The NBA: Where FIXED Happens

Disclaimer: This writing is based on my perspective and how I see the NBA and professional sports, as well as the research that I did to support my claims. This is in no way meant to be a conspiracy theory or a "sour grapes" complaint, it's about opening people's minds and helping them become more aware of their surroundings. It's quite possible that the people who do think this is a conspiracy theory might not even understand the basics of what I'm trying to explain. I realize that my strong feelings about this subject will come across as ranting to the people who can't understand what I'm trying to say. With that being said, I have to keep in mind that breaking out of the mindset that you were born into is very difficult for some people, and that I'm presenting something completely opposite from what the mainstream media manufactures. Speaking about these kinds of topics openly is so difficult because people are conditioned to believe what they see on CNN, Fox News, or C-Span to be the truth. The truth is much scarier, and the deception that the globalists put on the masses becomes more and more apparent every day to the educated person that watches, questions, and researches. The truth is also hidden in plain sight for the people that care enough to find it, and eventually it will start to scream at you every day as your awareness increases.

I want to start out by saying that not everything in the sports world is as it seems. Take a minute to think about how much of your life you have spent watching sports on TV, going to games, talking about sports, listening to sports talk radio shows, checking websites on your cellphone or computer for updated scores, and then watching highlights on ESPN or other stations at the end of the day. (I admit that it's been a big part of my life ever since I became old enough to keep up with sports.) Now think about how much of your thoughts have been consumed with upcoming games, or about the nights you stayed up wondering how in the world your team blew that big lead. How many times have you found yourself reminiscing about that improbable comeback win, like you actually played in the game yourself? Now think about how much of your hard-earned money you spent on tickets, overpriced souvenirs, overpriced food and drinks, hats, jerseys, trading cards, autographs, and DirecTV packages in your lifetime. Now ask yourself these questions:

What if all of that time, emotion, and money was wasted on a lie? What if the action on the field is not what it appears to be? What if you, and millions of other people like you, have been cheated, fooled, or just outright lied to by those franchises you hold in such high regard, all for the sake of making an easy dollar?

I'm sorry to say, but it has happened, and continues to happen. The majority of us at one point have been easy prey to the people running the carnival known as professional sports. I have always felt all major sports, to a certain degree, are fixed. I think as fans we are naive to think differently. It's all a part of the ugly side of capitalism, and they are going to do what they feel is best for business. With the incredible amount of money involved in professional (and collegiate) sports, the people who run the show want as much control over their product as possible. The powers that be are clearly looking out for the best interests of their respective leagues as organizations, with little regard to the actual game, and they will continue to do what they feel is best for their businesses regardless of what fans and critics will assume. Bottom line: When a win seems too good to be true- it is. When an impossible turn of events changes the course of a game- in most cases it would be impossible. When an improbable underdog rises to the top as a Cinderella story like some kind of movie script- it is. The leagues, which are hand-in-hand with the television networks that pump billions of dollars into professional sports, fix their own games to squeeze every bit of drama they can out of every season, and to make sure the fans stay committed to their sport and glued to their TVs. In November 2010, the Harris Poll conducted a study to see how fans felt about "sports." Among the questions asked of participants was "Please rate the likelihood of the league office influencing the outcomes of games to benefit its business." Other questions also allowed the participants to rate if the possibility of games being fixed affected whether or not they watched the sport. Again, all major sports are fixed to a degree, but for the sake of this discussion and the fact that this league gets the most publicity in this topic, I'll stick with the NBA.

The NBA is controlled by one man, David Stern, a Jewish lawyer from New York City who is also a member of the Council On Foreign Relations. This one man throws out $25K to $50K fines like they are going out of style, and he makes big decisions that concern individuals' futures. He has marketed the league over the years with a bigger emphasis on big name players than teams. Another way of putting it, is that in David Stern's eyes the name on the back of the jersey is more important than the name on the front. He promotes those players because they are the ones that sell tickets, jerseys, and sneakers. He has even expanded the playoff setup for more games for more profits ever since he was involved. For those that don't know, the Council On Foreign Relations is said to be an American non-profit, nonpartisan membership organization, specializing in U.S. foreign policy and international affairs. The organization really is a front for a secret society, which means that the rank-and-file (majority of organization excluding leadership) are not told the real objectives of the organization, and their knowledge is restricted to the details required by their assignments. In other words, Davis Stern is a member of an "invitation only" group of exclusive globalist elites that are highly connected to the political and financial structure of the entire world. This organization runs the entire world behind the scenes, especially when it comes to handpicking and controlling every U.S. president. The only requirement for being invited into the CFR is to be a person of influence who is deeply committed to Globalism. I'm not saying that David Stern is a part of the banker/politician cartel that runs the country, but he definitely rubs elbows with these people, and it's crystal clear that he has successfully enacted a globalist agenda for the NBA since he became commissioner. How many people in China or Germany even cared about NBA basketball in 1984? 

If you pay close attention, you will notice that a disclaimer is played after every nationally televised game that says "This programming was meant for entertainment purposes only."- maybe not in those exact words, but that's message in the disclaimer. Because of the way the NBA is marketed, it's in the league's best interest for those big name players to have success. For that reason alone, that's why they do as much as they can to manipulate the outcome of games, especially the big ones, to enhance the marketability of their "entertainment". Fixing games is wrong on so many levels, and that's another story for another day, but what it's really about is having an agenda of what direction David Stern wants the teams in the league to go and how that can benefit the league as a whole. The NBA office assigns certain referees to certain games, and the type of refs assigned to a particular game tells you all you need to know about what kind of calls will be made in that game and for who. Some refs do have an agenda, but for the most part, they just do what they are told when they carry out the orders that come from the top. Part of me wants to believe that some of them are naturally honest people that work in a corrupt word that's not only controlled by the NBA, but also New York City and Las Vegas. The instructions to the referees are very subtle. They never get orders to directly fix a game, but the orders are very clear when you read between the lines. It's not the least bit surprising when you think about all the different levels of corruption in the world. 

Real World Rule #1: If there is a lot of money going around, you better believe there is something shady going down.

