Aztecs’ Best Has Survived His Season on the Blink

The plane carrying the San Diego State basketball team was descending on Albuquerque, N.M. Michael Best was stretched out in his seat, staring blankly out the window. He was holding a Sony Walkman in his hands, and it was pumping music into his head.

Best will listen to almost anything. His preference is rap, jazz and reggae.

“I like music, period,” he said.

A long time ago, he played the drums. When he was seven, Best and three friends formed a band.

“My mom used to get mad when she’d try to go to sleep,” he said.

The band never performed publicly.

“We wanted to, but we never really got deep into it,” Best said. “People started moving away . . . “

He had a cousin who was about 10 years older, and he also played the drums. Best learned to play by watching his cousin.

“Picked it up by watching,” Best said. “Played by ear.”

The fledgling musicians also played basketball.

The subject had come up in the lobby of an Albuquerque hotel. Best was recalling his younger days, days when anything seemed possible and basketball was a joy.

“We played basketball all of the time,” Best said. “We played in snow, rain, darkness . . . we just played. That’s how it is on the East Coast. If you’re serious about what you want to do, you stick with it.”

And so he has.

But the moments Michael Best best remembers this season did not happen on a basketball court. They involve a coach, an old lady and a buddy from his hometown. And that should pretty much tell you how Best’s senior season at SDSU has gone.

He was supposed to be one of the cornerstones of a young Aztec team this season. He was the lone returning starter from a 12-17 team, a team on which he was the second-leading scorer (12.5 points a game) and the leader in assists (113) and steals (61).

But those numbers were buried by something else: after 26 games last season, Best was suspended for the season when he turned up dirty in a college administered drug test.

That’s where SDSU Coach Jim Brandenburg comes in. Brandenburg allowed him to return this season, and Best continues to appreciate it.

“That’s the main thing right there,” Best said.

Said Brandenburg: “I felt if he could right the wrong, he deserved a chance to prove himself.”

At 7:30 tonight against Hawaii, Best will play his final game in the San Diego Sports Arena.

It won’t be what you would call a triumphant exit.

His field goal percentage this season is 36%. Over the past nine WAC games, Best a guard, has made just a little under three of every 10 shots he has attempted (27%). And during a 70-55 loss at Texas-El Paso last week, he had nine turnovers.

“It’s been frustrating, but I’m not going to let it get to me,” Best said. “If you do, you start getting gray hairs.

“I’m going to hang in there. I know that a lot of people are expecting more out of me, but I can’t go out there and force it like Michael Jordan.”

The UTEP game was particularly frustrating. He looked like the Michael Best of old in the first half, dishing off for seven assists. But he had a rough second half--no assists, and by the end of things, finished with more turnovers than assists.

Then, he ran into the old lady. He had never seen her before, and he will probably never see her again. He didn’t get her name, but he will remember her. She was standing outside the Special Events Center at UTEP after the game and caught Best’s attention as he was walking to the team vans.

“Hi Michael Best,” she said. “I enjoyed watching you tonight.”

It was a simple sentence. But when you’re in the depths of disappointment and confusion, sometimes simplicity is what stands out the most.

“It really shocked me,” Best said. “I didn’t have a good game. I said ‘Thank you.’ That was a big memory for me. I’m not going to forget something like that. She was rooting for UTEP. And I didn’t see anything I did that was spectacular.

“If you know basketball, you know who can play. Someone can have zero points and do other things to stand out.”

In the past nine WAC games, Best has averaged 4.7 points a game. In those games, he has taken more than 10 shots just three times. The Jan. 18 New Mexico game, when Best made 10 of 13 shots and ended up with 24 points--is a distant memory. Lately, Best has quit looking for the shot. He is content to pass. When the season started, Brandenburg hoped for some leadership and scoring punch from Best. What he has gotten is a little bit of leadership and some rebounds--Best is third on the team at four a game.

