The first WrestleMania I remember watching was the sixth one, when Hulk Hogan defended his title against the Ultimate Warrior. I was a bit late to the party; my friends had all been fans for several years at that point, but I didn’t take to any sport – including ostensibly fake ones – until about fifth grade.

I never even considered asking my parents if I could order WrestleMania VI. The way pay-per-view used to be, they’d scramble the visual, but you could still hear everything. (The Playboy Channel and such were the same way, but for at least a couple more years, I was far more interested in peering at scrambled wrestling matches.) So I sat there for four hours, trying to make out glimpses of the action while I re-enacted it with my action figures.

Miraculously, something went wrong with their scrambling software or whatever, and the picture flickered on right before Hulk Hogan fought the Ultimate Warrior. It was like seeing a glimpse of heaven. I very gingerly walked around the den lest I trip or something and jolt the television back to its previous scrambled state.

The Hulk Hogan-Ultimate Warrior match was incredible. It was 22 minutes but seemed like an hour, since it was twice as long as any other match on the card. I was a huge Hulk Hogan fan, and I howled to the moon that life wasn’t fair when Hogan pinned the Warrior with the referee inconveniently unconscious and unable to make the count. When the Warrior defeated the previously indomitable Hogan, I actually cried. My friends had begun to speculate at that point that wrestling was scripted, and I guess I kind of knew that, but it just seemed so real to me, dammit!

The following year, my parents – having come to grips that my wrestling fandom was more than just a flight of fancy – allowed me to order WrestleMania VII and invite a whole bunch of my sixth grade buddies over. That was a social event we reprised for four years until one of my friends got one of those cable descramblers, and we looked forward to it for months. That first WrestleMania party, in particular, is still a thing of legend.

At that age, we’d do whatever the hell Vince McMahon would tell us to do. So when he informed us it was our civic duty as Americans to scream updates out the window about how Hulk Hogan was faring in his match against inexplicable Iraqi sympathizer Sgt. Slaughter, we did explicitly that. I doubt Vince’s grassroots promotional tactics were effective, and one of our more heartless neighbors actually called the cops. When two officers showed up and discovered it was a WrestleMania party instead of a slaughterhouse, they jokingly asked my mom if they could come up and watch.

After the show ended, still hopped up on Doritos and a 12-minute Hulk Hogan victory posedown, my friends and I staged our own battle royal in the living room with our “Wrestling Buddies” – the ugliest pillows ever, made to look like Randy Savage and Ted DiBiase. Gradually, sets of parents showed up and peeled my friends away.

To this day, just about every time I tell my mom I got together with my friends for a pay-per-view, she asks if the cops showed up, and if we had a match with our Wrestling Buddies following the event.

*****

Obviously, our WrestleMania parties are a little different now – It’s less about what we’re watching, and more a reason to get us all together and remember all the good times.

Last week, we gathered at my friend Ron’s place since his wife is about 8 ½ months pregnant, and we watched on a television far more advanced than my parents’ clunky tube from sixth grade. We talked about preparations for my upcoming marriage in September, I briefed everyone on the fallout from my recent car accident, and we compared war stories from our jobs.

Of course, some things never change: For little apparent reason, my friend Joe ran around the room hollering when Seamus egregiously won the opening match over Daniel Bryan in 18 seconds. They still spotlighted whatever doofus celebrity graced them with their presence, in this case Alex Rodriguez. And as always, we ate chips.

Wrestling is about a decade removed from the last vestiges of its Y2K-era glory days, but WrestleMania was entertaining as always. A returning The Rock pinned John Cena and looked pretty good doing it, though he wasn’t quite in the shape he was in the early 2000’s. That’s understandable; neither am I. Personal favorites C.M. Punk and Chris Jericho also had a very good match.

The best match, as has been the case the past four years, belonged to the Undertaker, who extended his undefeated streak at WrestleMania to 20 by defeating Triple-H in a rematch of last year’s war of attrition. They had billed the match, refereed by a third legend in Shawn Michaels, as the “End of an Era,” which was nebulous in that they never explicitly explained what era was ending.

Would it be Triple-H’s last match? The Undertaker’s? It was unclear, though it seems more likely the former than the latter. As Vince McMahon’s son-in-law, Triple-H appears to be the heir to the company, and it’s hard to imagine he’d want to take very many more chair shots to the back, if any. The Undertaker is down to working one match a year, and I’d imagine he continues for another year or three until there’s nobody left to beat or his body simply can’t take it anymore.

Their match seemed out of place – for one, because it was a lot better than any of the others, but correspondingly because the three seem relics of another time. Undertaker debuted when I was in sixth grade and is virtually never around; at some point soon, he and all of our other links to the past will be gone.

But presumably – hopefully – the wrestling parties will continue. It’s a trip in itself having these get-togethers every year, as we’ve all come a long way from smacking each other with pillows on my parents’ living room floor. It’s an added bonus to see our childhood heroes stagger to the back together, but I’m no longer sure it’s necessary.

Like clockwork, WrestleMania brings out the snark in people who can’t wrap their heads around spending time watching people fight scripted matches. I certainly get that there’s a stigma involved, and I hardly defend the long history and culture of steroid and other abuse that goes along with it.

But I’ve always valued wrestling for its ability to help me bridge the gap between generations. After all these years, the same guys I sat with at WrestleMania 8 in 1992 to watch Ric Flair walk that aisle will stand with me in September to watch my fiancée do the same thing.

That, to me, is as real as it gets, even as our longtime heroes gradually fall by the wayside.

The texts and tweets started rolling in around 8:30 on Friday night, as I stood next to a police officer looking at what was left of my Mustang. According to my phone, my alma mater, Duke, was behind No. 15 seed Lehigh late in their NCAA Tournament game.

I obviously didn’t particularly care very much in that moment. But as I watched my fiancée climb into an ambulance to be examined by EMTs, I couldn’t help wondering why I ever cared that much to begin with.

