Older and Wiser--and Staying in the Game

Even Michael Jordan knew enough to call it quits. Jordan put himself on the injured list 10 days ago, cutting short his storied return to pro basketball before he even made it through his first season back.

He decided that the constant pounding was more than his 39-year-old body could take. So, on the morning after his worst performance in 13 years of professional ball, he took a look at his swollen knee and hung up his Air Jordans--at least for now.

My fiance keeps trotting out that story to convince me of the risk in my plan to return to action in our local park’s women’s basketball league this spring.

But I see Jordan’s trials from a different perspective. Consider what one of the game’s greatest players has gone through on his way back from retirement to the hardwood: He had to lose 20 pounds to get down to his playing weight again. He broke two ribs in a pickup game that was supposed to help him get in shape. Preseason workouts left him with tendinitis. The resulting knee surgery forced him through weeks of therapy. And when he returned to action last month, his knee was so sore he wasn’t able to play unless he pedaled an exercise bike during timeouts. Still, he plans to return to the court this fall.

Now, I’m no superstar athlete. There’s no contract, endorsement or college scholarship on the line. And our MBL (Moms’ Basketball League)--though it’s no place for wimps, with its hazardous play--is not exactly the NBA.

But I feel you, Mike. At 47, I’ve got eight years on you, a record of recurring injuries and a gimpy knee that hurts when I run. The good news? I’ve only got 10 pounds to lose before opening game.

Until I was 41, the only time I set foot on a basketball court was as a high school cheerleader turning cartwheels for the boys. But six years ago, the coach of my then-8-year-old daughter’s team challenged us moms to take on our girls. The game turned out to be more fun than we could have imagined, and our Moms’ Basketball League was born.

Most of us were in our late 30s or early 40s, and only a handful had ever played competitive ball. Many of us had come of age before Title IX created sports opportunities for girls. Still, our league became so popular, we began attracting 20-something women, including several former college players.

That turned out to be my undoing. Trying to keep up with the younger players, I twisted my ankle, pulled a muscle, then blew out my knee in an athlete’s nightmare. (I planted my foot, tried to turn inside, then heard the “pop” that means a torn ligament.) But I refused to make that my swan song. Six months later, I was back on the court, slowed a bit by a knee held in place by $900 worth of protective gear. I played four games, then broke my finger. Sat out for two games, then came back and broke the finger again. That was it. My body was telling me to quit.

So for three years, I’ve stayed off the court and tried to satisfy my basketball cravings by yelling advice to my daughters as they play. Needless to say, that hasn’t satisfied any of us. When I announced to my youngest at her season’s end that I need to get more involved in the game and plan to sign up to coach the next time she plays, she begged me to reconsider. “If you want to be out there that bad, you need to play,” she said.

And I realized then how much I miss it. Not just the exercise, camaraderie and occasional thrill of victory, but the adrenaline pump of competition, the chance to slough off the polite conventions of day-to-day civility.

On the court, it doesn’t matter how much money you make, how clean your house is, how well your children are doing in school. Basketball offers a chance to fight back, in the acceptable confines of the gym, against the petty annoyances--the barking dog, broken dishwasher, overdue orthodontist’s bill--that conspire to weigh down our days. Sure, I love the physical charge that comes from playing the game, but it’s the emotional release I really need.

My fiance seems to think I’m too old, too ungainly and out of shape to return to the court this time. It’s foolhardy to play a game as demanding as basketball without months of training and proper conditioning, he says.

He’s right, of course. A woman my age, whose primary exercise has been going up and down stairs and hauling groceries in from the car, has no business playing basketball. And I suspect that’s part of the draw.

I don’t want to accommodate the changes that have ambushed me in middle age. I don’t intend to surrender to the notion that my body is abandoning my desires. I don’t “feel” 47, whatever that means, and I’m desperate to prove to myself that I can play like the athlete I’ve always imagine myself to be.

So I compromise and agree to work daily training walks into my evening itinerary. And I try not to find it discouraging that after only 20 minutes, my feet hurt, my ankle aches and my bad knee is getting stiff. It doesn’t help that my companion is my neighbor, Bill, who is in his 60s but walks twice as far and spends his afternoons lifting weights and exercising in his garage.

He understands the reluctant relinquishment of physical prowess to the ravages of age. In high school he was an athletic hero, lettering in every sport. Now each evening seems to bring some new ache, and getting out of bed is sometimes a chore. But he’s not giving in, and neither should I, he says.

“Play,” he tells me, “but don’t sweat the small stuff.” Staying in the game as you get older relies not so much on physical prowess, but mental attitude, he says: Have fun. Don’t fret if someone shows you up. You don’t have to avenge your opponent’s every move. It’s not all guts and hustle these days. Slow down, play smart, enjoy the game.

And that strikes me as good advice, about life as well as basketball. Some things don’t mean as much as you get older. And some things mean more than ever before.

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Sandy Banks’ column is published on Sundays and Tuesdays. Her e-mail address is sandy.banks@latimes.com.