On the Rebound : Former Titan Derek Jones Is Putting All the Pieces of His Life Back In Order With Help of Basketball

Derek Jones’ life nearly ended on Aug. 30, 1987.

That was the day he was hit by a shotgun blast that left him critically wounded at the front of his family’s apartment in Long Beach. He was in a coma for two weeks, and he was told he would never play basketball again.

Derek Jones was offered a Continental Basketball Assn. contract July 29. Life occasionally takes some miraculous turns.

“I’m pleased, but I’m a little disappointed it took such a long time,” said Jones, who finished his college career in 1989 at Cal State Fullerton. “I feel as though someone outside of myself finally feels I can compete at a level greater than what I’m playing at right now.

“But it’s too soon to get too excited. In my life, anything that can go wrong does go wrong. When it actually happens, I’m sure I’ll be elated.”

There’s no guarantee that Jones will sign the CBA contract with the Rockford (Ill.) Lightning. Teams from Germany and Spain have expressed interest in him, as have two teams in Mexico.

The Lightning is coached by Mauro Panaggio, who is inviting 18 players to camp and plans to keep 10. Given that Jones is being offered an above-average CBA contract, according to his agent, Jerry Clark, Panaggio wants Jones in a bad way.

“Panaggio said to me, ‘Derek needs to be seen, and if he’s seen, he has the potential to be called up to the NBA,’ ” Clark said.

Six Rockford players were summoned to NBA teams last year.

Panaggio saw Jones at the ASICS Southern California Summer Pro League at UC Irvine. Jones, a shooting forward, averaged 23.9 points and 9.1 rebounds and shot 48% from the floor (78 of 157). Jones, who helped his team to the free-agent championship, was named to the 12-man free-agent all-star team.

Clark thinks Jones should have gotten this chance much earlier.

“Many teams pass on him as a player, unfortunately, because they don’t realize how tough he is,” Clark said. “He has to be the toughest guy I’ve ever seen. You can knock him down, and he’ll get back up.”

Clark also coached Jones during the eight-game schedule in the summer pro league, and their team, Orange County, defeated Hyatt, 144-141, in overtime in the free-agent championship game.

Jones has always been interested in seeing how far he can go, and Europe might be the next stop.

“I’d go over there for free for a couple of weeks just to see how I could play, but if I could be compensated for it, I’d love that,” Jones said. “To spend a lot of time with something you love is great, but to get paid for doing something you love--you can’t beat that.”

Before the Lightning’s interest, NBA and other CBA teams thought there was a durability question about Jones. The buckshot damaged his stomach and collapsed a lung, and the scars on his left (shooting) arm and back make an impressionable statement.

The outer two fingers on his left hand don’t have full range of motion, and because of ulnar nerve damage, he has no feeling in those two fingers about half the time. On two occasions he smelled his fingers burning before he felt it when he was careless around an iron and a stove.

Despite the obstacles, Jones thinks his game has improved since the shooting.

“My range has increased,” he said. “I was predominantly an inside player, not effective outside of 15 feet. Now a college three-pointer is not a problem for me. The NBA three-pointer--that’s a long shot.

“But I’m able to shoot right- and left-handed from 15 feet in, I can dunk, hook--I’ve learned to improvise. That’s part of making me a better player. I’m a better dribbler, a better passer. Before I got shot, I was predominantly an inside player who could only go to my left. Maybe (the shooting) hasn’t made me a better player, but it has made me a more complete player.”

At 6 feet 7 1/2 inches and 207 pounds, he is wiry, all bones and muscle. He doesn’t like the physical nature of basketball, but he doesn’t avoid it, either.

“I don’t have a problem getting physical, it’s just not my style,” he said. “I would rather play a more finesse game. It’s a personal preference.

“At Fullerton, I never missed a game (during the regular season. The shooting) made me a lot tougher. I’m as tough as someone 6-10 but that’s not my style. I prefer to have the least amount of wear and tear on my body as possible.

“I have all my teeth and my nose is still straight--I’d like to keep it that way.”

Jones averaged nine points during his junior year and aspired to play in the NBA. Then came the drive-by shooting. He had always avoided involvement in drugs and gangs but was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Jones recalled the incident: He was standing in a group of eight men outside his Long Beach apartment building when a man pulled his car in front of the group and asked Jones about a drug purchase. Jones said he wasn’t involved in that kind of activity. But a boy, about 13, offered to make a sale. The man handed money to the boy, who ran off with it. The man got out of his car to chase the boy. The group of men, trying to protect their young friend, began beating the buyer. Jones intervened and helped the buyer back to his car, and he drove away.

All but Jones and another man left the scene, and they were recounting the story to two other friends, when the buyer returned about five minutes later with a shotgun. Everyone ran, but the shotgun blast sprayed Jones’ arm and back. Jones said had he been six inches to his left, he would be dead.

No one was charged with the shooting.

Physical therapists told Jones he would never again play basketball, a prognosis that upset him. So he quit formal therapy, he said, and conducted his own--playing basketball.

Granted a rare sixth year of eligibility by the NCAA, Jones averaged 12 points and seven rebounds and blocked 56 shots during his senior season at Fullerton.

He is a recreation specialist at the Long Beach Parks and Recreation Department, and he tries to help kids get past the temptations of drugs and gang life. And he plays basketball whenever and wherever he can.

“If I would have died, there would have been a lot of things I hadn’t done,” Jones said. “I was so concerned about playing basketball and what the future held for me, I really hadn’t lived. Life’s much too short to take anything so seriously.

“I don’t want it to seem as though I’m in (basketball) for the money. If money comes out of it, that’s a fringe benefit. I play basketball for the sheer joy of playing it.”

And the fringe benefits are on the way.