Is the AND1 Mixtape tour dead?

[DatZNasty]

I can't wait to read it. I was going to post a very detailed post about a lot of the factors why it is the way it is right now.

Vincent Da, you work with the Flight Brothers right? Please ask Werm why he wears Shaq's. I played with those dudes 2 weekends ago, played Alimoe 1 on 1 on Wednesday, dudes called me at work that day telling me to be ready because Alimoe said he like my guy and he want to play me so he can start getting back into it.

It wasn't quite And 1 though. For one, many of the And 1 guys split and went to Ball 4 Real, which is generally the exact same thing except apparently they have part ownership in it now and keep more of their own money. And even when they were with And 1, guys are still individuals outside of their And 1 commitments so they commonly would get together, about 12 of them, and go do a few cities and make some money on their own. The people who were there was AO, Alimoe, Hot Sauce, Werm, Hi Riza, White Chocolate, Swoal, ILLBRB, and Violator.

White Chocolate was scared to play me at the Open Run too. He was calling random people out after the Open Run and playing them 1 on 1 (even taking ball first himself) to 1, and was calling tons of bad ass fouls and cheating to win, but he didn't challenge nobody over like 5'4. Then he's like "Who else want some?!" and talking trash and I was grab the ball like I'll play and Joe Po (the mic guy) says, "Yea Chocolate, you don't want it with my man Malik Yoba," (the nickname he gave me, google him, I'll admit I do look kind of like him) and White Chocolate looked at me, looked up and down, and then is like, "Fuck it I'm tired, play Hot Sauce." And Sauce wasn't playing nobody, he was just shooting around and joking with people. Total ***** move from Chocolate on that, but yea he would have lost easily. I'm too tall for that corny ass move he kept doing and would have blocked his pansy ass layup easily or picked his sloppy handle. If nothing else, force him into a bad shot, get the rebound, and post him up.

[Balla_Status]

I know a couple dudes that went on tour with Ball4Real providing music and ****. Decent rappers too, probably the best out of AZ. Its lost a lot of the TV hype but that **** happens to gimmicks. From what I hear people still come to there tour.

[Mathius]

I don't know, but it should be.

I love streetball and I love AND1 as a brand, those t-shirts with trash talking phrases from the 90s are classic, but the kind of streetball that evolved from AND1 tours in the early 00s is pure crap. I lost all respect for that after I saw footage of a guy cross another guy over and then throw a ball into the crowd and raise his arms in triumph, as if the objective of the game was to embarass someone and not putting the ball into the basket.

The first priority should be putting the ball into the damn basket and embarassing someone should be a bonus, not the other way around. As soon as it becomes that, I lose all interest, I don't even see the relevance if a guy embarasses another one for the sake of embrassment.

AND1 isn't responsible for the decline of basketball. Before AND1 there was MTV rock 'n jock, before that the Globe Trotters. There are probably more I don't know about.

The decline of basketball has more to do with David Stern and co. tampering with the game in negative ways (too many expansion teams, changing the rules) and poor coaches not doing enough to instill discipline and fundementals. Hell, I'm not even sure the casual fan understands the game as much as they did 10 years ago.

AND1 is what it is. Entertainment. It's not about the NBA, it's a different kind of entertainment. It's like trying to compare UFC to WWE.

There isn't, and wasn't, anything wrong with AND1, if you accept it for what it is. And it was a great experience for the kids who were good enough to travel with the team, and maybe win some prizes and notority over the years.

Mathius

[DatZNasty]

I can't wait to read it. I was going to post a very detailed post about a lot of the factors why it is the way it is right now.

Oh yea Vincent Da, show Werm and Swoal this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgTEkJ5YOr8 I don't know why the sound didn't extract with the video, but if you got some better software, and I'm sure you do, the entire game is at http://www.vimeo.com/1117921 and you can find the Swoal dunk attempt at the 19:37 mark and the Werm dunk attempt at 28:42 if you want to cut them.

Like I said above, I was still flabbergasted by Werm's Shaq's. I mean Shaq's, not even Starbury's. AO had them on too, some black ones.

[Da KO King]

White Chocolate was scared to play me at the Open Run too. He was calling random people out after the Open Run and playing them 1 on 1 (even taking ball first himself) to 1, and was calling tons of bad ass fouls and cheating to win, but he didn't challenge nobody over like 5'4. Then he's like "Who else want some?!" and talking trash and I was grab the ball like I'll play and Joe Po (the mic guy) says, "Yea Chocolate, you don't want it with my man Malik Yoba," (the nickname he gave me, google him, I'll admit I do look kind of like him) and White Chocolate looked at me, looked up and down, and then is like, "Fuck it I'm tired, play Hot Sauce." And Sauce wasn't playing nobody, he was just shooting around and joking with people. Total ***** move from Chocolate on that, but yea he would have lost easily. I'm too tall for that corny ass move he kept doing and would have blocked his pansy ass layup easily or picked his sloppy handle. If nothing else, force him into a bad shot, get the rebound, and post him up.