For years the NBA has been fixing it's games, and the reason is simple.....TO MAKE MORE MONEY. The NBA is a business. Its goal is to make as much money as possible. They don't care about fans who care about and want to see some good basketball, all they care about is the casual rich fan that pays a small fortune for courtside seats to watch LeBron James or Kobe Bryant dunk, and the average Joe that buys their jerseys. David Stern does not care about the quality of games or who has the best team, all he cares about making money, and NOTHING ELSE. He tries to run the NBA like a corporation by enforcing a dress code and trying to control endorsements and comments from players or coaches. I personally find it hard to trust a man to be in charge of a game that he never played on any significant level. During the Michael Jordan era the NBA became very profitable in selling their merchandise, maybe the most profitable time in league history. When you factor in all the elements of what it takes to make the NBA run, it gets very complicated. I will say that David Stern has done a good job at making the NBA profitable......but at what cost? It's estimated that between 57% and 88% of all Americans know that the NBA is rigged. Should we really be surprised? The NBA currently has an image problem, and they get eaten alive by the NFL and MLB in ratings and profits. There's a reason why Davis Stern "half-jokingly" said that his dream Finals matchup is Lakers vs. Lakers. Since that's not possible, the next best thing would be Lakers vs. Celtics, which happens to be the classic matchup that can draw more interest, ratings, and advertising revenue than any other.

Games have been and continue to be fixed, not just by the mafia and gamblers (who have been proven to fix games even today), but by the leagues themselves. Why? Because the leagues have the most to gain from doing this. The leagues' profits mostly come from TV revenue, which is based on ratings......no ratings, no money. With that being the case, the leagues choose not to leave those billions to chance or coincidence. What's worse is that sports fans are being led astray by these leagues. If you know the leagues are lying to you - and they have proven to be excellent, yet pathological liars - then why watch? What are you really getting back from the sports that you spend your hard earned money on? Even former referee Tim Donaghy came out and made public that the NBA intentionally alters the outcomes of its own games through its referees to get better TV ratings and make more money. For the record, I would like to say that I believe Tim Donaghy's story. He was already in federal custody when he told the story, and if the FBI caught him in a lie, he would have had more prison time added to his sentence. As a matter of fact, his story was so believable that he got his prison sentence reduced. Even though the NBA had been monitoring the actions of the referees on and off the court, they had no clue about what Donaghy was doing until the FBI got involved. Since then, the NBA admitted that all of its referees had broken their collective bargaining agreement by getting into several forms of gambling. The league then issued a statement saying that it wouldn't punished its officials for this, but instead the rewrite its rules to allow the referees to gamble.

***I want you to know that this is much deeper than just referees getting orders passed down from the league office. PLEASE understand that there are layers to all of this corrupt foolishness. With the next piece of information that I'm about to share, PLEASE keep an open mind when you read it because if not, YOU WILL NOT BE RECEPTIVE TO IT. This IS NOT for the feint of heart or naive!!***

I mentioned earlier that David Stern is a member of the Council On Foreign Relations, which is in the category of Powerful Sub Families, near the top of the Pyramid Of World Power. If you are not familiar with the Pyramid Of World Power, you can go to this page and check it out. The CFR is in the category just below the Illuminati/Crown Council Of 13, who happen to be at the top of the pyramid and control all of the world's resources, especially finances and entertainment. Yes, these ruling crime families have infiltrated professional sports and created a tyranny, but that's another story entirely. Even though sports fixes have more to do with the mob and gamblers, you better believe that there is somebody else controlling things on a larger scale. First I want to point out that this organization has a special way of looking at numbers that they use for their rituals. The number 13 is significant because it's the Illuminati's signature number, and there are 13 bloodlines that make up the organization. Another significant number for them is 33, because it's the highest degree in Masonry that you can hold.

If you are old enough, you should remember that the first secret code that we learned as kids is the alphabet with a number above each letter. It starts with the letter A with the number above it and ends with Z and the number 26. It can even be used in reverse, with A being 26 and being 1. It's one of the simplest codes you could ever learn. Kids have used this code to pass letters to their friends in class. If you take a piece of paper and write out the code, it should look like this:

1  2  3 4  5 6  7  8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26
A  B  C  D  E F G  H  I  J  K   L   M  N  O  P   Q  R   S  T  U  V   W  X   Y  Z

By using this code, I'm about to show you how to apply it to the major sports leagues, the networks that broadcast their games, and even government and other media establishments. Once you do the math, you'll see that the number 13 or 33, and even sometimes both are cleverly hidden in the initials. Here we go:

14  2  1

N   B  A

(14-2=12+1=13)

14  6  12

N   F    L

(1-4=-3+6=3 and 1+2=3 make 33)

  N         F              L

3  2  19

C  B  S

(3x2=6-19=negative 13)

1   2   3

A  B   C

(1+2=3 and 3 make 33)

20  14  20

T    N    T

(20-1=19-4=15-2=13+0=13)

5  19  16  14

E   S    P    N

(5+19=24-16=8+1=9+4=13)

Here is a trickier one:

6  15  24

F   O   X

F = 6th letter of the alphabet

O = 15th letter of the alphabet (1=5=6)

X = 24th letter of the alphabet (2=4=6)

In other words, FOX = 666

To further cover up this corruption, in September of 2010, the NBA announced that it was expanding its "respect for the game" guidelines to include unsportsmanlike actions that they feel take away from the product on the floor and how it looks on television. In other words, this new rule made any reaction to a bad call a technical foul and an automatic fine, and David Stern dared anybody to complain about the officiating to the press. Guidelines for issuing technical fouls now include gestures like throwing a fist in the air out of anger, arm waving ,and excessive questioning of the call, even in moderate tones. With the game being so emotional, how does the NBA expect the players to keep their cool all the time? I even heard that the players were never consulted about the rule changes. The NBA is basically trying to silence of the players and coaches by force, but what the league is really doing is violating their constitutional rights of freedom of speech and the right to protest. Giving this kind of authority to already suspect NBA referees gives the power and more opportunities to change the outcome of a game. The way they implement this recent rule change could serve to rob the game of its emotional edge. The refs can basically fix a game the way they see fit. If a ref has a grudge against a player, change the outcome of a game by ejecting that player (Joey Crawford/Tim Duncan or Hue Hollins/Scottie Pippen). It doesn't matter if the player has a valid argument. It also doesn't matter that a referee could be screwing with the game for their own benefit...at least, not to the NBA. As little sense as it makes, it's just one way that officials can fix a game or games. One other way is by deciding to not call a foul, or slew of fouls, that occur during a given game. In addition, they could choose to call phantom fouls - fouls that never even occurred. By doing any of these things, the referees can manipulate the score to be within a range of their selection. It is the oldest trick in the book and, to be quite honest I'm sick and tired of seeing it happen, and so are the players. It's one thing for all the hotheads of the league to argue the calls, but I'm seeing some of the most respected and knowledgeable players and coaches, past and present, chastising referees because they can't understand how certain calls can be made. It should also be pointed out that NBA referees have more influence than any referee in any sport.