*****

The accident happened about three blocks from my apartment. My fiancée and I drove through a green light with the right of way, and I barely had time to react when another car made a blind left directly at us. I slammed the horn and the brakes, but he never slowed down and hit us head-on.

That split second right before impact seemingly lasts an hour. I remember seeing the other driver’s face and realizing that he never saw we were there, and then his headlights blinded me. The ensuing momentary sense of inevitability is the worst, as it dawns on you there’s absolutely nothing you can do.

It sounded kind of like a loud pop, and our car filled with smoke and oppressive heat as the air bags hit us. Then there was just quiet until the sirens started.

*****

Outside of the fact that we were in a head-on collision, we were honestly very lucky. In its finest moment during the decade I owned it, the Mustang took the hit like a champ. The other car’s bumper was sheared clear off, but we were kept relatively safe despite our car likely being totaled.

My fiancée had burns on her arm and stomach from the air bag, and she came up clutching her right side. The EMTs said nothing was broken, and she’s a trooper – we actually went to a boxing match we had tickets for on Saturday. But we think she has a pinched nerve in her neck, and I’m just hoping she starts feeling better soon.

As for me, I somehow didn’t have a scratch on me. And once I saw there was nothing really seriously wrong with Montana, I couldn’t help but find a little dark humor in the situation, even in the immediate aftermath.

For one, I had filled up my nearly empty gas tank about an hour prior to the accident, which struck me as the most wasted $50 I’d spent since my David Boston Dolphins jersey. And incredibly, one of the officers who showed up had actually put a dent in my parked car a couple years back. Not knowing he was a cop, I luckily hadn’t shaken him down for repair fees.

When the shock faded away, though, I started to realize there was some damage done. I can’t stop picturing the car coming directly toward us, and the horrible sound it made when it hit us. And every time I see my fiancée wince in pain, I despise that this happened at all, and I wish there was something I could have done to prevent it.

I went back to work on Sunday, and I’ve mostly just picked up my routines where I’d left off, just minus a car. But there are times when I feel overwhelmed thinking about how much worse this could have been, and I can’t help but flinch when I hear a car horn, even if I’m in my apartment. I assume all of that will pass, but it’s definitely going to take some time.

*****

The most common joke I’ve made to friends this week is that the best part of the accident – besides avoiding serious injury – is that at least I missed the Duke-Lehigh game. In actuality, I wasn’t watching to begin with. I was recording it while we went to a bar to check out a DJ we’re considering for our wedding.

I made that joke because I feel people can relate to it. Our sports teams frame our conceptions of each other. Most people who know me are aware I went to Duke, and it probably would seem unthinkable that I wouldn’t be watching their NCAA Tournament game.

Sports has always been so ubiquitous for me – there was always a game to watch, an article to read. But my priorities have changed so much, even from a couple years ago. I work as an editor for a sports web site, and sometimes I just need to get away. I now have very few fantasy teams, and on those rare occasions when I have a night completely free, I’d generally rather spend it cooking dinner with my fiancée than watching Carmelo Anthony jack up shots.

I think a lot about last year at this time, when I spent the first weekend of the NCAA tournament in Mexico, reading on the beach and relishing in the fact that I wasn’t subjected to wall-to-wall basketball. I came back and felt like I hadn’t missed a thing.

Then there was two years ago, when Duke won it all and I was surprised that it didn’t mean as much to me as I thought it would. Like, where do we go from here?

I still love sports, I have a vast base of semi-useless knowledge, and I still talk and read about it a lot. It’s just that as I get older and farther removed from college, I have little desire to get as invested as I remember being in the past.

I constantly see people on my Twitter feed and on ESPN obsessing over their teams – which hit a crescendo this week, with Tim Tebow coming to New York. I certainly don’t begrudge them that, our teams are part of the fabric of who we are, and I’ve definitely been there. But more and more, I’m not that guy anymore.

That’s never been more apparent to me than Friday night, when I literally could not have given less of a damn about Duke’s game against Lehigh.

There’s just so much more to life.

When Cedric Ceballos showed up out of nowhere on Saturday night, it instantly took me back to a point in time when the Dunk Contest actually could work.

With apologies to Jordan, ‘Nique and Vince Carter, my favorite Dunk Contest was the first one I watched, when Ceballos won with the blindfold in 1992. A strictly baseball fan for a few years, I was just starting to get into the NBA during a boom period. The ’92 Dunk Contest fit in perfectly with the Dream Team, Shaq, Michael Jackson’s “Jam,” White Men Can’t Jump and my first pair of Cardinal VII Air Jordans.

The picture above – sent to me by friend of SportsAngle Matt Weber – captures the moment perfectly. You have Thunder Dan in a suit, putting the blindfold on Ceballos while a photog with ridiculous surfer hair and knee pads chronicles the action. In the background, a React Juice-clad Larry Johnson holds court with a referee and the Currys, Dell and little Steph. They didn’t have to try too hard to make the whole scene work; it just did.

Ceballos’ blindfold dunk was all the rage the next day at Temple Beth Am during Sunday school. On breaks from studying for our Bar Mitzvah, we debated over cups of apple juice whether Ceballos could actually see. (Of course he could, but I mean, we were 12.)

The dunk was admittedly a bit corny and Ceballos was hardly a superstar, but there was still a certain organic cool factor to the whole thing.

*****

Fast-forward 20 years, and the centerpiece of NBA All-Star Weekend was widely panned. No major stars participated, and to cover for a relative lack of creativity and fresh ideas, it was muddied up with props, including a seemingly besotted and obviously nonplused P. Diddy.

Of course, even last year’s scripted winner – Blake Griffin dunking over (the hood of) an NBA sponsor’s car while a gospel choir sang – was underwhelming given how hard they endeavored to create something buzzworthy. At least Griffin didn’t botch it.

(Note: I did think Paul George’s glow-in-the-dark dunk was highly underrated, though he definitely should have used a luminescent ball.)

