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The Rules of Pacers Digest

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Whether your are a long standing forum member or whether you have just registered today, it's a good idea to read and review the rules below so that you have a very good idea of what to expect when you come to Pacers Digest.

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Below are the rules of Pacers Digest. After you have read them, you will have a very good sense of where we are coming from, what we expect, what we don't want to see, and how we react to things.

Rule #1

Pacers Digest is intended to be a place to discuss basketball without having to deal with the kinds of behaviors or attitudes that distract people from sticking with the discussion of the topics at hand. These unwanted distractions can come in many forms, and admittedly it can sometimes be tricky to pin down each and every kind that can rear its ugly head, but we feel that the following examples and explanations cover at least a good portion of that ground and should at least give people a pretty good idea of the kinds of things we actively discourage:

"Anyone who __________ is a liar / a fool / an idiot / a blind homer / has their head buried in the sand / a blind hater / doesn't know basketball / doesn't watch the games"

"People with intelligence will agree with me when I say that __________"

"Only stupid people think / believe / do ___________"

"I can't wait to hear something from PosterX when he/she sees that **insert a given incident or current event that will have probably upset or disappointed PosterX here**"

"He/she is just delusional"

"This thread is stupid / worthless / embarrassing"

"I'm going to take a moment to point and / laugh at PosterX / GroupOfPeopleY who thought / believed *insert though/belief here*"

"Remember when PosterX said OldCommentY that no longer looks good? "

In general, if a comment goes from purely on topic to something 'ad hominem' (personal jabs, personal shots, attacks, flames, however you want to call it, towards a person, or a group of people, or a given city/state/country of people), those are most likely going to be found intolerable.

We also dissuade passive aggressive behavior. This can be various things, but common examples include statements that are basically meant to imply someone is either stupid or otherwise incapable of holding a rational conversation. This can include (but is not limited to) laughing at someone's conclusions rather than offering an honest rebuttal, asking people what game they were watching, or another common problem is Poster X will say "that player isn't that bad" and then Poster Y will say something akin to "LOL you think that player is good". We're not going to tolerate those kinds of comments out of respect for the community at large and for the sake of trying to just have an honest conversation.

Now, does the above cover absolutely every single kind of distraction that is unwanted? Probably not, but you should by now have a good idea of the general types of things we will be discouraging. The above examples are meant to give you a good feel for / idea of what we're looking for. If something new or different than the above happens to come along and results in the same problem (that being, any other attitude or behavior that ultimately distracts from actually just discussing the topic at hand, or that is otherwise disrespectful to other posters), we can and we will take action to curb this as well, so please don't take this to mean that if you managed to technically avoid saying something exactly like one of the above examples that you are then somehow off the hook.

That all having been said, our goal is to do so in a generally kind and respectful way, and that doesn't mean the moment we see something we don't like that somebody is going to be suspended or banned, either. It just means that at the very least we will probably say something about it, quite possibly snipping out the distracting parts of the post in question while leaving alone the parts that are actually just discussing the topics, and in the event of a repeating or excessive problem, then we will start issuing infractions to try to further discourage further repeat problems, and if it just never seems to improve, then finally suspensions or bans will come into play. We would prefer it never went that far, and most of the time for most of our posters, it won't ever have to.

A slip up every once and a while is pretty normal, but, again, when it becomes repetitive or excessive, something will be done. Something occasional is probably going to be let go (within reason), but when it starts to become habitual or otherwise a pattern, odds are very good that we will step in.

There's always a small minority that like to push people's buttons and/or test their own boundaries with regards to the administrators, and in the case of someone acting like that, please be aware that this is not a court of law, but a private website run by people who are simply trying to do the right thing as they see it. If we feel that you are a special case that needs to be dealt with in an exceptional way because your behavior isn't explicitly mirroring one of our above examples of what we generally discourage, we can and we will take atypical action to prevent this from continuing if you are not cooperative with us.

Also please be aware that you will not be given a pass simply by claiming that you were 'only joking,' because quite honestly, when someone really is just joking, for one thing most people tend to pick up on the joke, including the person or group that is the target of the joke, and for another thing, in the event where an honest joke gets taken seriously and it upsets or angers someone, the person who is truly 'only joking' will quite commonly go out of his / her way to apologize and will try to mend fences. People who are dishonest about their statements being 'jokes' do not do so, and in turn that becomes a clear sign of what is really going on. It's nothing new.

