The great ones always grab our attention. The younger they are when they first turn our heads, the more intriguing. If you were a sports fan who lived or spent time in and around the Kansas City area in the 1990s, you knew of JaRon Rush. Metro Sports
smartman
Tom Grant was a father figure to Jaron the way Carl Peterson was a father figure to DT. More emphasis on the destination than the journey. Rick Allison is an idiot and a douchebag. Jaron didn’t become Lebron because he never had REAL mad skills not to mention ANY discipline. Pem Day was not the right school for him.in the metro. If someone like Eddie Fritz, Rick Zych, Bud Lathrop or Doug Bruce was his coach in high school it would have been a whole different story. From Philly to DC to NYC to Boston brothers in high school are shattering backboards every Friday night. Darryl Dawkins and World B. Free are damn proud. Unfortunately with budgets being cut the boyz gotta throttle back this season.
Ptolemy
Ironic that the problems alluded to in this documentary begin, thrive, and end on the understanding that high school kids should not garner this kind of media interest — the kind that Rush and others like him get. Rush wouldn’t have absorbed the fundamentals that a good high school coach would have instilled because he would never have listened because there was all that media attention to play to. This is why I have never and will never spend much time paying any attention to high school competition, unless I have relatives or close friends involved. Get your entertainment where the athletes are paid to entertain, not from children.
jojo
PEMBROOKE>>>>who would play there to increase
their skills on the court?
JaRon was a loser…short and simple. He’s the
black sheep of the family and the others learned
from his bad experiences.
Bill
Among high school greats in the 90s don’t forget about Derek Hood.
Eric
Greatest player to come out of KC….uhhhhhhhh….ANTHONY PEELER ANYONE? Jesus.
Uncle Dick
Tiger, Rod Jetton, and JaRon….a cheater, a beater, and a WalMart greeter.
smartman
Uncle Dick es en fuego! Muy bueno Tio Dick!
Paul
Uncle Dickhead, go away.
JimmyD
I still remember the 0.39 JaRon blew when getting his DUI. 0.39!!! Epic
Johnny Utah
the classic boy without a father tale. no one ever taught him to be a man and take responsibility for himself. no one still has. sad indeed.
John
Paul, go away.
Uncle Dick
I agree, Johnny U. Could be said for JaRon, too, as well as well as Paul.
A .39? Unfreakin’ real. You can pour white lightning in the tester and not get a .39. Don’t be too hard on the bro, he couldn’t walk, he had to drive.
Coach? Coach? Be like Rock Hudson being a scout master. Maybe Tiger can be a judge for the Miss America contest. Not like Tyson, who only got to grope sisters at the Miss Black USA deal, Tiger gets to feel up young ladies of all colors.
John
GH, interesting documentry.
Maybe Metro Sports can do one on Tony Temple, he was the JaRon of Kansas City football. The most recruited player in this city’s history.
Went to MU and really only had one great game, his last against Arkansas.
Now he kind of dropped off the face of the Earth. He hoped to get a shot in the NFL. But maybe because of his size there is no takers.
Right now it looks like the CFL doesn’t even want him. If there was an Arena Leauge would he be there? I don’t know.
Kevin
Can’t stand it when people like you criticize something like this piece. If you think you could do it better, get your own crew and you do it.
It seems that you have developed a superiority complex in your life — how the documentary could be better, how and when Jaron Rush should work, and on and on.
I have no ties to Rush or Metro, but man, I read your stuff every week, and lately, it makes me sick how you come off as a know-it-all.
_______
Kevin,
It is not my intent to come off as a know-it-all but the nature of writing a column with some edge and opinion can lead one to that conclusion. I wrote this critique to let people know about this doc on MS and that I thought it was worth their time. The fact that I pulled as many quotes from the doc to put together a decent OTC is proof the doc has merit. Again, I thought it was good, not great — not unlike much of what you read here.
GH
rick
I didn’t take it that Greg was all that critical just that he wanted more. Like getting a toy for Christmas but no batteries to go with it. Greg-I thought this was an excellent piece. Something you won’t get anywhere else.
Dawkins and World Be Free. Awesome references Smartman.
Uncle Dick one of the rare times you are wrong. Doesn’t seem Tiger has any interest in black women based on all his wife and the women he cheated on her with.
smartman
Kevin, peace out bro. Metro Sports is notorious for shall we say low production values and cutting corners. This whole Jaron saga can offer a real teachable moment for kids, parents, guardians, coaches and administrators. I’m sure it’s going to come off as a “cornpone” production that with a little more polish, depth and edge might make a nice documentary for ESPN or HBO that might have an impact and change a life. Anything worth doing is worth doing right. I gotta take Greg’s word on this. Like most of us that gather here Greg is sick and tired of the stupidity and mediocrity of our local sports media. In between work, family and masturbating sports is a guilty pleasure for us. We just want it to be Uma Thurman and not Joan Rivers.
