A Well-Adjusted Rookie

[ABM]

Dante Cunningham

http://www.columbian.com/news/2010/mar/01/well-adjusted-rookie/

Trail Blazers forward Dante Cunningham first described it as a deer in the headlights-type of feeling. Then he referred to it as a blur. But Cunningham finally settled on a sound.

It was the sound of a rush. Of watching the NBA game sprint and zoom by, while more talented and experienced players floated on like the world was simple and easy — theirs for the taking.

The sound: “Shoom, shoom, shoom, shoom, shoom.”

“In the beginning, me and Jeff (Pendergraph) are out there, and everybody’s zooming past us,” Cunningham, 22, said.

But where most rookies spend their entire first season wondering when life on and off the court is going to slow down, Cunningham’s initial campaign has been different...................

 

[MickZagger]

Cunningham's ma dood.

 

[ABM]

Cunningham's ma dood.

He's livin' the dream, man. You should have seen how many hotties were hounding him at the Big Al's event. What a life. WHAT a life!

 

[illmatic99]

Nice article. Dante's legit. I hope we use him some more in the future.

Also, I notice significant improvement in BTS' writing.

 

[handiman]

Good read, but I always feel like too much is made of the maturity and readiness of 4-year college guys. I'm pretty sure you would find, if there were any reliable means of mapping it out, that a 5th year guy straight out of HS and a 4-year college rookie would be at similar points in their games. It's an age thing, not an experience/level thing... The only likely difference would be in the relative skill sets, with the HS'er being more talented and maybe less refined in the fundamentals, as developing the latter is usually a necessity of not being good enough to go pro early.