Despite how much time everyone spends hating LeBron James, he’s incongruously been deemed the potential savior of the Dunk Contest. Even for LeBron’s tongue-in-cheek suggested fee of a million dollars – which he makes every four games this season – why would he want to dunk against a bunch of relative nobodies? He’d definitely win, but he’d look bad simply by association.

LeBron is the perfect athlete for the Twitter generation, which demands entertainment on its terms and gleefully lashes out when it isn’t satiated. (The fact that he passed up the final shot in an exhibition became a referendum on his character, even after he scored 36 points.) His reticence to do a Dunk Contest is understandable: If everyone’s going to kill him regardless of what he does, why should he put in the extra effort?

As such, the Dunk Contest as currently constituted is basically the perfect event for the times. In lieu of witnessing something that works, it’s en vogue to feast on the things that don’t, and at this point it’s difficult to tell which is deemed more desirable. People seemed to relish in tearing down an uninspired Dunk Contest as if it were a personal affront to them.

It sort of reminded me of Madonna’s Super Bowl halftime show. I enjoyed that, since Madonna is a living legend, her music is good and the Super Bowl thrives on spectacle. I was in the minority, however; Madonna and her show were pilloried by virtually everyone on my Twitter timeline, all of whom apparently were somehow being forced to watch.

And yet, the Madonna show became the most tweeted about music-related event ever. Likewise, voting for the NBA Dunk Contest took up 15 percent of Twitter, and the event itself received the second-highest ratings ever. Scorn has a tendency to move the needle.

The opportunity to broadcast our immediate thoughts is progress, but it breeds an inherent lack of satisfaction. Are we not entertained? Often, it seems to be preferable if we’re not.

*****

I’m not going to attempt to convince you the Dunk Contest was good – it obviously wasn’t – but I’m not quite as down on it as everyone else.

My fiancée’s parents came over to visit our apartment for the first time on Saturday, and it was honestly a great time. After they headed home, we cobbled together some snacks, I got out some scorecards I’d saved from the Hoophall Classic dunk contest, and we passed our own judgments from the couch. As you might guess, we awarded very few 10’s, and at some point she got tired of Chase Budinger and retired to bed.

I stayed up a bit longer finishing my beer and watching the rest of the contest. We’d had a great time posing as judges, even if the event was lousy. That doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be better for literally everyone if it were actually good — or at least decent. But the way I see it, you can either take perverse pleasure in not enjoying something, or you can just have a good time with it for the sake of doing so.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ll still caterwaul about the Knicks or whatever – often. There are still times when I slip back into that bottom line mentality, when I get caught up with negativity. But as I get older, I find it doesn’t really matter who wins or even what game we watch when I get together with my friends of 20 years; it only matters that we get together.

I don’t remember the judge’s scorecards in last year’s Froch-Johnson fight, but that it was Montana’s first live boxing match? I’ll never forget that.

And that’s what I find about sports more and more: It’s become less for me about dwelling on what actually happens, while becoming far more about the experiences I have and who I share them with.

At least to me, that’s far better than complaining about LeBron not doing the Dunk Contest.

I don’t remember all that much about life as a fifth grader – I recall being infatuated with G.I. Joe action figures, the Mets and the original Legend of Zelda, but that’s about it. And yet, so much about my first game at Shea Stadium remains totally fresh in my mind.

In April 1989, having never actually watched sports, I randomly turned on a Mets-Cardinals game and at that moment, Darryl Strawberry hit a home run. I watched the rest of the game, and I was mesmerized even though they lost. My uncle Jake got tickets to a game at Shea against the Expos in late September, and I looked forward to it all summer.

We went on ski cap day, which came in handy when the temperature dropped precipitously over the course of the afternoon. Our seats were in the upper deck, but Jake slipped an usher $20 to get us into the mezzanine.

Here’s the box score, but I mostly don’t need it: Darryl had the day off. The much-maligned Gregg Jefferies hit a leadoff home run, though once and future Met Hubie Brooks hit a grand slam off Frank Viola. But Tim Teufel (!) and Mark Carreon (!!) went deep and my first game at Shea went down in the books as a 13-6 victory.

The Mets finished the day 5 ½ games out with eight to play, which I did know at the time, but it didn’t matter to me in the least. To me, games at Shea had previously been untouchable, this mythical world that had only existed on television and in newspapers. Without really having done anything but show up, I felt like the king of the world.

*****

I vaguely remember sort of what everything looked like, Jefferies’ homer and all that. But the image that remains clear in my mind was in the sixth inning, after the Mets had stormed back to take an 8-6 lead and loaded ‘em up for Gary Carter.

Carter hit a soft fly ball to left-center that dropped in. It cleared the bases, and he ended up on second base with five RBIs. They put “GARY!” up on the big videoboard, and I chanted his first name along with the crowd while he beamed out at us. The ovation seemed to last forever; it was wonderful.

It was also his last great Mets moment as a player. Carter batted .183 in 50 games in 1989, had one more hit the rest of the season and was released in the winter.

But I’d always read about how great Kid had been: The homer to win his first game of as a Met, how he made the whole Mookie-Buckner miracle possible by getting a hit to start the rally. All those guys were larger than life to me: Darryl, Doc, Keith, Frankie V – even the Iguana Man, Julio Machado. (Basically, everyone but Juan Samuel.)

It didn’t matter to me that Gary had 28 hits all season or that the Mets weren’t a playoff team. None of it changed that he stumbled into one of my favorite and most vivid memories of my childhood.

When I heard Gary was sick, I felt terrible for his pain and for his family – 57 years on this earth isn’t nearly enough. But from all accounts, he lived his life to the fullest. And when I think about how loved he must have felt on that chilly day at Shea, I can only hope that albeit for very different reasons, he remembered it as fondly as I do.

*****

Three years after he took me to my first game, Jake died when I was in eighth grade. He loved to ride his bicycle, and he was doing that during a vacation in the Hamptons when someone fell asleep at the wheel and hit him. It was just one of those things, a freak accident, and it was just so tough on all of us, especially my mom. (They were twins.)

