an Arkie 30 for 30

[polksalet]

By Nate Olson

Basil Shabazz’s freakish athleticism and four-sport prowess made national headlines in 1991. The Pine Bluff senior rushed for five touchdowns in the Zebras’ state title win over Texarkana. It was the beginning of all-state honors in four different sports. College scholarships poured in and pro scouts and shoe company execs drooled.

“I haven’t seen an athlete dominate so many sports,” said Carlos James, Shabazz’s high school football teammate and head baseball coach at Arkansas-Monticello. “There have been other guys that have broken some his records and comparisons have been made, but there hasn’t been all-around athlete like (Shabazz). That guy hasn’t come through, yet.”

Shabazz never made millions playing pro sports or ran in the Olympics, but he found fulfillment helping others and raising a family.

“I have no regrets,” Shabazz said. “I played the hand I was dealt. I did the best I could in the situation I was in. I’m not blaming anyone, but there were reasons I didn’t make it.”

Shabazz split his early years between Little Rock and California before settling in Pine Bluff. It didn’t take the 12-year-old long to get “Pine Bluff cut” (street smart). Drug dealers lurked and gang bangers patrolled the Plum Street neighborhood. According to Shabazz, he and his brothers, coped with poverty and no electricity while what little money the family had often went to pay his mother’s gambling debts.

Sports became his refuge. He played pickup basketball and sand lot football with his friends James and future big-leaguer Torii Hunter. He even invented a form of street cross training, chasing rabbits on his dirt road.

“I caught a few of them,” Shabazz said. “I figured out if I could get them to the asphalt they didn’t have enough traction. When I ran the ball (in high school) I was known for how I changed directions so well. I developed that chasing rabbits.”

He also swam laps but not in chlorine-filled pool.

“Behind Safeway the loading docks where the big trucks unloaded, there would sometimes be six feet of water there,” he said. “That helped with my endurance.”

Shabazz dunked a basketball by the sixth grade. But it wasn’t until he took the field with the Falcons pee-wee football team he knew he had a special ability. After the third game “people realized I was a different breed than the other kids. It made me work harder,” Shabazz said.

Shabazz earned all-state honors in football, started on the basketball team and scorched the track. His 4x100-meter team set a record (40.9 seconds that still stands). Recruiting letters from football powers flowed in, setting the stage for a tumultuous senior year.

However, college athletics were not an option because Shabazz was unable to score the required 17 on the ACT.

Football did open a door, though. Legendary late Zebra baseball coach Billy Bock also assisted with the football team. Before the 1990 title game, he promised if Shabazz scored four touchdowns, he could play baseball that spring. Bock ran a tight ship, and didn’t want players that didn’t start the program as sophomores. Shabazz opted to run track. He took Bock’s challenge and ran for five touchdowns in a 33-13 romp over Texarkana.

“(Bock) said, ‘I’ll have a jersey waiting for you. That was the most amazing thing I have ever seen,’” Shabazz said.

Shabazz only played half his senior baseball season but hit .351. That was good enough for the Cardinals to draft him in the third round and offer a $150,000 signing bonus. However, Shabazz’s career hit a tailspin. He and Hunter were arrested on a visit to the University of Central Arkansas. Hunter had visited a dorm room, while Shabazz rested in the truck. Shabazz awoke to a thumping on the window. The police were outside of the truck with guns drawn.

Police searched the truck and found a “beat up” Josh Gordon cigarette under the back seat and Shabazz’s registered handgun.

“They said, ‘Look what we have here,’ when they found the joint,” Shabazz said. “When they called it in on the radio they said, ‘Basil Shabazz of the St. Louis Cardinals and Torii Hutner of the Minnesota Twins.’” Shabazz said.

The friends spent then night in jail and faced misdemeanor drug charges and Shabazz dealt with a charge of possession of a weapon on a college campus. All charges were later dropped. The Twins stuck by Hunter, but the Cardinals released Shabazz.

“That ruined my career,” Shabazz said. “(The Cardinals) didn’t even wait to see if I was innocent. I wasn’t even charged, and my career was over.”

Milwaukee signed Shabazz, and he played in AA El Paso before his release after that season. Later in the year Nasa, 25, was mysteriously murdered in New Orleans while at a nightclub with acquaintances.

Shabazz had one last hope. He enrolled at Arkansas-Pine Bluff and played during the 1996 and 1997 seasons. UAPB had a starting tailback in Ray Neely, relegating Shabazz to cornerback. His college football career ended when he broke bones in his neck covering a kickoff against Southern.

But his experience at UAPB rewarded him in another way. Shabazz met the love of his life, Reca, an all-American track athlete. In 1998, the two decided to head for Reca’s native Texas to avoid potential pitfalls in Pine Bluff.

“I knew I had to find a job, but there wasn’t any money in Pine Bluff,” Shabazz said. “I had to leave.”

Shabazz’s career began to take a different path, one that inspired him to help others. He worked with troubled boys for two years in Waco and volunteered with the Special Olympics. Later, he worked at a home for mentally disabled adults. He attended culinary arts school for two years. He now teaches private lessons at a Dallas-area baseball academy and coaches Hunter’s traveling team that features 13-year-old, Torii Hunter, Jr.

“He is a good coach,” Hunter said. “They go all over the country and win tournaments. He also tells (the players) about where we came from and what we went through. They really listen and can learn from us.”

Shabazz and Reca were married in 1999 and have three children, a daughter, Brazil, 9, and two sons, Degrate, 8, and Isaiah, 5. Shabazz became a born-again Christian three years ago and helps teach Sunday school.

“I’m blessed,” he said. “I want to be God-like, and I want to center everything around my kids and my family. I didn’t have that. Being a dad is important to me.”

“I’m proud of him,” Hunter said. “I played football and baseball with guys that are dead or in prison. He could have sold drugs and been on the streets. He moved away, and he has made a better life for his kids. That’s what I have done with my kids, but I take them back to Pine Bluff to show them what it was like. I am so proud of (Shabazz), anything I get I want to share it with him - just like I do with my five brothers. He is just like one of them.”

Seventeen years after he ran his last high school track meet, Arkansas sports fans still buzz about Shabazz. A thread on a Razorback message board this spring proves his legend is alive and well. Anyone that saw him play can’t forget him, and future Natural State athletes are measured by his greatness.

“When I was at the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame, I saw these guys that broke records and did this and that. (Shabazz) should be in there,” said Hunter, who was inducted in February. “He was football all-American, a great basketball player, set track records and played minor league baseball. That’s pretty impressive.”

[Dutch Oven]

Shabazz was an absolute freak. We played Pine Bluff in the state playoffs when he was there. Tremendous athlete.

[muck]

My best friend in college played hoops against him in HS.

 

Once, my friend went to watch a track meet Shabazz was to run in. He was wearing a warmup suit, and instead of it having his name on the back, it read, "Yeah, it's me".

[polksalet]

In his senior year at the meet of champs he missed the first two calls for the 200. He ran across the field in sweats, jerked them off without warming up, jumped in the blocks, and set the state record.

 

Where did your friend play ball?

[muck]

LR Catholic