If Tyler Ulis is 5-9, then I’m 6’1″. Ulis is listed at 5’9″ 145. Yes, you’ve read that correctly. He’s never the less blossomed into the fourth ranked point guard in the country and the 24th best prospect overall. The Chicago Heights, Ill., native heads to Lexington to be the next dominant John Calipari point guard.
See Derrick Rose, Tyreke Evans, John Wall, Andrew Harrison, Marquis Teague, Brandon Knight and Archie Goodwin. Tyler Ulis has the potential to be the next Coach Cal floor general, but this week he was something much more. He had the most profound soundbite (his future teammate Karl Towns had the funniest) of all during McDonald’s All-American Media Day, and may have been the event’s most eloquent speaker.
“Proud to represent Chicago and show ’em that there’s a little more to it than just the violence you see on tv, so it’s great to bring something positive,” Tyler Ulis said.
The next day, I followed up on that by asking Duke Blue Devils bound Jahlil Okafor, the nation’s #1 overall recruit, also from Chicago, what he thought about Ulis’ comment.
“It’s a great feeling to shed some positive limelight on the city of Chicago,” Okafor said.
“There’s a lot of talent coming out of Chicago and a lot of positive things, not just basketball.”
You can partially thank the CNN documentary series Pro Rahm Emanuel political infomercial “Chicagoland,” directed by people connected to the Mayor’s brother, for further perpetuating the gangland shooting stereotypes about the city of Chicago. If you can stomach Mark Konkol’s “voice fit for the print medium” narration of the series, and if CNN can tear themselves away from whatever BREAKING NEWS! EXCLUSIVE they have on the search for MH370, which is almost always in reality some minutia that we’ve realized isn’t all that significant days ago, I suggest you check out one episode of Chicagoland, if only for irony’s sake.
However, Chicago is also known for basketball. Michael Jordan, the greatest player of all time, led the greatest team and the greatest dynasty in basketball history in the very same room where Tyler Ulis talk with the media about the prestige and the pressure of the Kentucky Wildcats program, the recruiting prowess of John Calipari, the upcoming Final Four. And of course, the harsh critics of Coach Cal and Kentucky.
“He’s honest, he doesn’t lie to you,” Ulis said of Calipari.
“He doesn’t try to boost your head, and just tells you straight up if you’re not built for Kentucky, you can’t play there. He’s not going to hide you. It’s the spotlight.”
UK is not for everybody, Coach Cal will be the first one to tell you that.
“I don’t think it’s pressure, it’s basketball it’s what I feel I have to do. He’s (Calipari) is hard on his point guards, but it’s great. He has a history of sending his players to the NBA. Right now Andrew Harrison is playing great and he’s taking his team to the Final Four.”
In addition to being the capital of NBA history, Chicago is also the capital of high school basketball. The #McDAAG has found it’s home here. No city has come remotely close to hosting it as many times as the Second City has.
No other city can match it for attendance figures, and as long as that’s true, I don’t see it leaving the city of big shoulders any time soon. With Tyler Ulis and Jahili Okafor, the 2014 #McDAAAG had a perfect home in the Windy City.
“In Chicago we love basketball, particularly high school basketball,” Jahil said.
Paul M. Banks owns The Sports Bank.net, an affiliate of Fox Sports. He’s also a frequent guest on national talk radio. Banks is a former contributor to NBC Chicago and the Washington Times, who’s been featured on the History Channel. President Obama follows him on Twitter (@paulmbanks)