I’ve never met anyone like Jake who had such a passion for life. He marched to his own drummer, to be sure – I seem to recall he showed up late for my Bar Mitzvah for some reason – but nobody could ever get mad at him. I used to love hanging out in his bedroom when we’d visit my grandmother in New York; Jake always smoked a pipe in there, and I came to adore that scent.

And Jake just loved me so much. For a short Jewish guy, Jake was a really good basketball player. My mom told me he was always picked early on the playground, high praise in the City, and he was the one who taught me how to play. He loved showing me new experiences; he took me to my first classical concert at Carnegie Hall. It wasn’t really my thing, but it felt really good being there with him.

Jake always talked about bringing me to my first Knicks game, and I picked up the team in his honor. (For the record, his favorite player was Walt Frazier, and I think he would have gone nuts over Jeremy Lin.) When I was at Duke, my dad and I would talk all the time about how Jake would have loved to come down for games.

I’ve wanted to write about Jake for some time, just never found the right time or the right words. Twenty years after he died, I still miss Jake very much. There was just so much we never got to do, and I would have wanted him to know me as I am now.

But he died doing something he loved. And he lived such a wonderful life, albeit one way too short.

*****

When they knocked down Shea and put stadium seats on sale a few years back, I wanted to get a pair, but the $869 price tag just seemed like a lot. But last year, they started showing up on eBay for $300 less than that – still a lot, but not $869.

After explaining the situation to my fiancée to make sure she didn’t think I had completely lost it to blow half a month’s rent on this, I bought a pair of green mezzanine seats. They’re almost definitely not the same seats Jake and I sat in, but they’re at least from the same section, and I spend some time in them every day.

When Gary Carter died, I saw lots of people talking about what he meant to them in the context of their lives; this very good post, by Ted Berg, hit home with me for obvious reasons. As I get older and realize there’s far more to life than sports, that’s what I’m starting to take with me – not the wins and losses, not the home runs and strikeouts, but what things were like for me when it all happened.

Gary’s final Mets hurrah came in a relatively meaningless game in a relatively meaningless season. But it also was a big part of my fondest memory of my uncle next to the day he taught me to play basketball, and I’ve thought a whole lot about Jake this week as a result of his passing.

I think that’s the best eulogy for Gary Carter I can ever hope to offer.

Jeremy Lin’s done some amazing things the past two weeks, including making me not hate the Knicks quite so much. Make no mistake, I’m a Knicks fan, have been since I was a kid. But I’ve also spent the past year largely detesting the team because there was so little to like.

The sad part is that for a while last year, after a thoroughly dark decade, I actually had a Knicks team that I could get behind. Through his sheer competence, president Donnie Walsh had put together a squad that was not just good, but fun to watch. He had accumulated plenty of legitimate assets and set the team up for long-term success. I finally went back to the Garden, and it actually felt like home again.

But as I often say, your team is only as good as its owner. In idiot cable scion Jimmy Dolan, the Knicks have the worst owner this side of racist “Lob City” beneficiary Donald Sterling. When Dolan superseded Walsh’s trade leverage and headed to last year’s All-Star Game to take over the Carmelo Anthony negotiations, it obliterated three years of groundwork and signaled a demoralizing return to the previous decade’s hallmarks of cronyism, ineptitude and entitlement.

(Sidebar: Though I didn’t think Carmelo had any intentions of ever agreeing to play in New Jersey, I actually thought it wouldn’t have been such a bad thing for the Knicks if that happened. That would have given Walsh the flexibility to explore other available options, including a much better fit in Deron Williams, as Walsh later lamented he was unable to do after Dolan acquired Anthony.)

Besides the All-Star Weekend Carmelo debacle, Dolan and company destroyed Willis Reed’s tunnel so the corporate types could have a glass wall through which to watch the players walk to the court. Muzzled Dolan puppet Glen Grunwald set out to construct a team with literally no point guards and actually believed – at least I assume he believed? – that it would work. Carmelo and Amar’e appeared on the court to have never met before.

With Walsh predictably yet ridiculously phased out, I thought the Knicks deserved every last bit of the enmity they absorbed over the past year.

That’s why the emergence of Lin as a genuine phenomenon over the past two weeks has been so conflicting for me: Despite playing for a thoroughly unlikable franchise, he’s been impossible not to like. On top of his incredible run on the court, there’s been that irresistible back-story – the first American-born Asian NBA player, the fact that he went to Harvard, the relatively non-threatening religious zealotry. Ostensibly, all of this couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.

I can’t give the clowns running the Knicks credit for finding Lin when they had no idea he was any good at all. I’d assume they signed Lin as a practice player and roster filler only because Larry Hughes wasn’t made available until Feb. 1. They even sent Lin to the Developmental League a month ago (where he had a triple-double in his only game). Obviously, it does sometimes pay off to be more lucky than good. I’d assume Grunwald gets a lifetime extension because of Lin.

The resulting media firestorm has been overwhelming – rather, it would have been if I deigned to read literally any articles or watch any programs about Lin. Much like with Tim Tebow, I find when the media takes a narrative like this and runs with it, it’s really only insufferable if you pay attention to what they’re saying. I watch the games; that’s enough for me.

And to be certain, I’ve enjoyed riding the wave. Lin is a lot of fun to watch and as I said, a very easy guy to root for. I also like that the heat is off Mike D’Antoni for the time being. I don’t think D’Antoni’s perfect, but he’s won big at times, and he’s been dealt a pretty lousy hand for the most part. You coach a team with no point guards.

*****

But I just can’t get this one image out of my head; I picture Jimmy Dolan sitting in a conference room somewhere with his sycophants, gloating that the Lin hype will force Time Warner to acquiesce to his demands. Dolan, of course, doesn’t care whether Knicks or Rangers fans can actually watch their team’s games provided he wins his latest shoving match.