If the NBA had any kind of integrity, they would have put the clamps on this a long time ago instead of using this rule change to add to the foolishness. Only in the NBA can a referee literally pick a fight with a player like Joey Crawford did with Tim Duncan in 2007 and still have a job. At the very least, he should have been banned from officiating Spurs games for the rest of his career once he came back from his suspension. Instead, it's the exact opposite. I know the Spurs have won championships with him officiating in games, but it's not a coincidence that he gets assigned to Spurs games when they are on the verge of closing out a series. If you don't believe me, think about this: we didn't see Joey at all in the 1st round against the Lakers, probably because the NBA felt that the Lakers didn't have a chance against the Spurs without Kobe. In Round 2 against the Warriors with there being a real chance at an upset, Joey was front and center in Game 6, which was the elimination game. We also didn't see Joey again until Game 3 of the Western Conference Finals against the Grizzlies. We all know that if a team goes down 3-0 in a series, it's over.....Joey was there to slow or stop the Spurs' momentum. And then, of course we all know about Game 6 of the NBA Finals, which happened to be an elimination game for the Miami Heat. There is a widespread belief that Joey Crawford is the most crooked ref in the NBA, and that besides the games he fixes, he has a hand in other fixed games because his connections with fellow corrupt referees run deep.

Here are the 2 of the biggest fundamental problems with NBA refereeing:

1.) Referees ref the players and not the plays.

In other words, referees have biases, good or bad, against certain players and coaches. This is not a big secret, nor is it particularly surprising. This has been going on forever and will continue. It's also why I can't stand players who whine to the refs because it only adds to the problem. When it's all said and done, referees are human and if they keep getting screamed at constantly by the same player in inappropriate ways, the ref will start screwing the player with bad calls, even if it's just done subconsciously.

2.) The NBA has a star system.

There is no doubt about the overall benefits that the NBA gets from having its big market teams and big stars competing in June every summer.  I believe the league gives its "money players" extra leeway on the court to make sure they reach the levels of success that it needs to be profitable. We have seen a star system basically since the NBA's inception, but the teams to benefit the most from it have been the Lakers, Celtics, and Michael Jordan's Bulls. I have never been a fan of this system, but I had no choice but to live with it (until now). What this star system means, is that when a small market team plays either the Lakers or the Celtics and it's in the NBA's best interest for them to win, it means the small market team has to have a better game plan, play harder, minimize mistakes, and keep your mouth shut with the refs. Don't get me wrong, the Spurs didn't lose the NBA Finals to the Heat because of bad officiating. Joey Crawford didn't have 8 turnovers in Game 6 or leave Ray Allen wide open for a 3-pointer to tie the game and send it to overtime. But you have to know that in a high stakes game like that one you have to be better than the refs, because if you give them the opportunity, THEY WILL STEAL THE GAME FROM YOU!!

Once again Tim Donaghy, a former NBA referee, has publically admitted that the NBA fixes its games to generate better television ratings and make more money for both itself and the networks that basically fund the sport. He also said that referees are instructed to avoid calling fouls on “star” players, ignore or strictly enforce rules as the situation calls for, and ultimately, alter the outcomes of certain key games should the need arise. However, NBA employees and sports media outlets have a financial interest in dismissing the idea of rigged games, so the issue is downplayed and uncomfortably avoided. The reason why this subject will continue to get pushed aside is because no sports reporter will follow up on it because their livelihood is directly tied to the end result. For one thing, if one league is crooked, there is a good chance that others are fixed as well. The networks won't touch the story either, because they also have billions of dollars tied to pro sports and can't afford to have the truth revealed. But it's so rampant and insultingly obvious that sometimes even some NBA insiders can't help but say something about it. Most importantly, the FBI won’t investigate further because no crime is being committed. The NBA, and every other pro sports league, can intentionally fix the outcomes of their games without committing a crime. It is not illegal. Fixing a game for gambling purposes is, yet doing the same for entertainment purposes is not.

It's amazing how "luck" can go the NBA’s way. With the ratings already on a steady decline, the Spurs-Cavaliers 2007 NBA Finals had some of the worst ratings in league history, but in the ensuing offseason, the NBA signed its most lucrative contract with the TV networks to date, bringing the league nearly $1 billion a season. What happened the very next season? The NBA was “blessed” with the dream match-up of the Boston Celtics against the Los Angeles Lakers in the 2008 NBA Finals. I don't believe it was just good luck on the NBA’s part. With the Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen being traded to the Celtics and Pau Gasol being traded to the Lakers (while Kobe Bryant, who publically demanded a trade right before the season started because he saw no hope for the Lakers that year, stayed with the team) both teams were able to significantly bolster their rosters. Of course, both teams easily made the playoffs, and then their "magic" really started to take shape. With the Lakers and Celtics going head-to-head, the 2008 NBA Finals brought in massive ratings. ESPN's numbers were up 35% and ABC's were up 28% from the year before according to Broadcasting & Cable magazine which cited Neilsen Media Research. Even the ratings from both Conference Finals series skyrocketed 40% over the year before. Then, when the Lakers and Celtics both won their series, the NBA had its dream matchup with its two most storied franchises going against each other. Not only did the league benefit from having both the East and West Coasts covered, they had the two teams with the biggest fan bases playing each other. Then if you throw in the hype of the rich history and storied rivalry between the teams, and you have a 2008 NBA Finals that saw a ratings boost of almost 45% from the previous year. That was the perfect way for the NBA to make good on that $1 billion a year TV revenue contract and bring its broadcasting partners the highest ratings in recent memory. I personally don't believe it was luck or coincidence.