Randy (I refuse to call him by a stupid nickname he gave himself) sucks. He quite honestly is one of the worst well known players I have ever seen. There is literally no skill he performs at a level above a high school rating.

[BFRESH44]

"Yea Chocolate, you don't want it with my man Malik Yoba,"

[DCL]

the and1 homeboys are keeping it real and selling drugs now. no more fake sh!t.

[DatZNasty]

Randy (I refuse to call him by a stupid nickname he gave himself) sucks. He quite honestly is one of the worst well known players I have ever seen. There is literally no skill he performs at a level above a high school rating.

Nothing, not even dribbling which he is famous for. His breakdown moves suck and are sloppy looking, his normal dribbling sucks and is sloppy, but I'll give it to him he can shoot a little bit. I still maintain that myself, or any defender who is playing with a bit of intensity and taller than 5'10, blocks or contests every one of his jumpers though because his release is slow, has too low of a release point (about his forehead) for someone so short, and his transition of the dribble into his shooting motion is slow. Like I said, he didn't play anybody taller than 5'4. Dude was high as a kite too after the game when they were all in the booth splitting up the attendance money.


>>>>>

[Efunk7]

white chocoloate is a rat looking dude...i'm still confused how he won that mtv streetball thing a few years back...

[GOBB]

Only a matter of time before big wigs saw some financial gain by pimpin and1. I cant knock the and1 ballers. They are getting money to play basketball and travel places they would never have in thier lifetime. It pays bills, puts food on the table and keeps some out of trouble.

I dunno if the hype died down or the tough criticism that followed it finally won. and1 has always been about entertaining the crowd but knowing when to and when to play the game to win. Maybe that got lost in the shuffle. Everyone wants to be the highlight reel without skill or display any.

For people who play that kind of streetball, are calls out the window? Because some guys do tricks that require you to travel with the ball. Eh

[DatZNasty]

The game we played was relatively clean of intentional violations. I mean, maybe you carry or come close on a hesitation move or a crossover, but so do dudes in the league and get away with it. Sauce has like 2 moves that are blatant double dribbles (he hit me with it ). The play was very rough though and White Chocolate still does that one from like 97 where he cuffs the ball and spins while taking it around your head. I guess when pat Da Roc kicks it up to himself and spins it on his They bring their own refs and tell them not to call anything unless it's just super egregious in terms of fouls and moving screens, and when the game gets close they get every call and start making up stuff. But yea, it's really rough. Dudes would just run up on you and one would grab you around the waist and the 2nd would steal the ball from you. Violator and Swoal stayed throwing elbows. And if they wanted to throw a lob of like an in bounds but you were defending it too well, someone would just grab you instead of screening you.

So yea, generally calls are out the window. I think if I just came down and tried to run from the 3pt line for no reason it'd be called though, like it'd have to be something blatant and absurd. If you were playing D and forced somebody to pick up their dribble with nowhere to go, I mean they wouldn't just be like "fuck it, it's streetball" and start back dribbling again. It's like you can get away with something, if it's in the process of making a play like part of a move. Again, that's not terribly different from the league though. We see guys get away with an extra step on a breakaway all the time, or get underneath the ball on their crossovers. Handchecking though, absolutely allowed. There was 3 foul calls the whole game, one of them being in the Youtube clip I posted above when Ty "blocked" Werm on the dunk and 1 jumpball called.

I'm going to cut out the part of the game where I got called for a travel. It was a Tim Donaghy level call.

And I'm a product tester for And1's new basketball shoes coming out. I got a package Friday in fact, some shoes that won't be out until Feb 09. Part of their problem is they lost a lot of their people, and they're also closing down their performance basketball division shoes and just sticking with shoes in the 60-75$ range, which leads to them using cheaper textiles, and thusly an inferior product. Their availability is becoming non existent except for off price stores like TJ Maxx, Ross, Marshall's, and the biggest problem with the show is it never has had a set timeslot and thusly no good promotion. You'd just be up one night and then see it was on.

They could still fill up NBA arenas if they started coming back with the DVDs, got their clothes back in malls, got their tour show (they tour year round so they're somewhere right now) back on TV, and retroed some off their classics like 2Chis, Tai Chis, and the first Starburys.

They seem content and accepting to be falling to the bottom of the map.