Next bullet point: Dolan reads off a CBS Marketwatch report that has MSG stock near an all-time high, up 10 percent since Lin started playing. That constitutes yet more financial gains Dolan hasn’t earned, coming from a team that fell into his lap because of who his father is.

Next bullet point: With a grin, Dolan asks: Why not raise ticket prices to take advantage of Knicks fans desperate for something to love, not to mention Asian fans who worship Lin?

This made-up but completely plausible boardroom scenario gets to the main problem I have with Linsanity: Not very much under the surface has changed. As great an American dream as Lin is, I still have zero respect for the people fostering the consistently toxic environment at MSG, bottom-feeders who epitomize my absolute least favorite things I’ve seen in the corporate world. I still view Dolan as the sword of Damocles that hovers above this franchise, liable to stumble into the action at any time and destroy any good will Lin has cultivated.

After all, the opening might be there. Given how stellar he’s been in all facets of the game, I don’t think Lin is going to regress very much. But playing point guard in a D’Antoni system is a double-edged sword; Chris Duhon was a very good player for the Knicks for about 2 ½ months until it caught up to him that he didn’t have a credible backup.

Lin doesn’t have one either, and I have to think if something happens to him, the Knicks are right back to the 8-15 caliber ball they were playing before he appeared out of thin air. Not to mention, Lin has conquered the Lakers, but every other opponent during the six-game streak has been lousy and the schedule gets markedly harder in late-February and March.

For old times sake, I’d rather the Knicks actually be good, and I plan to enjoy watching Lin for however long he ends up doing this. The thing I may never be able to fully reconcile is how much Jimmy Dolan is enjoying it at the same time.

Make no mistake, I’m used to being in weird environments. Last year, I helped set the Guinness Record for participating in the largest gathering of zombies. But from a sports perspective, sitting at the Hoophall Classic last week, I couldn’t help but think the whole thing was pretty perverse.

Most people think this is at least a little weird, but big-time high school basketball is one of my favorite things. The passion is real, the competition is generally pretty fierce, and I love getting in on the ground floor with players before they become household names. (Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, for one, has been a personal favorite for two years now.)

But at the same time, at its highest level, the whole scene is pretty out there. Last week at Springfield College, Coach K sat to my left under the basket, with John Calipari looming a few seats to his right. I sat next to the guy who runs NBADraft.net, comparing our views on Brad Beal’s NBA prospects. And every eye in the building was fixated on 18-year-old wunderkind Shabazz Muhammad, who overpowered a bunch of overmatched teenagers en route to a dunk-heavy 37 points.

For the most part, regardless of talent or status, the players carried themselves like the would-be LeBrons they would have you believe they are. Wearing the requisite outfit of Dr. Dre headphones, a sweatsuit bearing their high school team nickname and retro Jordans that originally dropped around the time they were born, lanky adolescents strutted their stuff while casting sideways glances at Coach K. They all then told the media that had descended on frigid Springfield that they model their games after Kobe Bryant.

Speaking of which, attending my first Hoophall, I found Springfield to be an interesting location for the tournament. I’d only been up there twice: a trip to Six Flags New England about a decade ago, and a solo journey to the Holyoke Mall back in 2005 because they had literally the only Best Buy in America with a Michael Jordan brand MP3 player. (That’s a story for another day.)

Springfield doesn’t really have a ton going on. Obviously, there’s the Hall of Fame a couple miles away. My Comfort Inn in West Springfield had a Hooters across the highway, which came in handy for a late-night dinner after a long day of games. (I’m probably the only person in Hooters history to get the grilled chicken salad, and definitely the first to order take-out. Like I said, long day.) Google Maps told me there was allegedly a Dr. Seuss exhibit or something like that right around there; I never saw it. On top of all that, it was literally seven degrees.

But while driving 150 miles of notably non-scenic landscape in Connecticut – excepting the kitschy thrill of passing WWE headquarters about an hour before Monday Night Raw – it became apparent that the pre-eminent high school tournament was basically in the middle of nowhere. That seemed to make perfect sense; I got a kick out of the idea of Mike Krzyzewski flying on a private plane into nondescript and beaten-down Hartford, known as the “Insurance Capital of the World” according to Wikipedia.

The whole thing was weird and wonderful, and brought to mind for me its various geneses. There was that night in Trenton I watched LeBron return from his throwback jersey suspension to score 52. The dunk-and-crossover YouTube highlight tapes of today were preceded by the And 1 Mixtape I eagerly jammed into my dorm room VCR. The former exceeded even my outlandish expectations, while the latter was a disappointing reminder that a constant stream of crossover dribbles and windmill dunks minus any exposition or rising action is actually kind of boring.

I’ve railed on the narrative-starved media judging 17- and 18-year-olds as if they were finished projects, a la Austin Rivers. And yet, how else could it possibly be when high school games are treated like it’s the Final Four, complete with Jay Williams calling the action?

You reap what you sow. As a fan, I loved LeBron on the cover of SI at 16, loved when ESPN began running high school basketball during the LeBron era at St. Vincent-St. Mary’s. That all has led to where we’re at now, with recruiting becoming mainstream. We used to read about commitments on shadowy bulletin boards; players now get air time on ESPN to sit at a table with five hats.

Not that any of that is necessarily bad. In an information age where anybody who deigns can communicate with these players on Twitter – which is mutual, as they retweet every last mention – this is manifest destiny. As probably the last Luddite in the United States to get a smart phone before I caved in November, I’m obviously a bit reticent to change, but I’m not so naïve as to cower in fear at the thought.

That said, watching literally a dozen reporters chase Muhammad in a futile attempt to pry clues about his college decision process, I couldn’t help but shake my head a bit.

And then ask him about his decision process.

I’m not about to tell you it’s entirely possible to make decisive empirical conclusions based on watching someone, particularly a high schooler, play exactly one game. With that disclaimer, I think it is possible to frame an idea of what a player’s strengths and weaknesses are. It’s one of my favorite pastimes at high school tourneys: trying to figure out what a player is going to be like on the next level.

