Greatness

If he wasn't 6-foot-7... if he didn't have a grin wider than a ruler.... and if he wasn't so damn good at basketball, Juan Paulino might have blended in at Finger Lakes Community College. Probably not though. A gigantic, Latino, Jay-Z lookalike from the Bronx, Juan stood out in the Big Apple. Imagine him at an Upstate college most known for its Woodsman's team and Natural Resource Conservation program.

Most of the white population seemed to be intrigued with Juan. Some of them would timidly say "good game," but most just stared as he walked by. Not to say he was the only minority - there were always a few black kids from the suburbs around the school, but few with similar backgrounds. Not many, though, with a tilt to their stride. The one letting you know they've been through things you don't understand.

On the basketball court, he wasn't graceful like Jordan, tough like Rodman or disciplined like Pippen. He wasn't fast like Rondo, fierce like Garnett or sharp like Pierce. He was a dash of all six. He was so audaciously better than anyone in junior college, you couldn't help but invoke the famous Billy Joel line: "Man, what are you doing here?"

The funny thing about Juan was how easily you could see his potential to be really great. The ease in which he dominated. The fundamentals that could be improved. Intangible passion for the game. But, being really great is quite different than being great. Great is local. Great is secure. Great is natural. Really great is transcending, risky and takes a hell of a lot of work.

A baseball player from the 30's Buck Rodgers may have best described greatness as "commitment to excellence and rejection of mediocrity." Not just to be, but refusing to not be. Most of us never reach really great at anything. Juan had it in his view and mid-way through his second year at FLCC, Division I schools were taking notice.

Coaches would come to a town built for tourists around a pleasant little lake to see Juan play in front of a couple hundred fans in a smelly gym with plastic bleachers. They'd watch as he brilliantly read his opponents' head fakes, pouncing at the right time to slap the ball into the half-empty stands. They'd see his balance and quickness on the dirty floor.  They'd leave in awe of the powerful forward scoring 30 points and ripping down 30 rebounds while getting slapped and hacked for 30 minutes.

While the competition in junior college isn't anywhere near D-I, other teams had guys who were his height. They had guys who - unlike Juan - played years and years of organized basketball. They had size, talent and experience. They didn't have anything close to Juan. Especially by the end of his sophomore season. I'd watched him go from clumsy to smooth, from pudgy to jacked, from a great D-III player to one with D-I talent. But, I noticed that something was going on with Finger Lakes star.

One night after leading a blowout win - who knows how many points and rebounds Juan had - 25/25 is a safe bet - I pulled up behind him at a stoplight. We knew each other slightly beyond a head nod. So, when he turned a little white Honda which probably wasn't his into McDonalds, I figured I'd stop in to congratulate him. But, when he realized I was following him, Juan paused in the lot long enough for me to park then slammed on the gas and high tailed it out of there.

It didn't make sense. I thought about the way he looked talking to people he didn't know well.  He looked  at them like a poker player trying to make a read. He spoke with caution. Not that he wasn't friendly, even at times gregarious, but the book was always half closed.  It wasn't long after the season ended and Juan had an offer to play with the best college basketball players on Earth, that I found out why he sped away.

He thought I was a cop.

Turned out Juan had failed to reject mediocrity. He was arrested for selling cocaine and eventually sentenced to one year in prison.

Go ahead and say it. Typical minority basketball player from the Bronx: good enough to play D-I but blows it by getting arrested. Sure, we could spend years debating whether a little 99-percent-white town could ever be a jury of Juan's peers. We could talk about why he felt he had to sell cocaine in the first place. We could talk about the hypocrisy of the legal system punishing petty drug dealers with much harsher penalties than those who drink and drive. But none of that matters. The fact is, Juan knew the consequences and shredded his D-I chances.

I thought he'd spent the rest of his life regretting not being really great. While I'm not the betting type, my chips were down on his story playing out as so many others' do: go in, meet up with more drug dealers, deal more drugs, get arrested again.

Isn't it great to be wrong sometimes?

After Juan was released from prison, Wells College men's basketball coach Joe Wojtylko came calling. After several hundred days living in a box, Juan wanted only to turn things around. "Something just woke me up," Paulino told AuburnPub.com in 2010. "It really helped that I went. It really helped that I went before it was too late. I learned a lot and decided to come back to school."

He wanted only to get his degree. The 6-foot-7 didn't want to be known as a baller. He wanted to be known as a good man and good father to his new daughter. But, Wojtylko's call lit the fire and passion that made Juan so great the previous one year before.

The Jay-Z lookalike with the one-foot grin spent 2009 and 2010 dominating. By the end of his second season, Juan was right back to 20/20 games.

A few camps and NBA teams sniffed around, but there were no takers. Juan ended up signing with an ABA team in Seattle and was eventually traded to New Jersey. It's clear he won't ever play with the likes of Rondo, Garnett or Pierce. He won't ever be really great on the basketball court. But, these days, Juan does reject mediocrity.

"I have a daughter now," Juan said in 2010. "I want her to see that I worked hard and I want her to do the same thing when she gets older. I want her to see that I have a diploma, that I wasn't a bum.”

Nope, he'll never be anything more than just great on the court. But don't try and convince me Juan Paulino didn't become really great.