In any case, quite frankly, the overall quality and health of the entire forum's community is more important than any one troublesome user will ever be, regardless of exactly how a problem is exhibiting itself, and if it comes down to us having to make a choice between you versus the greater health and happiness of the entire community, the community of this forum will win every time.

Lastly, there are also some posters, who are generally great contributors and do not otherwise cause any problems, who sometimes feel it's their place to provoke or to otherwise 'mess with' that small minority of people described in the last paragraph, and while we possibly might understand why you might feel you WANT to do something like that, the truth is we can't actually tolerate that kind of behavior from you any more than we can tolerate the behavior from them. So if we feel that you are trying to provoke those other posters into doing or saying something that will get themselves into trouble, then we will start to view you as a problem as well, because of the same reason as before: The overall health of the forum comes first, and trying to stir the pot with someone like that doesn't help, it just makes it worse. Some will simply disagree with this philosophy, but if so, then so be it because ultimately we have to do what we think is best so long as it's up to us.

If you see a problem that we haven't addressed, the best and most appropriate course for a forum member to take here is to look over to the left of the post in question. See underneath that poster's name, avatar, and other info, down where there's a little triangle with an exclamation point (!) in it? Click that. That allows you to report the post to the admins so we can definitely notice it and give it a look to see what we feel we should do about it. Beyond that, obviously it's human nature sometimes to want to speak up to the poster in question who has bothered you, but we would ask that you try to refrain from doing so because quite often what happens is two or more posters all start going back and forth about the original offending post, and suddenly the entire thread is off topic or otherwise derailed. So while the urge to police it yourself is understandable, it's best to just report it to us and let us handle it. Thank you!

All of the above is going to be subject to a case by case basis, but generally and broadly speaking, this should give everyone a pretty good idea of how things will typically / most often be handled.

Rule #2

If the actions of an administrator inspire you to make a comment, criticism, or express a concern about it, there is a wrong place and a couple of right places to do so.

The wrong place is to do so in the original thread in which the administrator took action. For example, if a post gets an infraction, or a post gets deleted, or a comment within a larger post gets clipped out, in a thread discussing Paul George, the wrong thing to do is to distract from the discussion of Paul George by adding your off topic thoughts on what the administrator did.

The right places to do so are:

A) Start a thread about the specific incident you want to talk about on the Feedback board. This way you are able to express yourself in an area that doesn't throw another thread off topic, and this way others can add their two cents as well if they wish, and additionally if there's something that needs to be said by the administrators, that is where they will respond to it.

B) Send a private message to the administrators, and they can respond to you that way.

If this is done the wrong way, those comments will be deleted, and if it's a repeating problem then it may also receive an infraction as well.

Rule #3

If a poster is bothering you, and an administrator has not or will not deal with that poster to the extent that you would prefer, you have a powerful tool at your disposal, one that has recently been upgraded and is now better than ever: The ability to ignore a user.

When you ignore a user, you will unfortunately still see some hints of their existence (nothing we can do about that), however, it does the following key things:

A) Any post they make will be completely invisible as you scroll through a thread.

B) The new addition to this feature: If someone QUOTES a user you are ignoring, you do not have to read who it was, or what that poster said, unless you go out of your way to click on a link to find out who it is and what they said.

To utilize this feature, from any page on Pacers Digest, scroll to the top of the page, look to the top right where it says 'Settings' and click that. From the settings page, look to the left side of the page where it says 'My Settings', and look down from there until you see 'Edit Ignore List' and click that. From here, it will say 'Add a Member to Your List...' Beneath that, click in the text box to the right of 'User Name', type in or copy & paste the username of the poster you are ignoring, and once their name is in the box, look over to the far right and click the 'Okay' button. All done!

Rule #4

Regarding infractions, currently they carry a value of one point each, and that point will expire in 31 days. If at any point a poster is carrying three points at the same time, that poster will be suspended until the oldest of the three points expires.

Rule #5

When you share or paste content or articles from another website, you must include the URL/link back to where you found it, who wrote it, and what website it's from. Said content will be removed if this doesn't happen.