It's time for David Stern (or Adam Silver) to actually fix the game itself. The NBA is a great product, but not a great game anymore, and it hasn't been for a long time. There are just too many obvious discrepancies for the game to stay mainstream with sports fans. At some point, accountability will have to be demanded from the public, or the NBA will be seen in the same light as the WWE. For those referees out there that might possibly read this that don't fix games, be proud of yourself for that, because you are few and far between. This type of corruption has gone on long enough and needed to be addressed YESTERDAY!! It's not fair to the players or fans, and it gives Vegas an unfair advantage in gambling on NBA games. Yes I'm aware that a lot of people do bet on games, but Vegas has no right to fix these games to their benefit. No other sport can be single-handedly controlled the way that basketball can and it's a shame that the NBA would rather carefully control the games with their officials than allow the real talent on the court to decide the outcome of the games. Obviously, games can only be fixed to certain degree, and I don’t think the players are in on it, but the refs can definitely dictate the pace of game. It's time to stop all the cover-ups and brushing off bad performances by officials, and start restoring consistency with rules interpretations. That might mean losing some officials, but for the integrity of the game it's worth it. Doing these things will go a long way toward bring integrity and accountability back to the game, but it's all up to the commissioner.

Exorcising Demons

Exorcising Demons 

11/16/10

Disclaimer: Some people will read this and might not like some of the things that they read, but that's okay with me, because I didn't write this for people to like it, I did it to get some things out of my system. The people that I tag in my writings are the people I feel would understand where I'm coming from the most, especially since they knew me when I was going through certain things in life. I have had a lot of people read what I write and think I'm trying to get back at somebody. That IS NOT true at all. I have strong feelings about certain things, and all I do is express them. I ask that anybody that reads this would disregard everything that does not apply to them. When it comes to exorcising demons, breaking yokes, and getting rid of strongholds in your life, YOU HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO BE STRONG. If not, those things will take you out.  

I felt that it was necessary to put myself out there because if I don't tell my story, somebody else will. If they tell it, they'll either add something to it, or take the truth away from it completely. Everybody has skeletons in their closet, and it's good to dust them off from time to time. This is not about being bitter or holding grudges, it's strictly about exorcising demons and getting my mind rid of all of the garbage and negativity that it's been cluttered with, and plaguing me for so many years and holding me back from a lot of blessings and opportunities that I should have had. A person can't function the way they need or should be able to with all of that going on.  

If I had to choose a single biggest positive from 2010, I would say it's me going through this whole purging/cleansing process. I won't even lie to you, this process does not feel good at all. The hardest and most painful part of this whole process is that you have to relive all of the trials and tribulations that cause you all of the pain and suffering, after you thought you had moved on from them. I want to warn you that old feelings will come back up that will have you upset and wanting to fight somebody, you might even feel depressed, and you probably might feel drained after a couple of days of doing it. Like I found out the hard way, putting issues in the back of your mind and moving on to something else is not the way to handle them. I had been doing that since I was 8 years old, and now I'm paying the price for it having to relive 23 years of pure hell just to be able to move on with my life and reach my full potential. One step in this cleansing process, probably the most critical, is forgiveness. Unforgiveness will tie you to a person in a negative way, and it's like drinking poison and hoping somebody else will die. The people that wrong me have moved on and are living their lives, and now it's time for me to do the same. After you finish reliving all of this stuff, you still have to forgive all of the people who wronged you if you want to be completely healed. The silver lining to this dark cloud is knowing that I'm reliving all of this stuff for the last time. 

Here is a small list of things that I'm cleansing from my system so I can move forward: 

-traumatic childhood

-not feeling safe at home as a child

-being played against my sister by family

-treated differently from my sister, driving a wedge between us

-scorned, verbally abused, having my self-esteem SHATTERED mainly by family and classmates

-often feeling unloved and unwanted

-being the most misunderstood and disliked in my class (I had classmates in grade school constantly tell me that nobody in the class liked me, sometimes with smiles on their faces.)

-constant rejection, in every form or fashion

-being homeless

-16 different jobs in 5 years

-heartbreak by 3 women in the same year

-constantly being told I wouldn't be able to do what I set out to do  

Again, this is just a fraction of all of the things that I went through, that molded and shaped me into who I was before I started this conviction of myself. I didn't realize just how broken I was and how fragile my psyche was until I started this process. I was conditioned to be that way starting at 8 years old, and as I got older I started to accept all of that garbage as normal, and I never learned how to speak up for myself. I also didn't have the option of acknowledging, "Something is wrong, I don't like the way this feels.", because I was trained not to recognized my feelings and only have a limited sense of constriction or emotional numbness. Growing up in the environment that I did can have lasting costs, and you can inherit habits and beliefs that complicate relationships, decision making, spirituality, and emotional development. After starting this process of cleansing, I realized that the very thing that needs to be changed is the thing that we got accustomed to and learned to tolerate. When you get tired and want a change, you have to desire it more than just about anything. You have to want it as bad as you want to breathe. 

I had to ask myself 2 very important questions: 

1.) "Do you want to get well?"

2.) "How bad do you want it?"  

I want it so bad, that I was willing to go all the way back to when I was 8 years old and relive every bad thing that happened to me, every bad thing that was said and done to me for the last time so I can finally be freed from so many years of bondage once for all. I realize that this is the price I have to pay for me to truly be happy and live the life I want to live and have the things I want to have. I also realize that you can't be powerful and pitiful at the same time. If you feel like you are wearing yourself out and not getting results, it's time to get a new plan. Emotional baggage blocks spiritual, physical, and financial prosperity. It affects how we live, earn, believe, and choose everything in life. Usually, the root of most of your problems is how you feel about yourself. When you learn to love yourself, you end up giving standards to everybody around you. Whatever you accumulate in life is a direct consequence of your mindset. Every aspect of your world is somehow a result of your creation. When you feel good about yourself all the time, you attract both the people and the events into your life that empower and position you for opportunities most people never dream possible. You can solve or avoid a lot of problems if you surround yourself with the right people. It's crucial that you surround yourself with people that are excited, and can get you excited, not drag you down.  