“He really does have an instinct for the game very few players have,” Brandenburg said. “The scoring hasn’t been there, but one thing he has done is rebound for us.

“I’d say he probably took the heat as far as the best defensive players in the WAC. They started playing him much closer, not giving him much room to shoot. He knew what we needed to be successful, and he started to try to give us scoring punch to the detriment of his own stats. He won’t say it, but I think there is a confidence factor.”

Brandenburg is right.

“I don’t think I’ve lost confidence,” Best said. “If I’m off and I keep shooting, I ain’t doing nothing for the team. If somebody is at 48% to 60% inside shooting, they have a better chance than me. I just try to make the best play for the team.

“It hasn’t been a great year for me--I’m not scoring big numbers, but I’ve done other things. I’ve created things on the court and played hard during (crunch) time. I’ve gotten the ball to people who can score. I can’t do everything.”

The season started going downhill for Best even before it had begun. He underwent surgery to remove pins from his left knee just weeks before practice opened Oct. 15. Since then, his statistics have been down and his weight has been up. By the time he was ready to play, he weighed 235 pounds--from a normal 215, according to Best. The SDSU media guide lists him at 6-feet-4 and 200 pounds. He has lost some weight, but not much. He said he is at 228.

The pins were left over from knee surgery when he was at Clemson, before he transferred to SDSU in 1987. His knee ached, and finally he decided to have the pins removed.

It was supposed to be a simple procedure. It turned out that the doctor had to scrape away some of the bone that had grown over the pins--more of an ordeal than expected.

That meant more time sitting around before he could work out. The starch and grease from the school cafeteria collected, and soon there was more of Best than there was last season.

“I think obviously the weight is a problem,” Brandenburg said. “I’ve not been pleased with the weight he has maintained. I’d like to see him 10 or 15 pounds lighter, but that’s easier said than done.”

Already a few weeks behind his teammates in workouts, Best hasn’t been able to catch up. His shooting fell off. His turnovers increased. Eventually, he was taken out of the starting lineup. He sprained an ankle and missed SDSU’s victory at Air Force Jan. 13, and he hasn’t returned to the starting lineup on a regular basis since.

“I’ll come off the bench,” Best said. “It doesn’t bother me. I’m not mad about not starting. That’s how life is.”

Best began to learn some of life’s lessons several years ago on the streets of Washington, D.C. When he played against Colorado State 10 days ago, he had a chance to talk about those days with Ram guard Jamie Hines, an old friend. The two hadn’t seen each other in a several years, and they talked about the old days--and about how much had changed.

Best was in his hometown of Seat Pleasant, Md., for three weeks last summer, and he didn’t like what he saw.

“It didn’t look the same,” he said. “Everybody there wants to do their own thing. They’re shooting each other over drugs. Before I left (from Clemson to SDSU), they were telling me they were not going to get into it. I said I’d be back soon. I came back there and they couldn’t even look me in the eye and tell me what they were taking. They were walking around like zombies. They had me scared, and they were like my best friends.”

This was a couple of months after a few marijuana cigarettes left his own future in jeopardy. One of Best’s cousins died last February. Before that, one of Best’s uncles died. “I’ve been through so many problems in school, I was stressing sometimes,” Best said. “There’s been a lot of death in my family. But it was a stupid mistake on my part, and I regret it.”

Not that Best’s life was trouble-free before that. He is 24, two years older than most college seniors. One reason is because he redshirted a season. The other is that he had to repeat fifth grade after he was expelled from school for throwing a snowball with a rock in it and hitting a girl in the eye. He was expelled again in seventh grade for poor attendance.

A few memories like these, and 36% from the field doesn’t seem so bad. He is still hoping to earn an NBA tryout. If that fails, he said he will try to hook on with a team in Italy. But for now, he is playing college basketball. And despite some lower-than-expected numbers, that in itself is quite an accomplishment for Michael Best.

“That’s why I’m so proud,” he said. “It’s a big turnaround. I was the baddest thing on the streets.”