An example:

If I copy and paste an article from the Indianapolis Star website, I would post something like this:

http://www.linktothearticlegoeshere.com/article
Title of the Article
Author's Name
Indianapolis Star

Rule #6

We cannot tolerate illegal videos on Pacers Digest. This means do not share any links to them, do not mention any websites that host them or link to them, do not describe how to find them in any way, and do not ask about them. Posts doing anything of the sort will be removed, the offenders will be contacted privately, and if the problem becomes habitual, you will be suspended, and if it still persists, you will probably be banned.

The legal means of watching or listening to NBA games are NBA League Pass Broadband (for US, or for International; both cost money) and NBA Audio League Pass (which is free). Look for them on NBA.com.

Rule #7

Provocative statements in a signature, or as an avatar, or as the 'tagline' beneath a poster's username (where it says 'Member' or 'Administrator' by default, if it is not altered) are an unwanted distraction that will more than likely be removed on sight. There can be shades of gray to this, but in general this could be something political or religious that is likely going to provoke or upset people, or otherwise something that is mean-spirited at the expense of a poster, a group of people, or a population.

It may or may not go without saying, but this goes for threads and posts as well, particularly when it's not made on the off-topic board (Market Square).

We do make exceptions if we feel the content is both innocuous and unlikely to cause social problems on the forum (such as wishing someone a Merry Christmas or a Happy Easter), and we also also make exceptions if such topics come up with regards to a sports figure (such as the Lance Stephenson situation bringing up discussions of domestic abuse and the law, or when Jason Collins came out as gay and how that lead to some discussion about gay rights).

However, once the discussion seems to be more/mostly about the political issues instead of the sports figure or his specific situation, the thread is usually closed.

Rule #8

We prefer self-restraint and/or modesty when making jokes or off topic comments in a sports discussion thread. They can be fun, but sometimes they derail or distract from a topic, and we don't want to see that happen. If we feel it is a problem, we will either delete or move those posts from the thread.

Rule #9

Generally speaking, we try to be a "PG-13" rated board, and we don't want to see sexual content or similarly suggestive content. Vulgarity is a more muddled issue, though again we prefer things to lean more towards "PG-13" than "R". If we feel things have gone too far, we will step in.

Rule #10

We like small signatures, not big signatures. The bigger the signature, the more likely it is an annoying or distracting signature.

Rule #11

Do not advertise anything without talking about it with the administrators first. This includes advertising with your signature, with your avatar, through private messaging, and/or by making a thread or post.
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Never Blink - Thomas Robinson's Story

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  • Never Blink - Thomas Robinson's Story

    It looked like a lot of people heard about this on/before draft night, but I had not heard it and I assume other have not either. I wanted to share it though, I respected Kansas after the KU/Purdue game this year, and I will definitely be rooting for TRob to make it now.

    This story appears in the Nov. 14, 2011, issue of ESPN The Magazine.

    HE STILL GROANS WHENEVER his phone rings. If he had his way,he'd never answer it again. You're better off texting him, or just going to find him at his home away from home -- the gym. Sometimes he's at Allen Fieldhouse three times a day, for the sole purpose of self-preservation. He's in there shooting, lifting and running with only two things on his mind: his little sister and a tree.

    The sister, 8-year-old Jayla, is an aspiring pianist with a smile that could light up 15 city blocks. He just wishes he'd see it more. As for the tree, it's barely six weeks old and stands inconspicuously outside the fieldhouse, feeding off the autumn mist and growing day by day.

    He stops and inspects it every time he's walking to the arena sometimes he'll stay for 10 minutes, lost in his thoughts, his hopes and dreams. When the campus gardeners planted the tree in October, he wrote a letter and buried it with the roots. If what he wrote in that letter comes true, Jayla will be set for life. If it doesn't, it won't be because he didn't try.

    "EARL! EARL! Come up in this kitchen right now and learn to cook, Earl!"

    Lisa Robinson had a son to raise, and because life is unpredictable, she was always preparing him for emergencies. Maybe she'd have to work late babysitting mentally disabled children, or maybe her chronic high blood pressure would incapacitate her for a day. Someone would have to cook, someone would have to take care of his baby sister. That's why Lisa was always hollering for Earl.

