August is here, which means three things: school is about to be back in session, another year of Lobo sports is about to start, and we should probably start writing again. There’s a ground to cover that is either about to happen or that occurred while we were taking our semi-unplanned summer vacation, but I figured that I’d first focus on the Lobo that I’ve found myself thinking about the most over the last two months: Cam Bairstow. You see, while I haven’t done much more than alternating between loving and hating the summer weather, Cam’s actually been out doing things.
Here’s a (probably) incomplete list of things that camp has done in just the past couple of months:
- As he did last year, Cam hosted a basketball camp for local kids. He didn’t do it alone, though, as there were a lot of familiar faces involved:
So, not only is he giving back to our community, he’s also proving to be quite adept at bringing generations of Lobo basketball players back together.
- Speaking of local kids, Cam did something that at least slipped under my radar a little bit: he started sponsoring the AAU club formally known as the Danny Granger Hurricanes. I actually found out about this when I happened to be on the same plane as the club a few weeks ago as they were heading to their first tournament under their new, aussified name: the Bairstow Boomers. I think that we’d all like to see more high-level basketball players come out of our state, and Cam being a part of this will only help that cause.
- After the basketball camp, he organized the Battle of the Rio Grande, where Lobo and Aggie Alums played each other to demonstrate which one is the superior basketball program in the state. The Lobo Alums won, naturally, 102-97.
- Right before Cam did all of this in Albuquerque, he had a sudden career change when he was traded from the Chicago Bulls to the Detroit Pistons for Spencer Dinwiddie. It looked like he was going to have the opportunity to earn a spot on the roster until the Pistons signed the hilariously large man that is Boban Marjanović, which overcrowded their frontcourt and left Cam as the odd man out. He was released by the team shortly thereafter.
- That didn’t keep Cam down for long though. Just over a week later, and after apparently fielding several offers to play all over the world, he signed with his hometown team, the Brisbane Bullets. For their part, the Bullets seem almost beside themselves that they were able to get him, calling the signing “one of the biggest signings in National Basketball League (NBL) history” and “not only a massive coup for the club, but also the NBL” in their press release. I think that this is awesome for Cam, as not only does he get to play for the team he grew up watching, he’ll actually get to play a lot, which will likely do more for his development as a player, and be more fun, than sitting on the bench most games. As an added bonus, he gets to face his old coach later this month, when the Bullets play an exhibition game against UCLA. Go Bullets.
- Oh, and on top off all of this, he made the Australian Olympic team.
https://twitter.com/cbairstow41/status/761727663723712512
Not a bad way to cap off a busy summer.
There’s an underlying context to all of this that makes it somewhat amazing to me that I’ve paid so much attention to Cam this summer. After all, just five years ago, I’m not sure that any of this seemed likely to happen. Cam was that really tall Aussie who only managed to get limited action his first couple of seasons at UNM and was somewhat of an afterthought going into his junior year. We all know what happened after that. By the end of his senior year, he transformed himself into one of the best college basketball players in the country and muscled his way into being drafted by the Chicago Bulls.
Cam’s story is a perfect example of why I love college sports. We get to watch the players grow up, we get to know them, and then, when everything is said and done, we end up being so proud of them and celebrate all their successes. And while it’s great to root for a hometown kid, college sports somehow make it where even a kid from Brisbane, Australia can become a New Mexican.