past and present, inspired THE LEGEND OF GRAVITY: A TALL Basketball Tale. 

Using a storyteller's voice that feels right at home among the colorful, impressionistic urban center of Milwaukee, the narrator addresses young admirers of "King James" Le Bron  and other deeply talented, lauded, and compensated hoop stars. That opening concedes they are "not too shabby", followed by the familiar phrase, 

"But have you ever heard of ..." 

And so begins the TALL tale of GRAVITY. The narrator spins a colorful, lively description of a sunny June street ball game among talented friends with trait-revealing nicknames: Sky High, Left 2 Right, and Liquid (smooth with the ball and with his words). A single pass and play reveals that his knobby-kneed, lanky, and low-key approach disguises phenomenal ball skills. but he did not have a street name of his own. A terrific double spread reveals that the narrator was a team member, and she tags the new kid GRAVITY, because he goes up like he's never coming down, like he has redefined GRAVITY.

This already-good team is now unstoppable, heading toward a championship. Teams used housing project courts, rode city busses to other neighborhoods to compete, headed into summer's end with confidence. Best of the Best Milwaukee Basketball Tournament" was theirs to win, and time spent on strategy always relied on GRAVITY. In a single weekend they defeated team after team as his legend grew. When  the final game approached, the perennial winners, the FLYERS, devoted themselves to keeping GRAVITY down. That's when the power of leadership and spirit proved themselves to be legendary, too. 

I won't spoil your reading with an ending, or even reveal the pages leading up to that final buzzer. I will say that I'm convinced I'd love this and recommend it even if it wasn't set in Milwaukee, my longtime hometown. The swaths of colorful scenes, dynamic perspectives, impressionistic but effective expressions, and action postures, stances, and moves make this a power house picture book, one that will stay with you. It offers (without overdoing it) an authentic  look at the importance of individual skills and talents, of teamwork, of believing in yourself, and of excellence regardless of outcome. For each NBA player (even those often traded or benched) there are, literally, hundreds of thousands of kids playing B-Ball on city playgrounds, at the Y, in schools and clubs who will never know and who will never be drafted by an NBA team. Even so, among them are many who will be remembered, whose names will remain legendary. 

Meanwhile, GOOD LUCK, BUCKS!