    His full name is Thomas Earl Robinson, and while everyone else in southeast Washington, D.C., called him Thomas or T-Rob, Lisa always summoned him by his middle name. Earl was her "yeah, you heard me" name, the one that made Thomas come running. She was the only one allowed to call him that, because to him, Earl sounded like an old man's name. And he never wanted to be older than his years.

    Besides, being Thomas was getting him attention on the basketball court. As a young teenager, he was raw offensively, but coaches have a soft spot for kids who can run all day and live to rebound. By 2008,Thomas' junior year at Riverdale Baptist High School in Upper Marlboro, Md., the college scouts were lurking. Before his senior year -- and now with a build of a Greek god -- he transferred to higher-profile Brewster Academy in Wolfeboro, N.H., and the buzz was that he was among the top 30 or 40 players in the nation.

    Kansas coach Bill Self was already frothing. He had first seen Thomas in the summer of 2008 at the Reebok All-American Camp in Philadelphia, and as much as Self loves McDonald's All-Americans, he adores raw prospects with high motors. "The thing I remembered is how hard he tried," Self says. "I said, 'Am I missing something in this kid? He looks better than everybody else here.'"

    Kansas started calling -- ahead of Memphis, Pitt and Kentucky -- but Lisa wanted nothing to do with the Jayhawks' program. Kansas was too far away. She was afraid of flying and didn't have enough money for an airline ticket anyway. It was hard enough that her son was spending his senior year in New Hampshire, so she was not having Kansas; she flat-out told Thomas she was crossing the school off his list.

    Lisa, a single mother, was a disciplinarian unafraid to grab her son by the ear. Her mantra: Never blink. But Thomas also considered her his best friend; they'd talk about everything -- girls, movies, even the father who had no part in his life. So when it came to his college choice, he pleaded his case and brought other family members into the discussion. The extended group included his grandmother, Shirley Gladys White, who often babysat him; his grandfather, Willatant Austin Sr., who loved hoops; and even his half brother, Jamah, who was eight years older and lived on the other side of town.

    Thomas told all of them that he thought Kansas basketball had a family feel. And he told Lisa about Marcus and Markieff Morris, twins who were skilled big men and could mentor him. Better yet, their mother, Angel, lived in Lawrence and served as a second mom to just about every player. They all called her Miss Angel.

    Lisa agreed to a home visit in September 2008, though Self knew she remained skeptical. The minute the coach walked in, she said, "So you're the man who's been giving me headaches." But once they hugged and she sensed the coach's sincerity, all was forgiven. Self was particularly taken with Jayla, who grinned wide, asked her mom for a Jayhawk doll and wanted to see the apps on the coach's iPhone. "Not a cuter girl out there than Jayla," says Self, who loved her energy. Lisa fell for Self as well, and Thomas committed to Kansas soon after.

    Still, the day in 2009 when Thomas left DC for Lawrence was a melancholy one for Lisa. After her son made it to campus, she called Angel Morris to introduce herself and talk mother to mother. "Please make sure my baby is doing okay," Lisa pleaded. "Can you check that he's not eating pizza every night and that he's doing his work? Can you please take care of my baby Earl?"

    A FULL SEASON LATER, Lisa still hadn't made it to the KU campus. So when the Jayhawks were scheduled to play Memphis at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 7, 2010, Lisa and Jayla drove the five hours from DC. Before the game, Thomas proudly introduced them to his teammates and their moms, and everyone noticed how he doted on his baby sister. "He loves that little girl," says Jayhawks guard Elijah Johnson, Thomas' roommate. "She's his world." Thomas had always considered her his sidekick. Jayla was born in 2003, just as Jamah was moving out; when Lisa was working, Jayla would have to tag along to Thomas' basketball practices.

    Twelve years older than Jayla, Thomas also saw himself as her protector. Lisa gave him leeway to discipline Jayla, so when the girl showed up in New York wearing multiple earrings, Thomas wagged his finger. "Why does Jayla have all those earrings?" he asked Lisa. "They're too grown up for her. You need to take the earrings off."

    It was as if he were Jayla's dad. Her real father, James Paris (who is not Thomas' dad), had recently finished serving a prison term for distribution of a controlled substance. Lisa and Jayla had visited him in jail, but according to family members, Paris had never played a consistent role in the girl's life. Thomas had always been the male that Jayla depended on, a responsibility he relished. So when Thomas said so, those earrings came off.

