The Kid Who Always Got Dunked On | Teen Ink

The Kid Who Always Got Dunked On

January 12, 2010
By Paul Bianchi BRONZE, Streamwood, Illinois
Paul Bianchi BRONZE, Streamwood, Illinois
1 article 0 photos 0 comments

Henry Bojangles only goal in life was to be good at basketball. His only problem was that he failed miserably at it. He was 6’11” which is an amazing height for basketball, but he had no hand-eye coordination whatsoever. The only reason he started on his team was because of his height and there was really no one else. Henry played for his high school team in the small town of Griggsville, North Carolina. They were ranked 587th in the state. Good right? I think not.



Henry’s main problem was how susceptible he was to giving up the dunk. Kids would just fly into the lane and boom on Henry. There was absolutely nothing he could do, but sit in the paint and look like a complete idiot. The worst part of it all is that whenever Henry gets dunked on, the newspaper photographers always get a picture of it. This has happened so many times that there is an entire website dedicated to photos of Henry getting boomed on. Ouch, that’s a low blow.



This hurts Henry’s feelings so much that his new goal is to turn into the guy who dunks on other kids. Yeah, Henry has the height but the only problem is that his vertical jump in 2”. How embarrassing. Henry decided he had to sit down with his father, to ask him to pay for a vertical jump trainer. However, his dad hates him because he is a complete failure. How would you like waking up, going to the driveway to grab the paper, and see a guy crashing his midsection into your sons face while getting dunked on? I doubt you’d like that, so you can most likely understand where Mr. Bojangles feelings come from.



So of course, Henry’s dad denied him the money. Henry had to move to plan B. He got a job at McDonald’s to pay for the vertical jump trainer. He had to make $700 which he got after working at McDonald’s for four months. He then went to the training center and signed up for jump lessons. He started the next day.



When Henry walked into and met his trainer for the first time all that the trainer said was, “this is going to be terrible.” I guess you could add the trainer to the ongoing list of doubters/haters. The trainer made Henry work twice as hard, just because he already hated him. The trainer had seen all of the pictures of Henry getting dunked on and was completely embarrassed to train him. Anyways, after six months of training, Henry’s vertical jump was now up to 10 inches. He could finally touch the rim! It’s a miracle! After another six months Henry was now up to 19 inches and could finally dunk! He couldn’t wait to show his coach his new ability.

Today would be the biggest day of Henry’s life. He was going to surprise his coach with a dunk! Henry went right over to the ball rack and picked up a basketball. He said, “Hey coach, watch this!” So his coach had to see what Henry was about to do. Henry started running towards the hoop and right before he was about to jump, he tripped over his shoe lace and broke his ankle. The bone was sticking out of his ankle. It was quite gross and embarrassing! The doctors informed Henry that he would never again play basketball or walk.

Henry was pretty crushed, but how couldn’t you be crushed when you’re 6’11” and can’t even dunk? It’s official; Henry Bojangles will forever be the loser who is terrible at everything and especially terrible at basketball. After all this stuff that went on in Henry’s life, his social life was completely ruined. So he packed up some clothes, wheeled away from home and is now living under a bridge under the expressway. You have to feel for the guy, but at the same time it is sort of humorous. Oh yeah, and he still gets recognized under the bridge every day. People drive by, honk, and yell “Hey that’s the loser who always got dunked on!”



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