I caught most of the games on Sunday and all of them on Monday, and here are some thoughts on some of the significant players I saw last weekend at Hoophall.

Shabazz Muhammad, Bishop Gorman: Jay Williams pointed out to me a couple things Muhammad needs to work on, namely that he can’t go left and can’t finish with his left hand. When I watched the game again at home, he was right on the money with both assessments.

That doesn’t mean Muhammad isn’t a very good player. Having never seen him live, I was surprised at just how solidly built he is. He really did look very much like a man amongst boys while scoring 37 points in a rout of a very good Dematha team, and it seemed as if he was simply outworking everyone to go along with his talent advantage. I don’t think his athleticism jumps off the charts, especially since he appeared winded at times. But I have no doubt that as he continues to improve his jump shot and conditioning, Shabazz is the sort of player you can build a program around.

Jeremi Grant, Dematha: Harvey Grant’s son couldn’t really slow down Muhammad, but that doesn’t say much. I thought Grant was a stupendous offensive player with a ridiculous vertical leap and a tendency to be right in the middle of the action. Grant went 5-for-6 from the field for 12 points and would have scored more if not for 2-for-7 free-throw shooting. Grant is on his way to Syracuse next year, and to use an uncreative but potentially accurate comparison, he reminds me of Hakim Warrick. I really like his chances of being an impact player.

Rosco Allen, Bishop Gorman: A perfect Stanford player, heady and leverages his 6-foot-9 frame well. I see why Carolina wanted him, he kind of reminds me of Tyler Zeller. He really needs to fill out more, but on this level, who doesn’t? A perfect indication of what he brings: On a fast break late in the game, he tapped it back perfectly for a crazy windmill dunk by Muhammad. Shabazz got the attention, but the play told me far more about Allen.

Nerlens Noel, Tilton: My favorite player I saw at Hoophall next to Muhammad, Noel had 22 points, seven rebounds and an outstanding seven blocks. A legit center with room to fill out, I think he’s potentially the most transformative player on the next level, an Anthony Davis-level defensive weapon. As a Duke grad, I’d kill to have him anchor their front line for a year or two.

Mitch McGary, Brewster Academy: McGary was completely immolated by Noel. He shot 1-for-8 for three points, and though he had 12 rebounds, he looked very ordinary for someone as big and physical as he is. I’ve long wondered whether McGary skyrocketing to become a Top 5 player was more a function of his crazy dunk over the summer, when he shattered the backboard and came up bloody in a cool visual. His performance didn’t exactly allay those concerns.

Jabari Parker, Simeon: I think I caught the No. 1 player in the Class of 2013 on an off day, and he was still obviously a very good player. Simeon got swamped by a Findlay team that features talent at all five spots and threw waves of players at Parker. (They did the same thing to Muhammad later that week.) Parker still went 24-12, he just didn’t look comfortable doing it, floating a bit. I want to see him again against good competition.

Kyle Anderson, St. Anthony: What a difference a year makes. I somewhat liked his game last year, but Anderson has gotten a lot stronger, picking apart Miller Grove. I still don’t see Anderson as much of a point guard, but if you put him in the high post, he’ll control the entire tempo of the game from there. If I’m Muhammad, I could do far worse than going to UCLA and benefiting from Anderson’s playmaking abilities. Consider me a big fan, at least as a college-level player.

Sidebar: One of my favorite moments from the tournament came postgame, when ESPN was interviewing Anderson, delaying the traditional team picture. Bob Hurley just stood there glaring at them, attempting to mind-meld Anderson into wrapping it up so they could get on with it and he could get the hell off the court.

Tony Parker, Miller Grove: Coach K would die for this guy, and I get why Miller is coveted, since he’s enormous. But as much as he physically looks like Elton Brand, his game needs a ton of work. Against the disciplined St. Anthony, Miller Grove didn’t stand a chance, specifically Parker, who was bodied out by guys not even close to his size. I hear effort level is an issue, but I wouldn’t think that would dissuade anyone from wanting his services.

Noah Vonleh, New Hampton Prep: The No. 2 sophomore, Vonleh resembles Harrison Barnes in body type and facial features. I absolutely loved his game and the way he carried himself. Vonleh scored seven points and had nine rebounds in a loss to Notre Dame Prep, missing all three of his three-point tries and turning it over eight times. The key number was the 30 minutes he played as a sophomore. Make no mistake, he’s going to be a stud and he’s ranked as such.

Steven Adams, Notre Dame Prep: Committed to Pitt, the New Zealander is a top 5 player in the Class of 2012. I didn’t see much of him – he missed most of the first half with foul trouble and a head injury and didn’t really distinguish himself – but he’s certainly enormous. He also seems to have a dry wit and a charming accent, for what that is worth.

Myles Davis, Notre Dame Prep: I originally saw Myles singlehandedly lead St. Peter’s Prep past Oak Hill two years ago at the Primetime Shootout in Trenton, stealing the show with big shot after big shot. I was selfishly disappointed when he transferred to Notre Dame, since I’d see him play less, but it’s worked out well for him. Davis scored 24 in ND Prep’s win over New Hampton, and told me after the game that he relished the opportunity to be a leader of a talented group. (He also told me he does listen to some jazz music, because I mean, come on. If your name was George Lucas, you’d watch the Star Wars movies at least once even if you didn’t care for them.) He’s headed to Xavier next year, and I expect him to be a good college player at the very least.

Sam Cassell Jr., Notre Dame Prep: I don’t recall much about Cassell’s game; he had eight points in 29 minutes. Luckily, he isn’t the spitting image of his father. And if you want to feel really old, I’d prescribe watching Sam Cassell’s kid play high school ball.

Right before Christmas, I flew down to North Carolina to visit Duke, something I’d previously done five times since I graduated in 2001. Though a lot remains unchanged in my life since my last trip three years ago – same job, same apartment, same obsessive sneaker collection – I’ve since met my future wife, which qualifies as a very significant positive change.

