Harlem, New York has had one of the greatest influences on the NBA and the game of basketball overall. Legacy of Rucker Park extends onto the NBA's greatest 50 players list. More importantly, the legacy of Holcombe Rucker extends to every basketball coach in community centers around the country. It was also the Legends of Rucker Park that provided the myth and mystique that fueled the swag and rise of the AND1 brand and the rise and fall of the Streetball market in the mainstream.
'Some consider Rucker Park to be the center of the world of Streetball. NBA stars who have played Streetball at Rucker Park include Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wilt Chamberlain, Dr. J, Nate "Tiny" Archibald, Connie Hawkins, and former Senator
Bill Bradley. Nevertheless, it's not about them. It's about the amazing players who, for whatever reason, never made it to the professional level.'
Rucker Park is named after Holcombe Rucker, a New York Park and Recreation employee who helped over 700 young boys and girls earn college athletic scholarships. Rucker grew up in Manhattan, attended Benjamin Franklin High School, and between 1948 and 1964 worked for Parks as a playground director in numerous Harlem locales.
"In 1947 … he started a basketball tournament in Harlem. The Rucker League's motto was "each one, teach one," and it stressed education in combination with recreation. Rucker taught participants reading fundamentals, graded their homework, and let success on report cards influence who would play. Throughout the tournaments, Rucker helped obtain over 700 college athletic scholarships for participants. He continued his education as well. Rucker attained his degree from the City College of New York in 1962 and went on to teach English at J.H.S. 139."
Mr. Rucker used athletics to promote education and those who have or do work with youth know the subject of "life" was taught as well. Rucker is also the creator of, what is called today, the Pro-AM Leagues.
"In the 1960s, Rucker transformed his local league into a basketball institution by organizing games where his best players shared the court with professionals such as Wilt Chamberlain. Although Rucker died at age 38, due to complications from cancer, the 1960s and 1970s represented a high point for the Pro Rucker League when greats such as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar came to play. By the early 1980s, professional athletes became reluctant to risk injury during non-season play, and the league returned to its amateur roots; Rucker's original tournament, however, is still played today on the Colonel Charles Young Playground.
Several basketball tournaments for children, high school, college, and professional players now take place on Rucker's Playground, including the Entertainers Basketball Classic and the Each One Teach One tournament…."
The Rucker is best known for its impact on basketball's evolution and some of the game's greatest players. Holcombe Rucker's legacy and therefore Streetball's legacy is building communities through serving youth. This was Rucker's original intent and it is wholly consistent with Dr. Naismith's vision and purpose for the game.
AND1
"AND1 grew to more than $210 million in revenue in 2001, with licensees selling an additional $65 million. The connections Berger made obviously won't hurt Westtown. He said he would limit NBA interaction for his players but also said, "I think that it helps that I'm one call away – at most two calls away – from anybody in the basketball world I need to get."
"The legend goes that the people at AND1 first used the Skip tape, as it became known around the company's corporate office just outside Philly, merely to amuse themselves and people who came to visit the office. With just one or two TV's in the company's small office, it was easy to gather everyone to watch the tape repeatedly, accompanied by groans, screams and "no he didn't" every time Skip embarrassed a defender. While the marketing people at AND1 intuitively knew the tape had some value beyond personal amusement, they did not quite know what to do with it. It wasn't until the company shot a series of commercials and print ads at nearby Haverford College in the summer of 1999 that they fully realized the potential of the footage they owned."
AND1 began as a basketball database, but, after one year, they switched to selling T-shirts. AND1's association with Streetball was first and foremost a sound business move. AND1 became synonymous with Streetball and when Streetball began to take on a "negative image" among basketball's mainstream, the brand suffered. The founders of AND1 solved the problem by selling the company and washing their hands of the problem. Again, it was business, not service to the community or the culture, which motivated AND1's decisions.
AND1's business entrance into the market, for brand expansion, resulted in the development of contentious relationships with streetball tour players. It was AND1 players that built the brand, they understood their value to the brand, and felt entitled to a greater share of the company's growing revenues. AND1 presented the Mix Tapes as an opportunity to bring their style of basketball to people who otherwise would never see it and give great ballplayers the exposure richly deserved. AND1 accomplished their goals, but did they exploit their players in the process?
Mitchell and his Push Company are not driven by strictly monetary gain. He is an old school player, who laments that he has seen too many of his peers being taken advantage of over the years. He plans to make a stand. How? Mitchell wants to organize a Streetball labor union, a Streetball player-owned corporation under his guise, and help the new generation, as well as the old, protect their rights and business opportunities.
"You gotta understand, all these years of playing street basketball, we weren't rewarded for them," Mitchell explains. "I told [the players I know] they need to protect their moves. I told everyone. AND1 came up and sweep them all away, gave them a little funky $10,000, $20,000, and then they went bananas. Years later, they made shoes, the videos, and stuff, and they didn't pay them. They didn't because they weren't SAG. No one represented them -- their publishing, royalties and all that stuff. They all came back and said 'Donye, you were right.' Of course, I was; it was a no-brainer. Business is business. Protect your moves. Now, they're like 'Whatever you do, I'm with you.'
"It's time for us to organize and give the ownership back to their players. The players need to organize, form their own companies -- under one umbrella -- and hire a marketing firm to shop their talent, but at a fee. All the royalties from all the distribution deals, that has to come back home to us, so that we can distribute that through the culture," he adds.
AND1's contribution to the Streetball culture is confirmation that the urban market can support urban orientated independent, competitive basketball franchises. The market AND1 uncovered is global. Like the Harlem Globetrotters before them, AND1 took the Streetball story and game around the world. With the decline of the AND1 brand domestically, other smaller franchises have arisen with some attaining moderate success. These brands are following in the tradition of the Harlem Renaissance and Globetrotters barnstorming around the globe doing exhibitions and taking all comers. The Globetrotters traveled the world spreading goodwill and promoting basketball. AND1 traveled the world pollinating communities around the world with the seed of Streetball.
