Heart and Soul: Well Wishes to Etan Thomas

October 19, 2007
By: Dave Zirin

Last week, I found myself overwhelmed by phone calls, text messages,  and emails, all asking me the same question: "Is Etan going to be all  right?" Although it was hardly a lead story, the news had hit the  wires: Washington Wizards center Etan Thomas was going under the knife  for career - if not life threatening - surgery to replace a "severely"  leaking aortic valve in his heart.

The post surgery news is very good. Despite a four and half hour  operation that required the cracking open of his sternum, Thomas is in  good health and better spirits. A return to the court by season's end  is not out of the realm of possibility.

But the question I'm sure might linger for the casual fan: why would a  player averaging six points and five rebounds over seven year career  generate an outpouring of concern more appropriate for friends or  family?

One reason was expressed quite simply by teammate Caron Butler to the  press. "He reaches out to the community, goes to speak at correctional  facilities, has a gift for writing poetry and is very intelligent. He  was one of the team captains, even though he wasn't appointed. ..."  This is all true. The man has given something back to the District of  Columbia more precious than money: himself. "There are two Washington  DC's," he said to me once, "There is the capital and then there are  the people in the city who care very deeply about a host of issues and  ideas...I have met people on demonstrations and the people in this city  really care about politics and issues. That's the kind of people I  want to be around. That's the kind of place I want to be."

But he also has achieved such goodwill because he sees himself very  consciously as part of a tradition both romantic and polarizing: the  activist athlete. "I have never had a problem standing up for what I  believe in. I admire the athletes of the past, like Bill Russell,  Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown, John Carlos and Tommie Smith, Kareem  [Abdul-Jabbar]. Athletes that used their position as a platform to  speak out on social issues and stand up for a cause. Basketball is not  my life. To quote Bill Russell, 'You're not going to reduce me to an  entertainer. I'm a man who stands up for what I believe in and you're < going to respect me for it.' A quote I live by is, 'I speak my mind  because biting my tongue would make my pride bleed.'"

Two years ago Thomas wrote an acclaimed book of poetry More than an  Athlete and has been known to read verse and talk politics in front of  crowds great and small. If he is a banger as a player, he's more like  a sleek two guard on the microphone. He soars.

I first heard about Etan's poetic political side from some hipster  poets who wouldn't know Lebron James from Etta James. They called me  >and said, "You gotta see this 6 foot 10 inch guy flow! He's got this  amazing flow."

I asked who it was.  They said, "Etan Thomas." I said, "The basketball  player?"  They asked me what a basketball was. (not exactly but  close.)

In an era when many pro-athletes live in gated communities surrounded  by an anabolic moat of bodyguards and try to insulate themselves as  much as possible from the people who look up to them. Etan is cut from  different material, closer to living the words of Muhammad Ali who  said, "I will never look down on anyone who looks up to me." When  people see someone in their neighborhood, someone speaking out who  doesn't have to, it breeds a loyalty that transcends the ephemera of  celebrity and becomes real.

In recent weeks preceding his surgery, Thomas has found time to speak  publicly about justice and fairness for the Jena 6, work on a book  about politics and poetry, and read a poem at a September rally  against the war. In front of ten thousand of his closest friends,  Thomas said of President Bush:

If he says he's a Christian doesn't mean he follows Christ  Because he's the President doesn't mean that he's bright  Just means you need to research what his speech writer writes  But through methods of deception he made yall think that he's right  
You owe us
For every mother who will never see their son again
Every husband whose lives you've ruined
Who will never taste the sweet lips of their wife's kiss
Left with the stale bitterness of death to caress their reality
You've created whirlwinds of a widowed future
Causing pain and suffering to give birth to normality
Their blood is on your hands
I hope their pain haunts you while your sleeping
Wakes you up at night with the cries of the lives you've destroyed
Visions of caskets should dance in your head
I hope your conscious shouts in your ears that our heroes deserved better
Rest in peace to the abundance of lives you've ceased
Mr. Commander and Chief
You owe them more
They put their trust in you
Riding in a ship that we all new would sink
A medal of honor to put in their grave is a slap in the face
Human life is precious no matter what you think
And even after all that...
You're still committed to continuing a winning less battle
You don't know when to say when
You can't even admit that you made a mistake
So how can the healing possibly begin?

"People say that he is a different kind of guy, but that is a good thing," Wizards center Tony Massenburg said after hearing that the surgery was a success. "He is the kind of guy who cares about  community issues and politics, and he tries to use his status to  affect people in a positive way. That is something that a lot of guys  in the league could learn and benefit from." The learning will  continue. Leaky heart valves are no match for a powerful soul.