When we stopped for a snack at the general store adjacent to my freshman year dorm, a couple of wide-eyed freshmen, still shell-shocked from their first final exams, asked me what had changed about Duke in the thousand years since I’d been a student, and it got me to thinking.

Most of what jumped out at me was cosmetic. The big stone walkway to the student center now features various sets of furniture; when I was there, it was simply a walkway and nothing else. Mike Krzyzewski also apparently commissioned an entire museum attached to Cameron Indoor Stadium, which looked remarkably similar in décor to his home office.

But for the most part, as I gave my fiancée a tour of the landmarks that defined my college years, not a whole lot seemed different. The enormous and beautiful chapel still loomed regally, while my old dorms looked pretty much the same. The radio station at which I conducted interviews with Elton Brand and Shane Battier looked frozen in time, down to the “Nas is coming” sticker on the door to the studio to promote 1996’s It Was Written.

We also attended my first basketball game since I was a student, a run-of-the-mill exam break blowout of UNC Greensboro which served dual purpose: I interviewed Austin Rivers for Dime, and my most recent game in Cameron was no longer a Senior Night debacle against Maryland in which Carlos Boozer broke his foot.

Certain things about Cameron had changed, and not necessarily for the better. A trumped-up Knicks-style introduction on the new video board was subtraction by addition, as was the loud music blaring on the PA. Of course, I couldn’t have expected things to remain as they were when I was a student, back when I was still a good two years from sending my first text message.

And when it came down to it, Cameron hadn’t changed all that much. The 2001 championship banner I watched unfurl from directly beneath it in the upper deck was still right where I left it. Coach K walks out the same entrance he always did. The band plays on.

Walking through Clocktower Quad toward Cameron Indoor that night, I could vividly picture making that exact walk countless times as a student, never believing for a second that those weren’t the best years of my life, and swearing that I would never let myself take them for granted.

*****

I’ve noticed that the groupthink on nostalgia has rendered it somewhat taboo. I often see nostalgia referred to as a dirty word, a sign of weakness – not something you explore, but something you lapse into.

I obviously don’t ascribe to that all or nothing theory. I branch into nostalgia here from time to time, looking back on cherished things or experiences in my life, and I’ve never figured that for a character flaw or anything.

I do understand the reticence toward sentimentality, since as a general practice, living in the past is a dangerous concept. We all know people who continue to pine for a lost love way too long after that flame was snuffed out, at the expense of healing and progress, who haven’t learned from their past painful experiences.

Admittedly, if we live through them long enough, our memories become excessively lionized. To believe that one point in time was as good as it gets is to dismiss the reality that life simply gets sweeter as we age. As Incubus wryly put it, “There’s no such thing as the good old days. The older we all get, the better we all were.”

Yet, I don’t find anything wrong with taking a few minutes to look back on the wonderful things we leave in our wake as we unflinchingly head toward where we end up. Our experiences and memories don’t just dissipate a la Memento. They’re forever a part of us that we can and should draw upon when we need to, or when we want to.

This is why we do things – not just for the experience at the time, but for the knowledge that we’ve done them.

I consider it a golden opportunity when I can revisit my old stomping grounds and visualize the person I was back then, primarily for a base of comparison. College life was idyllic, a truly amazing time for me; I nonetheless unequivocally prefer where I’m at now.

In a similar vein, I truly enjoyed showing my fiancée around Duke, and it was a blast to watch some wrestling with the newest member of one of my best college friend’s families.

But after four days, I was more than ready to head north to resume exploring new horizons.

*****

When I was a junior and senior, I did the majority of my studying in a building they called “Old Chemistry.” They’d long since built a state-of-the-art chemistry building, leaving this relic to house the German and statistics departments, stuff like that. Nobody else ever came there and the couches in the lobby were comfortable, so I’d set up shop and read in peace.

One night, the pen I was using ran out of ink. I’m not quite sure what thought process went into this, but I decided to clip it to a vine attached to the building outside a second-story bathroom window. When I graduated a few months later, it was still there.

With a bit of trepidation, I went to check two weeks ago. Sure enough, despite all the rain and wind over the past 10 years, the pen – now completely drained of color – still clung to that vine. I instinctively reached out and touched it, and when I did, the vine crumbled and the pen fell into my hand.

I found it incredible that the pen was still right where I left it, somehow hanging on to that vine after all that time. But a decade later, I guess it was finally time to let go.

Back on July 4, I stood on a balcony in Union City and watched the fireworks over the Hudson with my friend Sam Reiss. I had gotten engaged to a wonderful girl four days ago, the possibilities seemed endless, and life was good.

Five months later, I’m typing this while lying in bed with my fiancée, resting up before we ring in the New Year on our couch. On our bedroom television, the Real Housewives of Orange County are screeching at each other at decibel levels that could drown out a jet engine.

And I absolutely couldn’t be happier.

*****

As I’ve said here many times, with the exception of Halloween, I don’t have a use for most holidays, but I do very much like New Year’s Eve. It’s one of those rare times when you remember to stop and take inventory, to consider how far you’ve come and where you’d like to go next.

I’ve always been a bit of a loner, so to look back at 2011 as the year I got engaged to be married is weird, wild and wonderful. Honestly, Montana is one of the best things that ever could have happened to me. She’s beautiful, fun, smart and driven. She recently passed the bar exam in both New Jersey and New York. She’s also an excellent cook, and I would starve within days without her.

Despite all that, she patiently puts up with the fact that at 32, I remain fixated on LeBron James, Freddy Krueger, Air Jordans, Ghostface Killah and Spider-man. Lord knows what I did to deserve her.

Obviously, my life is changing, in a very good way. But you find that your priorities change as well. Cooking a quiet dinner at home minus the Internet or televised sports becomes a coveted event; a movie and beer in bed is a blessing.

It does, of course, mean that things aren’t quite the way they used to be. For one, I’ve definitely been less prolific in recent months in terms of posting at SportsAngle.

Truth be told, the majority of my posts here over the past few years have been written between the hours of midnight and 4 a.m., which isn’t always preferable for me at this point.