It also took me a long time to figure out that people either come into your life for a lifetime or a season. I had a hard time trying to tell the difference. Think of your life as a tree:

Some people are leaves on a tree, the wind blows and they go left or right. They are unstable and you can't count on them. All they ever do is take from that tree. Leaves have a season, and in that season a leaf will wither and die, then blow away. LET IT GO!! The branch people (be careful) come in all shapes and sizes, and you never know how strong they will be in your life. Tip out on that branch slowly, and when you go out on a limb, don't put too much weight on it at one time because it can fall and leave you high and dry. Sometimes you have to wait for the branch to grow up before it can hold all the things you want to share with it. Finally, there are people who are like the roots at the bottom of the tree. The roots don't care about being seen, they are there to hold the tree up, and to make sure it stays in the air. It comes from the earth to give the tree everything it needs. All you really need is 2 or 3 solid relationships with people who want to be in your life for the right reasons.

Up until the last couple of years, I often felt defeated and like I needed to be rescued. I also found myself sometimes trying to make up for not getting enough love and affection growing up, which is probably why I felt like I didn't get enough attention and nobody ever took me seriously. The root of these feelings came from all of the rejection that I got over the years from family, classmates, teammates, women, etc. For a brief time, I did have a couple of friends in elementary school that helped to lighten the mood and take some of the sting out of it. (Mel, Tameka, I'm talking about you. I definitely appreciate y'all doing what you did to help soften the blow. You have no idea.) I was always surrounded no matter where I was (EVEN AT HOME!!) by people who made me feel like I wasn't loved, accepted, not good enough, didn't belong, unwanted, unimportant, and not being valuable. It was the worst for me in elementary school, and some of the hell I caught in elementary school followed me to high school, mainly because I ended up going to school with a lot of those people. A combination of all of those things by all of those people SHATTERED my self-esteem and sense of self-worth over the years.  

On a final note, I want to point out that everything you do or say to somebody else is a seed that you set up to come back to you more than how you gave it out. Your mouth is the most powerful weapon on your body, and is 100 times more powerful than most people realize. You really have to be careful with what you say to somebody and how you say it, because you can definitely scar a person with your words. Once you say/do whatever you said/did, YOU CAN'T TAKE IT BACK. IT'S TOO LATE AND THE DAMAGE HAS ALREADY BEEN DONE. How you treat a person is how they will act, whether they are that way or not. You can tell what's in a person's heart by what comes out of their mouth, because it will control your life. If you see where you have wronged or offended somebody, PLEASE don't hesitate to make it right with them. While it's good to apologize, apologizing WILL NOT stop what you already put in motion. You have still sown a seed, and that seed is still going to come up. A lot of people think that just because they apologize they won't reap what they sowed because they don't reap it right away. Even if you don't see it right away, just know that it's coming. To the degree that it was sown, like corn, it's coming back more than how you dealt it out, and it will hurt VERY BADLY. You can't keep sowing negative things into the lives of people and not expect it to come back on you. 

Once again, I want to reiterate that all I was doing with this writing is expressing myself, and exorcising demons and releasing strongholds from my life that have held me in bondage for so many years. After writing this piece, I'm proud to say that I took a huge step in that direction, and that I'm coming to grips with all that I had to endure in my past.

How Football Ended For Me

How Football Ended For Me 

11/16/10

Disclaimer: Some people will read this and might not like some of the things that they read, but that's okay with me, because I didn't write this for people to like it, I did it to get some things out of my system. The people that I tag in my writings are the people I feel would understand where I'm coming from the most, especially since they knew me when I was going through certain things in life. I have had a lot of people read what I write and think I'm trying to get back at somebody. That IS NOT true at all. I have strong feelings about certain things, and all I do is express them. I ask that anybody that reads this would disregard everything that does not apply to them. When it comes to exorcising demons, breaking yokes, and getting rid of strongholds in your life, YOU HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO BE STRONG. If not, those things will take you out.  

Another painful, but critical step in this cleansing process is being honest with myself about how devastated I was when football ended for me and the effects that it had on me when I got pulled off the field. For a long time, I was too embarrassed to talk about it because of how it happened, and I didn't even talk about football to certain people just to avoid talking about it. I just carried the hurt, agony, and bitterness around for a long time while I suffered in silence. It was only 3 years ago when I started getting answers to questions and figuring this whole thing out. Now that I have it all figured out, I can deal with it accordingly, and finally move on with my life the way I should have a long time ago. I felt that it was necessary to put myself out there because if I don't tell my story, somebody else will. If they tell it, they'll either add something to it, or take the truth away from it completely. Everybody has skeletons in their closet, and it's good to dust them off from time to time. This is not about being bitter or holding grudges, it's strictly about exorcising demons and getting my mind rid of all of the garbage and negativity that it's been cluttered with, and plaguing me for so many years and holding me back from a lot of blessings and opportunities that I should have had. A person can't function the way they need or should be able to with all of that going on. I honestly didn't realize just how scarred I was by this whole thing until about this time last year. 

This is how it all went down: 

Because I was (am) misunderstood so much, when I was in school I was the butt of a lot of jokes, as well as the center of gossip. It was especially true in high school, and I was an easy target, mainly for my football teammates. First of all, I didn't have the advantage that most of them had of playing peewee football. I didn't start playing until 10th grade (I was held back from it until then), so I was already behind the 8-ball coming in. Another strike against me was my size, in the 10th grade, I was 6'2" and only weighed 145 pounds, and was weak as all hell. I could do 10 push-ups, if I was lucky, without straining and had a max of 65 pounds on the bench press. By the 12th grade, I was up to 6'4" and still only 160 pounds, with an 85 pound bench press. The only things I had in my favor were that I was fast and I could catch. Because of all these shortcomings, I caught all kinds of hell from my teammates AND coaches. I constantly was laughed at, put down, and scorned by them every chance they got. The same energy that they used to dog me, they could have used it to help me develop my shortcomings and deficiencies so I could make a contribution to the team. I didn't go through this in just the 10th grade, I went through it in the 11th and 12th grade as well. What really got me was how one of my fellow wide receivers refused to help me learn our playbook when I reached out to him a couple of times, and I reached out to one of my captains to vent to him and he blew me off. I told him I was thinking about quitting, and he told me it was my problem, not his, and that he didn't care.