    At the Garden, Lisa also visited with Angel and confided that she'd recently found out her parents had little time to live. Both were being treated for serious illnesses in a DC hospital. Lisa, who was stressed and experiencing intense headaches, asked Angel not to tell Thomas. She wanted nothing to disturb his basketball.

    At that night's game, Thomas, a bruising forward and Self's kinetic sixth man, was sensational. He had 10 points and 10 rebounds in 15 minutes, and with Kansas comfortably ahead, he sat at the end of the bench so he could quickly hug Lisa and kiss Jayla, who were seated nearby. "Having a good game and seeing my mom happy was priceless," he says. After the 81-68 Kansas win, he was first out of the locker room so the family would have more time to visit before the team plane left for Lawrence. Angel took a photo of Lisa, Jayla and Thomas embracing. She promised to send copies.

    Seeing his mom and sister made Thomas miss them even more. He began spending additional time with Miss Angel and the twins. Marcus and Markieff had heard Lisa call Thomas "Earl" back in New York, and when they and some other teammates jokingly said "Pass me the ball, Earl" at practice, Thomas just stared back at them. "He had the best physique on the team," says Barry Hinson, the Jayhawks' director of men's basketball operations. No one dared call him Earl again. The name belonged to Lisa.
    Nancy Newberry for ESPN The MagazineFalling on basketball helped the Jayhawks star through his darkest days.

    By late December, Thomas had settled back into his Lawrence routine. But before practice one day, he noticed Lisa had been calling his cellphone. He dialed her back and received the bad news: his grandmother had died. As Thomas wept on the phone, Lisa, who faithfully read the Bible, assured him that everything happens for a reason. When Self saw his player sobbing in the gym, the coach urged him to take the day off. But Thomas insisted on practicing. Never blink.

    When he returned to DC for the funeral, Thomas was a rock for Lisa and Jayla -- and hid his own emotions. Three weeks later, in the middle of January, the phone rang again; this time his grandfather had died. "I'm thinking, This is bad," Thomas says. "This shouldn't be happening. I'm not even over my grandmother yet. Far from it. And now I get the call that my grandfather passed."

    Lisa told him not to fly in for the funeral. He had a season to play, and she wanted to protect him. But she also didn't want Thomas to see what was happening to her. After her mother died, Lisa's headaches and blood pressure worsened, and when she arrived at the morgue with a friend, she needed help getting out of the car. She was in physical pain at her mother's funeral, some of which Thomas noticed, but Lisa never revealed to him that the doctors subsequently found a clogged artery in her heart.

    The only person Lisa told in Kansas was Angel, and after Thomas' grandfather died, Angel began calling Lisa regularly. On Jan. 20, Angel phoned and could hear Lisa fussing at Jayla in the background. A few weeks earlier, while Jayla stayed with relatives, Lisa had undergone an angioplasty. She was feeling a little better but was still suffering with intense headaches. Angel sensed that Lisa was overwrought and urged her to go to the ER, but Lisa said she had a new medication and wanted to try it out first.

    The next night, Friday, Jan. 21, the Jayhawks players watched film in preparation for a pivotal Big 12 home game against Texas. Afterward, around 11 p.m., the Morris twins recall they were kicking back in Thomas' room when his cellphone rang. "It's from home, man," he said. "I hope it's not any more bad news."

    "Pick it up," Markieff said.

    "Forget it. I'm not answering."

    Thomas let the call go to voice mail, then checked the message. It was from Jayla; she was crying and begged Thomas to call her back.

    He dialed Lisa's cellphone, but she didn't pick up. "Oh man, I don't know what's going on," Marcus said. Thomas' eyes were watering, and the twins were starting to tear up. He dialed his mom's home phone, and Jayla answered. She told him that Lisa had had a heart attack. Their mother was dead.

    Thomas dropped his phone, sobbing. In less than a month, he had lost both maternal grandparents and his mother. The twins called Angel, who, when hearing the news, yelled, "Oh my god." She immediately left for Thomas' apartment and phoned Self on the way. The coach started weeping. "He was crying, I was crying," Angel says. "I said, 'Coach, we gotta get ourselves together. Because we both got to walk through that door and be there with that kid.'"