Jip
I saw them all play, and as far as high school careers go, JaRon Rush was better than all of them. Obviously, Peeler and Lue and Brandon Rush are in the NBA, but JaRon was out-of-this-world good when he was in high school. He completely overshadowed the career of Kareem Rush, and Kareem’s in the NBA now.
He was a decent player at UCLA, nothing great. He had one great game that I recall, in an overtime win against Stanford after he came back from suspension.
That kid could play, but there’s a lot more to making millions than just putting the ball in the hoop.
MandDshagger
Jaron didn’t exactly ball against the best players in the metro playing at Pem Day. I’m sure he’ll get his chance to coach in the prison league some day. Why in the hell isn’t Papa Grant trying to help him out now?
yawn
Another uplifting, inspirational piece by whats-his-name. He is always so positive and insightful.
Uncle Dick
Rick, it’s mostly white women in the Miss USA contest anyway. Not many sisters from Boise are going to say I da ho.
Arte
Just hope it’s better than Metro’s KU-MU documentary. That one lost me as soon as I saw Neal Jones and Soren Petro pop up in interviews. They added nothing. Plus the narrator sounded like a bad impression of Liev Schreiber. (Schreiber does HBO documentaries)
Hammy
Greg, did you seriously just put up a list of KC’s best players and include Tyron Lue and Brandon Rush but not Anthony Peeler? Have you recently hit your head?
_______
Hammy,
Total whiff on my part. I was considering Jevon Crudup for the 80s but didn
Dexter Morgan
This town is extremely lucky to even have Metro Sports. The documentary Gough did on the history of Pro Wrestling in KC wasn’t flashy, basically just a simple format or interviews and snapshots overlayed, but the fact that he did it was what was so cool. Who else is ever going to do a doc on KC’s Pro Wrestling history?
I haven’t seen the Rush doc, but as yourself the same question. Who else would even bother to do a documentary on him? I kind of sympathize with Kevin’s comments, whereas this entry from GH seems to be confused as to whether it’s a review on JaRon Rush or a critique on Metro Sports’ production abilities.
For all the finger pointing GH does here, and we are entertained by it, sometimes a finger needs to be pointed at him as well.
whereTHEFk
may I fkn humbly ask, where the fk, is the fkn story, about the first fkn blackout at Arrowhead, in 20 fkn years, caused by this fkn owner, whose fkn plan, is to fkn move this team, to another fkn city, and that is why he hired this fknPOS non fkn coach golfer douchefknbag ?
rick
Dexter you are right the wrestling doc. was great. I was at the premiere and I can tell you other then the fact the Stomper wasn’t included most wrestling historians felt it was a good piece of work. Though like all things wrestling their was some hype that was all that factual. But good stuff.
rick
Meant to write “That was NOT all that factual”.
Collective Noses
Very good post Greg. I don’t subscribe to TWC so I won’t see the piece but very interesting and unfortunately sad.
I too was hyperventilating when I didn’t see Peeler’s name above but I see you’ve acknowledged your omission so I forgive you.
The one thing I missed, and maybe it’s common knowledge or discussed in more detail in the doc, is JaRon’s drinking problem. Does he acknowledge it? Has he done anything to curb it? Or, is more of a crutch?
___
CN,
JaRon did not shrink from his drinking problem in the least. He casually mentioned it a couple of times as does Tom Grant. There were no penetrating questions though about his drinking, which I thought would have made the doc even more interesting. He looked very fit and he sounds like he wants to be a better man. But he didn’t have much of a plan on how to get there.
GH
Kevin K.
If we are discussing omissions from the list of great KC high school players, where are the Jons Sundvold and Koncak, both of whom had nice D-1 college and NBA careers?
Do only the guys with subsequent NBA careers count, or can we mention guys who were utterly dominant in H.S., like Marcus Walker, Domo Johnson, and even reaching back into the 70s, Kirk Chastain?
Does anybody remember the pure shooting duo of Tim Presko and Chris Cone at Pius? Didn’t Kirk Shawver once look like he’d star in whatever professional sport he chose? How about Robert Estes at Liberty? And wasn’t Greg Gurley pretty doggone good on the Kansas side?
Tim
I do, Kevin. Thanks for mentioning. The above subject aside, I played for Pius at the time Tim and Chris did. The two “super sophs”. Unfortunately, I was a soph gaurd too.
But I certainly agree that their are several other KC area players I’d think rank above JaRon Rush. I actually got to play against a kid named Clay Johnson, from old Manual HS. He ended up playing for the Lakers. He wasn’t particulary tall, but he’d destroy the likes of Rush because he was talented, but also technically skilled— and a decent young man—not spoiled rotten.