During track season, I didn't catch hell like this, things went much smoother for me. The sad thing is that a good chunk of my track teammates were football players too, and had a couple of the same coaches for track that I had for football. Again, I got COMPLETELY DIFFERENT treatment during track season than I got playing football. I told a teammate about that one time, and he told me that it was because I was better at track than I was in football. It frustrated me so much because I felt like the reason he gave me for that was a cop-out. I'll even admit that because of the way things went back then, I didn't have the motivation to work harder and get better, and my grades suffered too. I went to summer school my first 3 years. I was just going through the motions in every aspect of my life, and all of this was on top of the hell I caught at home everyday, but that's another story in itself.

After high school, I thought I would never play football again, but right before I went to Alabama A&M I changed my mind. When I visited the school that summer, I talked to a couple of players that were already on the team. With me being so skinny back then, I asked one of them if they thought I was too little to play football. All of them told me no, and that size didn't matter. Then one of them told me that he expected to see me out there when it was time for walk-ons to come out. That's when I decided that I would give it a try because of the way it turned out in high school, and plus I didn't want look back one day and wonder "what if". I knew college football would be a lot tougher than high school, but I never thought I would end up back in the same situation I was dealing with in high school. This was supposed to be my second chance at football, and I really wanted to make the most of it. Man, was that a big letdown!! Like I said, I went through the same thing in college that I did in high school. Since basically every player on the team had a nickname, the one they picked for me was Ziggy, and I hated it like hell. (It doesn't bother me now like it did then, but I only let my Bulldog teammates call me that.) The coaches said that nickname was a perfect fit for me, and then they started calling me that. I can't remember exactly which teammate gave me the name. As soon as the team started calling me Ziggy, it was downhill from there because I was always a target all the way to the very end.  

After a while, I got so tired of being picked on by my teammates on and off the field, I started threatening to shoot them (literally) if they didn't leave me alone. I didn't know what else to do to get them to stop. I felt like I didn't need the garbage I was getting from them after what I had already came out of because I was already mentally fragile with a lot of wounds still being fresh. Sometimes I really did feel like there was a chance I could go postal on somebody. One day in the weight room in the middle of a lifting session, I had a teammate really let me have it that day, and I told him that you really need to watch what you say to people because they can take what you say to heart and commit suicide. Then this cat told me, "If what somebody says to you can make you commit suicide, then you need to go ahead and do it." I can't repeat what else he said, but I could not believe what I had just heard. I used to catch the most hell in the weight room than any other place, especially my freshman year with teammates yelling "Ziggy put some weight on that bar!!" across the weight room. It was mostly from the seniors, but that came with the territory. One day in practice my freshman year, I was sent across the middle on a slant and got my block knocked off by a linebacker, and was slow getting up. When I was on the ground, that same LB told me, "That's why I keep telling your ass to put some weight on that damn bar!!". After taking that hit, every practice for the rest of the season, I always knew where #59 in the maroon jersey was.  

Toward the end of my redshirt freshman year, one day after practice, my position coach pulled me to the side to have a talk with me. He started out by saying, "You ARE NOT a Division 1 football player." Then he went on to tell me why I wasn't cut out to play football. Then he told me, "The only reason why I let you stay on the team this long is because I like you." What made things worse, was that my head coach started to wonder if I had ever played football before. He asked me had I ever played, and where I played. Then, HE WAS TEMPTED TO CALL MY HIGH SCHOOL COACH TO VERIFY THAT I PLAYED!!! He didn't tell me that outright, but it was obvious to me that it crossed his mind, and I was FURIOUS. Two days after that, I was even approached by the equipment manager to be one of his assistants. What made everything so bad was that our coaches didn't pull players to the side to talk to them, they called us out in front of people, whether it was teammates, other coaches, cheerleaders, whoever. I used to catch a good chunk of it. I don't take that too well at all, that's a good way to get me ready to fight. Anyway, my teammates gave me hell after they heard the equipment manager ask me about working with him. They even found creative ways to tell me that I sucked at football. Again, it felt like high school all over again. They even started telling me I looked like JJ from Good Times. I might have grown maybe an inch in college, but I was still 160 pounds (I was that size until I was 22), and was still weak. By then, I really didn't have the motivation to push myself to get better.  

Including me, there were about 115 people on the team, and I was the only one who couldn't bench press 200 pounds. As a matter of fact, I still couldn't even do 100. Everybody, coaches included, was quick to remind me about it. Just like in high school, nobody would take the time to help me get better so I could be able to contribute, instead they would dog me about what I couldn't do. I had one teammate say that the team "had to make a man out of me first before they could make me a baller". One day at practice, one of the coaches that ran the scout team offense even told me that since I didn't know what I was doing, he didn't want me in at scout team receiver. I even had a fellow scout team receiver cock-block me from getting reps one day in practice, but since I was trying so hard to be nonconfrontational, I just let it ride. Also by then, I was being kept out of hitting drills and from using the blocking sled. 

Not quite halfway through the season my redshirt sophomore year, I was ostricized from the team. One day in practice I made a wrong move in the bull-in-the-ring drill, and the head coach blew his whistle before I would get contact. He looked at the equipment manager and said, "He's a part of your staff now." Words can't describe the embarrassment, shame, and anger that I felt at that time, especially with as many people out there as it was. After that, I was so numb that all I could do was watch the rest of practice. As soon as practice was over, I flew to the locker room to get dressed. I waited until I got back to my dorm to take a shower because I was too embarrassed to be seen by anybody from the team at that time. The next day when I went to talk to the head coach, he gave me his parting words, basically telling me how dangerous he thought it was for me to be out there and how scared he was of me getting hurt. I tried to at least get him to let me work out with my teammates so I could have somebody to push me to get stronger, and he wouldn't let me. 

After I left my meeting with the head coach (which I thought would be private), I went to see the equipment manager to turn my equipment in. He told me that I would never be able to come back to the team as a player, I would have to be a manager. Then I bumped into the recruiting coordinator/offensive line coach a few minutes later, and he also told me there was no way I could get back on the team because I was too little and that I was puny and had no strength whatsoever. After that, I went to the cafeteria for lunch. After I got my tray and was heading to a table, I felt a bunch of my teammates' eyes on me, so I looked over that way and saw them laughing and talking, and glancing at me. I already knew they were talking about me because I heard Ziggy come out of one of their mouths. Then one of them looked up at me, gave me a dirty look, shook his head and told me "YOU SUCK!!". I didn't want to be seen anymore after that, so I stopped going to class and turning my work in. 