    They found Thomas slumped on his bed, surrounded by teammates. When Self entered the bedroom, the players cleared, and the coach asked Thomas: "What can I do to help? Is there anybody you need to talk to tonight?" Thomas had been sobbing uncontrollably. But he stopped, dry-heaved and looked up at Self. "Coach, you don't understand. I don't have anybody. All I have is my sister. All I have is Jayla."

    THE NEXT 12 HOURS were a blur. Thomas kept howling that Jayla needed to fly to Lawrence and pleaded to Angel: "Just don't leave me. Can you stick with me through the entire thing?" Self called the team doctor, who said to make sure Thomas wasn't left alone. Angel brought him to guard Josh Selby's mother's house, which was quieter; he didn't fall asleep until about 4 a.m. The other players were up most of the night as well, with the Texas game only hours away.

    The team met that morning for its pregame shootaround, and out of the blue, Thomas arrived in uniform. Self hadn't expected him to play, but Thomas remembered how Lisa had always prepared him for emergencies, how she ordered him to never blink. He found himself being pulled to Allen Fieldhouse, and once he arrived, he asked Self if he could address the group.

    "Nobody treat me different," he told the players and staff. "I don't want anybody to baby me. Babying me is not going to help me get through. I don't need the coaches not to yell at me. I'm a grown man."

    When he finished, he was the only one not in tears. Self asked whether Thomas wanted the PA announcer to ask for a moment of silence, but Thomas said he couldn't endure it. Self reminded him that Lisa had never been to a home game; this would be the way to finally get her there. Thomas agreed, and the second he checked into the game, Allen Fieldhouse erupted. "It wasn't loud in a fan way," Hinson says. "It was, if there is such a thing, loud in a loving way. I looked around, and I mean grown men, ladies, kids, students, little ones -- just tears."

    The team played the first six and a half minutes on adrenaline, leading 18-3, but finished the game on fumes. The Jayhawks' shots kept rimming out. In the stands, Angel kept repeating three words: "Release the rims." Hearing her, guard Tyshawn Taylor's mom, Jeanell, asked, "Who are you talking to?"

    Angel replied: "Lisa. She's here."

    But two hours later, the Jayhawks' 69-game home winning streak was over. Hinson accompanied Thomas to DC, with Angel following the next day for the funeral. Angel shielded Jayla as best she could, while Thomas and Jamah picked out a casket and an outfit in which Lisa would be buried. Even more difficult for Thomas was entering her apartment. He took her favorite sweater, some photos and her Bible as mementos, but he quickly had to get out of there. All Angel kept saying was, "Baby, it's going to be okay."

    Out of necessity for Jayla, Thomas tried to remain a rock. The funeral -- paid for by KU, with the blessing of the NCAA -- was held during a snowstorm, and the electricity was out for much of the gray afternoon. But for Thomas, the day brightened a bit when the entire Kansas team walked, single file, into the church. Afterward, the KU coaches watched Jayla cling to Thomas on the way to the hearse, and one by one they began thinking the same thing: We'll adopt her.

    IT WASN'T JUST FOR SHOW. Bill and Cindy Self, who had raised a son and daughter, were serious about gaining custody of Jayla. Assistant coaches Danny Manning, Joe Dooley and Kurtis Townsend, as well as Hinson and Angel, made similar inquiries. But that wasn't the half of it. Kansas fans around the state were e-mailing and texting, offering to be Jayla's guardians. They were also donating cash to a newly formed scholarship fund for her.

    Still in a fog, Thomas was grateful. But he was the one who wanted custody, even though he was living in the Jayhawker Towers apartments and had a full load of classes. It didn't seem feasible that a 19-year-old basketball player could raise a second-grader, which is why Self and his staff were willing to step in. But up until Lisa's funeral, Thomas was still thinking of ways to fly Jayla to Lawrence, still looking into area grammar schools. "He thinks every day of his life, Jayla, Jayla, Jayla," Angel says.

    What Thomas didn't expect was the fast bond Jayla was forging with her dad, James Paris, back in DC. Perhaps Jayla was subconsciously gravitating to the only parent she had left, but Thomas noticed Jayla latching on to James and his three sisters. James implored Thomas to let Jayla stay with him. Rather than uproot a brokenhearted little girl, Thomas gave his approval.

