Have you ever stopped and wondered what happened to the star basketball player of your high school? Did he go on and have an exciting career or did he get married and is living blissfully with 2.5 kids? Maybe neither happened to him maybe he still thinks about those glory days of high school basketball. John Updike’s poem “Ex-Basketball Player” is a look at what a dismal life this once star could have.
In the first stanza the reader is introduced to the basketball player, Flick Webb. Flick works at “Berth’s Garage” which just happens to be not even a “chance to go two blocks” away from his old high school. This is probably because Flick does not want to be to far away from the place where he had been such a idol. Flick is not even the owner of this establishment he just merely “helps Berth out.” He is in a job that is taking him nowhere and which hardly seems fitting for someone with such potential.
The third stanza gives the reader a look into his glory days. Flick “bucketed three hundred and ninety points” which the speaker seems to be in awe of. He also still holds the county record that young basketball players attempt to beat every year. Those young basketball players probably think he has gone on to become a professional athlete and not the guy that pumps their gas every morning. The speaker’s admiration is expressed again when he talks about watching “his hands that were like wild birds.” Flick had such promise and he was probably very aware that people felt that way. He probably never saw it coming when he did not receive a scholarship from any colleges or get drafted in the NBA.
The Essay on High School Cliques
The school environment causes natural polarization of peoples with similar backgrounds, attitudes, or any other factors that would form certain peer groups, or ‘cliques’. This is particularly observable in the High School setting, as the predominant social groups are composed of adolescents who are beginning their socialization process. This socialization forms various groupings or factions that ...
The last stanzas talk about Flick’s life now. “As a gag, he dribbles an inner tube” which demonstrates that he still wants people to be impressed by his talent. It also shows that he still has some of that talent left and he still can not do anything more with it than just impress the people around him. After work Flick “hangs around Mae’s luncheonette,” this is because he probably has nobody to go home to. He does not talk to anyone just stays in a daydream where there is an audience applauding for him. When in all reality there is no audience only “Necco Wafers, Nibs, and Juju Beads.” He is just a lonely man with nothing to look forward to, only the memories of his past in which he felt like someone essential.
The reader begins to wonder if it would have been better for Flick to never have shot one single basketball. If Flick had never got that rush from hearing the audience cheer for him, maybe he would be more content in his monotonous life. He might not have even had a mundane life at all. He could have worked vigorously at some other endeavor that would have supplied him with an exciting career and a devoted family. Instead of ending up all alone working a Berth’s Garage with nothing to look forward to, waking up each morning just to relive the past. John Updike leaves the reader with a distressing thought about what could have happened to the superstars at their own high school.