Like I said about my teammates in high school, I felt like the same energy used by my teammates to pick on me and make fun of my shortcomings could have been used to help me develop into a key contributor for the team. I'm a firm believer that NO teammate should be left behind. I was the one that got left behind and allowed to slip through the cracks. I went into a deep and long depression after I left the team. I was so depressed after turning my equipment in, that for a split second, I wanted to go home and DRINK A BOTTLE OF PINE-SOL!! The best way to describe how I felt, to borrow a line from Kelis, "YOU TOOK MY HEARTBEAT FROM ME, SHOULD HAVE JUST STABBED IT FOR ME." I really felt like I was being thrown away.

My grades dropped so low, that I ended up being suspended for a semester. The worst thing for me at that time was for my family to find out, because the way they do things is KICK YOU WHEN YOU'RE DOWN/POUR SALT IN THE WOUNDS FIRST, ASK QUESTIONS LATER. They refused to believe any explanation I gave them, took the easy road and gave me hell about it instead of helping me cope with it and taking the time to find out why it happened, and when I was official that I would be out of school for a semester, they did and said everything they could to make me feel like they didn't want me there.  

Not too long after the school year ended, I ended up making what I feel like was the biggest mistake of my life, I enlisted in the Army. I can promise you this, if you go in the Army or any other branch of the military and not join for the right reason, it won't take you long to figure it out. Up until 3 years ago, I knew I had made the wrong choice to get in the Army, but I didn't know what my reason was for enlisting. It came to me out of the blue that the reason I went in the Army was because I was so depressed about being ostricized from the football team, and I felt like the only thing worse than being treated the way I did by teammates and coaches was having to deal with a drill sergeant in basic training, so I went on and enlisted. How is that for a wrong reason? Combine that with being 20 years old and "young and dumb". After I got out of the Army, I thought I would be able to move on with my life, until in June 2004, I got a Western Union telegram and a manila envelop from the Army with orders in it. They were calling me back in so they could send me off to Iraq. God had other plans, because 2 weeks before I was supposed to leave, I had a car accident on the interstate. The weather was awful, it was raining so bad that I couldn't see, and as I tried to pull off the road and wait for the rain to ease up, I did a couple of 360s and hydroplaned off the highway and landed in a ditch with the front of my car caught in a sewer. Since I couldn't open my door, I had to punch out my window to get out, and then I climbed out of the ditch. When I went the doctor the X-rays showed that I had a TWISTED SPINE, 6 sprained ligaments in my back, 5 pinched nerves, 2 of my discs came out of place, and I had a sprained neck. I WALKED AWAY from the accident and I didn't even have to be put in the hospital. Even though I regretted being in the Army, I did learn some valuable things that still serve me well today, and the strengths that I had to develop to survive my childhood got even stronger. I'm talking about things like resiliency, resourcefulness, perseverance, intuition, and sensitivity. I definitely needed these for what I was about to go through next. After I got out of the Army, I stumbled on some hard times for a little while. I had 16 jobs within a 5 year period, 13 within the first 3 of those 5 years, and I was homeless for the better part of 2 years. The majority of my struggles were from 2003 to 2005.    

Looking back on it, being pulled from the team started a disturbing trend for me, a domino effect of me starting things that I couldn't finish. I'm talking about everything from football to school to jobs. I didn't have this problem before that happened. Going through this also played a major role in my self-esteem being shattered. Like I said earlier, I was already mentally fragile when I first got to college because of things I went through growing up, and this just compounded everything. Now at 30 (almost 31), I find myself trying to figure out how to scratch this football itch that never went away before I really get too old. I also have ex teammates tell me all the time that if I was the size I am now back then, I would be in the NFL, and that's getting old. That's something I have been dealing with for the last 10 years. I won't stress it though, because I know it will work itself out. 

Thanks to writing this and taking the other necessary steps to get over this happening, I can officially say that I'm no longer angry and bitter about going through the football banishing. It wasn't easy to get to this point, and it didn't happen overnight. After I left the team, I have to confess that I was so bitter, that I rooted for the team to lose every week up until the teammates I had graduated. I have only been to 3 games since I left the team. At first it was because of my bitterness, but then after a while life got in the way. I can honestly say I would be OK from now on if I went to a game. I'm still a work in progress, nowhere near a finished product. I'm not where I want to be, but I'M NOT WHERE I USED TO BE EITHER!!!

Set Apart For A Reason

Set Apart For A Reason  

11/30/10 

For years, mostly when I was in school, I tried my best to fit in with everybody else to keep people off my back and minimize ridicule and scrutiny. No matter how hard I tried, nothing ever worked. Somehow, some way, me being different from everybody else always had a way of coming out, and I was even treated like I was different. Even in pursuing relationships with women, I had being different used against me. The biggest reason for it was mainly because I have morals, values, and standards to live up to, and plus I actually know how to treat a woman. It became obvious after a while that the women that I dealt with in the past were not used to how I treated them and the lengths I would go to to make them happy. Because I'm cut from a different cloth than most people, I have always been misunderstood. I don't particularly like it, and it even gets frustrating at times, but I have learned to deal with it. One big reason for being misunderstood is that people don't take the time to get to know somebody, so they make assumptions and judgments based on what they believe. That is a form of laziness. This is why I have the saying, PEOPLE NEVER LET THE FACTS GET IN THE WAY OF WHAT THEY WANT TO BELIEVE IS TRUE!!!I believe 3 of the most crucial things that hold people back and keep them from ultimately getting what they want in life are negativity, judgement, and imbalance. Which brings me to another phrase I live by: 

IF YOU DON'T LIKE IT, DON'T KNOCK IT, SOMEBODY ELSE MIGHT WANT TO ROCK IT.....IF YOU DON'T NEED IT, DON'T WASTE IT, SOMEBODY ELSE MIGHT WANT TO TASTE IT. 

It wasn't until I was 21 that I realized that I can't be anybody but myself. From that point on, I was done with putting up a front and trying to be something that I wasn't. I decided that if somebody was going to like me, they had to like me for me. If not, that was one less person in my life that I had to worry about. That's also when I realized that true friends know ALL about you, even your most embarassing, deepest, and darkest secrets, and they STILL like you and embrace you for you. I also learned that everybody is unique in their own way, and that we all bring certain gifts to the table that nobody else can bring. People have found all kinds of ways over the years to tell me that I'm different, like calling me things like weird, strange, eccentric, or just simply not normal. Up until about 4 years ago, I hated it like hell. But now, it's whatever. Think about it: with everybody being different in their own way, is there really a such thing as normal? The perfect scripture to back me up on this way of thinking is 1 Corinthians 1:27, which says that God uses foolish things to confound the wise. It's amazing how much people run away from things because of the way they are disguised. Sometimes the very person or thing you can't wait to get away from might be the source where you find everything you are looking for. 