    "I have a lot of mixed feelings about James," says Thomas. "But he loves his daughter and she loves him, so that's something that I thought about, as far as me wanting to take my little sister. She'd lost a lot, and all she knows is me and him. So I couldn't be selfish. That's why she's home.

    "It kills me. I pray the days go by fast sometimes, just so I can see her. I wished that she could be with me here right by my side. But it wasn't the best timing for it, you know?"

    Thomas' uncle, Willatant Austin Jr., who had filed for custody of Jayla, took Paris to court in the spring, claiming he was unfit to be a parent. (Lawyers have advised both Paris and Austin not to comment.) For his part, Thomas just wanted the legal haggling to stop. He was drawing up his own long-term plan for Jayla, and he began implementing it on Jan. 29 against Kansas State, his first game after Lisa's funeral. Coming off the bench to another tearful ovation -- "I couldn't even look up," Hinson says, "because I'm bawling like a baby with about 16,000 other people" -- Thomas was a beast. He scored 17 points, shooting 7-for-11, and in the stands Angel thanked Lisa for releasing the rims. Thomas, then a sophomore, was the best player on the court, including the twins, and there was one overriding reason: "My whole purpose of playing basketball was different," Thomas says. "I don't care about the points anymore. I don't care about the stats. I don't care about being the man. This was just a stepping-stone for me to get where I have to go.

    "I want Jayla with me. I want full responsibility for everything. And I was in a position that if I took care of business with basketball, everything I wanted for her could become possible."

    His teammates could sense what was happening. At first, they had wrestled with the deaths, wondering why a good kid would have to bury three relatives in a month. But they would hear Thomas, quoting Lisa, say that everything happens for a reason. They soon realized what that was: The deaths motivated Thomas to become a star. He had to take care of Jayla.

    The plan was delayed, if not derailed, last February when Thomas needed surgery to repair a meniscus tear in his right knee. After coming back, he didn't even score in KU's Elite Eight loss to Virginia Commonwealth. But that just made him more determined.

    Over the summer, Thomas was a workaholic. He wouldn't take a day off and was the most electric player at the Amar'e Stoudemire Skills Academy, outplaying even Ohio State's Jared Sullinger. "He has the speed of Kobe and a body like LeBron's," Markieff says. "Sky's the limit."

    When Thomas wasn't on the court, he was back in DC with Jayla or on the phone with her. She'd begun asking when she could live with him. He'd tell her: "Soon, baby. Soon." What he didn't tell her is that the minute he gets to the NBA, he is going to request full custody and move her in with him.

    "I would never say he needs to leave for the NBA," Self says, "but I hope Thomas is able to leave. I hope this is his last year at the University of Kansas. Selfishly I want him to stay. We would win more games. But it needs to be his last year."

    Now a 6'9", 237-pound junior, Thomas is no longer a sixth man. In a preseason poll, he was voted first-team All-America by CBSSports.com. Some NBA scouts are even predicting he could be the No. 1 overall pick in the next draft. In the meantime, he lives part-time with Angel, who is fulfilling her promise to Lisa and keeping an apartment in Lawrence, even though her twins were both NBA lottery picks in June. Angel also flies regularly to DC to check on Jayla, who, because of her scholarship fund, is attending private school and learning piano. And on both Thomas' and Jayla's bedroom wall is the same photograph -- the picture Angel took at Madison Square Garden of Lisa and the two kids, hugging.

    "I'm still scared for my little sister," Thomas says. "I cry and I complain about how it's not fair for me, but she's going through way more. She's 8 years old. She ain't got the memories that I got with my mom. I just feel like I can't stop. I got to do something to where I make her so happy that she'll never have to go through any pain in her life ever. No more bad phone calls. None of us can have any more bad phone calls."

    Basketball and Jayla: That's about all Thomas thinks about. When Self recently suggested planting a tree in memory of Lisa outside Allen Fieldhouse, a place she never lived to see, Thomas thought it was the quintessential idea. He and Self watched the gardeners dig the hole, and Thomas placed his letter in with the roots. It reads:

    Mom,
    I guarantee you have no worries about Jayla.
    I will make sure everything is okay. I won't blink.
    My promise.

    Love,
    Earl
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