Summer Ball Read Free

to happen when he went up against some guy who was getting ready to be a junior in high school?
    That was part of Danny’s secret.
    Here was another:
    He wasn’t going because he couldn’t wait to take on the kid from the next block over, couldn’t wait to get to the next level, oh yeah, bring it on. That was the way his dad looked at things. No, Danny was going because he had to find out for himself if he could cut it once he got in with the real big boys.
    When he’d gotten cut from travel that time, he knew in his heart that it was because a bunch of adults thought he was too small. And then he’d shown them they were wrong.
    Now Danny, as brave as he tried to act in front of his parents and his buds, wasn’t sure he could keep showing everybody forever.
    This wasn’t just about size anymore. It was about his talent and, if he really thought about it, his dreams. Especially the big dream, the one about him someday doing more in basketball than even his dad.
    Danny had to know .

2
    I T WASN’T JUST ANY SUMMER BASKETBALL CAMP THEY’D FINALLY DECIDED to go to, not by a long shot.
    This was Josh Cameron’s Right Way Camp, about an hour outside of Portland, Maine, in a town called Cedarville.
    Josh Cameron, just two years younger than Richie Walker, was the star point guard of the Boston Celtics, having won more championships with the Celtics than Larry Bird had. He was Danny’s second favorite player, after Jason Kidd, and he was always talking about playing basketball “the right way.” Right before he’d go out in the next game and show people exactly what he meant by that.
    He was listed at 6-2 in the program, which probably made him five inches taller than Danny’s dad in real life, not that Richie Walker would ever admit to something like that. What Richie would say about Josh, though, every time the subject came up, was this:
    His size had never held him back, either.
    And every time he would say that, Danny would think, Where do I sign up, right now, to be 6-2 someday?
    Where do I sign up to be whatever height, 5-9 or 5-10, that my dad really is?
    According to Richie, Josh Cameron had started Right Way with the help of one of his old college teammates about ten years ago. Now it was supposedly on a level with the Five-Star camps that all teenage basketball players had heard about. It had become such a big deal that college scouts would come up to Maine every July and even start looking at seventh and eighth graders they might want to think about recruiting someday.
    The “junior” part of the camp, the July part, was limited to kids between the ages of eleven and fifteen. The elevens and twelves went into one league, Danny knew from the brochure; the older kids into another. Later on in the summer, there was a separate camp for elite players about to enter their senior year in high school. But in either session, Right Way was all basketball, all the time—clinics and instruction in the mornings, games in the afternoon and at night. Because of who Josh Cameron was, he got top college coaches to come to Cedarville and every year would get some of the most famous college players in the country to come work as counselors.
    Starting next week, Danny and Ty and Will would be going up against the best kids in the country. Until then, Will and Ty seemed to have made it their sworn duty to bust chops on Danny every time he’d even suggest that he’d just rather stay home this summer and hang out.
    â€œI’m the one who should be looking to stay home,” Will said now. “You both know I’m not good enough to be going to this camp.”
    â€œSure you are,” Danny said, halfway believing it by now. “You’re a great shooter and you know it.”
    â€œBut all I can do is shoot,” Will said. “The only reason I got in is because your dad made them take me.”
    Danny grinned. “Maybe he