Phoenix is the latest stop on the Mike James world tour
Mike James thinks back to a year ago, to Greece and fans lighting fireworks in the arena, shooting off flares, hurling anything within reach toward the court, where players were saved by a large net. He thinks back to how the crowd was so out of control at times that his team was ushered to the locker room while the arena was cleared out before play could resume.
James thinks back on walking the streets, not just there but in each of the countries where he played professionally the past five years -- Croatia, Israel, Italy, Spain and then, finally, Greece -- and how he and his teammates were mobbed for autographs and pictures.
He didn't speak their language, but, he says, "basketball is its own language." The fans spoke it with fervor, treating their favorite team's players like rock stars, but James never saw himself as one and never wanted to either.
"I like being normal a lot," he says.
Quiet. Reserved. A hooper, nothing more. And so, unwanted celebrity became a price he paid to play the game for a living.
But after an improbable journey that began back home in Portland, Oregon, wound to Eastern Arizona College, then Lamar University in Texas, before venturing across the Atlantic, James has found himself classified as a 27-year-old "rookie," tied for the third-oldest player on his latest roster.
http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/21473587/nba-basketball-voyage-27-year-old-rookie-mike-james