Besides educating myself, my purpose for my research and my writing is to:

-change people's perspective/give them a different understanding in some areas

-get people to think outside the box 

-turn people's view of the world upside down and cause them to be brave enough to rethink everything they ever thought

I see life much differently than most people, and I don't process information the same way everybody else does either. I also see a lot of things that are not obvious to most people, and I give examples in everything I write. If any of these examples sound familiar or make you uncomfortable, then that might be a sign that you should assess some of these for yourself.  

Here are a couple more random examples of how my mind works: 

Example 1: Real life and sports mirror each other, and not just on the playing field.  

One good example I can give for this, is how the Dallas Cowboys ended up with Dez Bryant. I'll make the connection with that process to my own life. Underneath every point I make about Dez Bryant, I'll have a parallel about myself in parenthesis. 

-Dez Bryant was labeled as a thug and a character risk because of a dysfunctional upbringing and a bad habit of always being late.

(I was labeled as simple, slow, retarded, soft, etc. by people growing up while I was dealing with a traumatic childhood and all the things I went through along with it.)

 -Dez Bryant had football taken away from him when he was suspended by the NCAA 3 games into his junior year at Oklahoma State.

(I got football taken away from me during my redshirt sophomore year at Alabama A&M when I was told by my coaches that I wasn't cut out for football. I went into depression and got an academic suspension.) 

-After being suspended from football, Dez Bryant declared for the 2010 NFL Draft.

(After being suspended from school, I enlisted in the Army.) 

-Dez Bryant was EASILY a top 5 talent, and most definitely was the best wide receiver in the NFL Draft. In my opinion, he was the prize of the draft. He was definitely a steal for where the Dallas Cowboys picked him. Dez Bryant is a once-in-a-generation talent, blessed with extremely rare physical gifts. Even as a rookie, he is physically the most gifted wide receiver in the NFL, and as soon as he learns the ropes he will be the best wide receiver in the NFL for years to come. With all of that being said, as talented and as physical gifted as Dez Bryant is, he slid all the way down to the 24th pick in the draft. Not only was he not selected near the top of the draft, he wasn't even the first wide receiver picked. He was passed over for a another wide receiver, as well as other players with inferior talent. The Cowboys traded up a few draft spots and drafted him, and now Dez Bryant is well on his way to proving everybody wrong that passed on him.

(I have several different rare and unique talents, and considered a rare breed by just about everybody I meet. I'm a late bloomer and still learning the ropes in some aspects of life. My inexperience in these things have hurt me in crucial areas of my life. I have been overlooked and passed up by not just women, but just about everybody I encountered, even given up on at times. When it came to women, I was passed over quite often for men that were dishonorable, dishonest, and all other traits that give men a bad rap. I feel like once I gain a little bit more experience in life and mesh it with all of my gifts, I will live as an UNSTOPPABLE force of nature.  At that point, I'll be well on my way to proving everybody wrong that passed on me.) 

Like Mike Jones said, "Back then they didn't want me now I'm hot, they all on me." 

 Example 2: Controlling Your Own Destiny And Becoming The Person You Were Meant To Be 

My blog that I wrote 3 years ago called Slavery In America & The Prison Of Hope covers this very topic, and I'll be writing several more blogs on it in the future. To make a long story short, you WILL NOT reach your full potential and become the person you were meant to be by playing it safe and not taking chances. The biggest reason people don't want to pay that price to make that happen is because by nature, we don't like to unsettle things in our life. Because of that, we settle for mediocrity when we could have a miracle. Only 3% of the world population have decided to pay the price to have that freedom, and the other 97% are employed by them. The 3% crowd are very open-minded, know how to make the most of their opportunities, and most importantly they know how to work SMARTER-NOT HARDER. Because of that, the 3% crowd also control 97% of the wealth in this world, whether they got it the right way or the wrong way.  

I honestly believe that I'm a part of that 3% crowd myself. I believe I can hang with that crowd because I fully understand the mindset that you need to have to be in that position, I'm very well aware of the price you have to pay to have that kind of freedom, and I'm definitely not afraid of failure. If anybody from that small group of elite people in the world came to me and wanted to have an intelligent conversation, I'm confident that I most definitely would be able to keep up. In other words, I have the makeup of those people, but not the wealth just yet. With that being said, I have absolutely no problem being labeled as a MISFIT, and I embrace it all day every day. 

The biggest obstacle that I run into is that things like education, past experience and habitual thinking patterns keep people trapped in limiting assumptions. It takes a real effort to challenge those assumptions and think outside the box. Most people are very poor at doing this and have to work hard at it, unlike creative geniuses to whom this kind of thinking comes naturally. I feel like once you learn how to think outside the box, you open up many more possibilities, and problem solving becomes easier. One of the biggest (probably the biggest) prices to pay for not rethinking what you believe and not learning how to think outside the box is that you will continue to be deceived. Deceived is seeing things from the wrong point of view, leading your mind in the wrong direction. Deception can get so bad that the person that is deceived will think the person with the truth is the one that bought the lie. If you don't rethink what you believe, you will find yourself in a life of maintenance, working hard to stay in the same place. 

One last thing, I had to totally rebuild my confidence in myself and my abilities, as well as my self-esteem over the last 3 years. In the past when I didn't have much confidence, a lot of people used to tell me that I need to work on it. When I did show traces of it at times, those same people thought I was being cocky or arrogant. I'm not either one of those by a longshot, I just know who I am and know what I'm capable of. I even believe that if I get my needs and wants met, everybody that's connected to me in some kind of way will benefit from that, because then I'll be in a position where I can pull everybody else up and make sure they get theirs too. I also know that your mouth is the most powerful weapon that you have, and that what you say is what you get. It's absolutely critical that you believe in yourself the way I do myself, because nobody else will believe in you the way you do. You will never go beyond what you believe about yourself.