In addition, I’ve started doing some writing for Dime Magazine, which is sort of a full circle thing for me. A decade ago, Dime was the first publication to actually take a chance and let me write for them, back when I had no idea what the hell I was doing. I always appreciated that, and with a little more experience under my belt, it’s good to be a part of their team again.

Between all of that and a job that makes plenty of demands on me, it definitely took me away from SportsAngle, especially the past couple of months. But you know, I think that’s okay. It doesn’t mean I’ve lost one bit of my passion for expressing myself here, it’s just that there are only so many ways I can stretch myself before it’s too thin, and doing a weekly football post (for example) is no longer one of those ways.

Rest assured, I still have plenty to say. When my good friend Terry Rains helped me bring this site back after about a four-year hiatus, it was to give me a creative outlet I lacked. I think at times this year, like back in the spring, I was doing some of the best writing I’ve done anywhere. I have no plans to stop doing that, just maybe not quite as often.

And honestly, I really did get around this year.

I got to interview Penny Hardaway, Bryce Harper, Austin Rivers, Elton Brand – and sentimental favorite Oliver Perez. I saw Justin Verlander pitch in Cleveland in a pennant race.

I watched Jay-Z and Kanye West in Baltimore, and Incubus at the Jersey Shore.

I got to write about Mike Krzyzewski’s 903rd victory. I attended my first Duke game in Cameron in over a decade, and got to show my fiancée my old stomping grounds.

I drove through Western Pennsylvania thinking how glad I was that I wasn’t sitting in traffic trying to get to work, and sat on the beach in Cozumel thinking how glad I was that I wasn’t at a desk.

Essentially, though I’ve struggled at times with the idea of not having the time or energy to bring to fruition some of the ideas I’ve had these past few months, I’ve come to realize that real life getting in the way isn’t even close to a bad thing.

SportsAngle has long been a big part of who I am, and I love writing here. But one thing I’ve learned is that life is way too short to dwell on the things I’m not doing, while overlooking the things I am.

*****

In two hours, my fiancée and I will watch the ball drop on television and toast with a rare true splurge: a bottle of Dom Perignon.

Why Dom P over, say, Korbel? I find I have more than ever to celebrate. We’ll toast to Montana passing the bar, to all we’ve accomplished over the past year and all the experiences we’ve had, and to the arrival of a year in which we’re going to get married to our respective best friends.

Even as our lives change, it’s all part of becoming the people we’re meant to be. And though life seems to speed up a little more every year, I think that’s because we just become more and more aware of how sweet it is to wake up every day, take a breath and feel alive.

My best to all of you for a prosperous, healthy and happy New Year. God bless.

I still remember like yesterday the day Darryl Strawberry left the Mets for the Dodgers. I was waiting to get a haircut in fifth grade when the news on the television at the barber shop told me Darryl had jumped ship. I melted out of my chair and sank to my knees.

Straw was my first sports love; it was as if my best friend had moved away. (That actually happened a couple years later, and I don’t recall it hitting me nearly as hard as losing Darryl.)

Going through that was rough when I was 11, but it was a necessary lesson about two years into being a sports fan: Nothing lasts forever. Players leave, teams change, eras come and go. I eventually came to grips with it – years later, I even bought a Dodgers Strawberry jersey.

Now somewhat jaded at 32, with Dan Marino and Patrick Ewing and LeBron James the Cavalier in my rearview mirror, this sort of thing honestly doesn’t faze me anymore. Our teams are inextricable parts of our identities, but the players on them shuttle in and out like friends from various chapters in our lives.

As such, I always just have to shake my head at people’s knee-jerk reactions when a star player leaves for another team. If you’re 12, sure, it’s a crushing blow. But if you’ve been watching sports for any legitimate portion of time, how can’t you know by now this is the way it goes?

The easy narrative when Albert Pujols left the Cardinals for the Angels last week was to turn him into the baseball version of LeBron James, but it didn’t really take. Pujols didn’t have a reality show to announce his decision, nor was he a native of St. Louis, and the tired “damaging his legacy” argument holds no water. Pujols’ legacy is going to be that of an awesome baseball player.

I heard people say Pujols should have finished his career in St. Louis, that they thought he’d be there forever, and I might be willing to go along with that if Pujols had played 18 years or something and only had a few seasons left. But Pujols signed a 10-year deal with Anaheim; that’s a long time to stay somewhere just to say it’s the only place you’ve been.

It’s not hard to comprehend why Pujols went to the Angels. They offered him a lot more money, and he now has the opportunity to live on the beach in Malibu (or wherever) year-round. Not to mention, the Angels are a good team, and with the Dodgers flat broke, Pujols has the opportunity to be a big-time star in a major market with a strong Hispanic community.

Not to be overlooked, 11 years is simply a long time to work in one place. Sometimes, it’s just time for a change.

As for Cardinals fans, I don’t feel for them in the slightest. They got 11 years of the best player in baseball, along with a team that contended basically every season over that span and won two World Series titles. That’s not a bad return for lucking into Albert Pujols in the 13th round of the draft. But their focus has been on Pujols’ decision to leave, rather than the fact he helped their team win the World Series two months ago.

Mets fans were kind of the same way with Jose Reyes, blaming the Wilpons, the Marlins and the universe, pining away like Drake making a drunk phone call – “I’m just saying, you can do better…” – . I obviously would prefer if the Wilpons sold the team to someone who can actually afford to own it, but independent of that, nobody knows if giving Reyes a six-year deal would have actually worked out.

Perhaps not right away as currently constituted, but it’s obviously possible to compete without Jose Reyes. Reyes is exciting, but he’s also notably flawed – and he’s certainly not the be-all, end-all.

In fact, nobody is – not Pujols, not LeBron James, not Dwight Howard.

To dwell on your team losing a star player, even if you felt a strong attachment to him, seems okay when you’re 11 and don’t have a whole lot else going on. But these players are just flesh and blood, like anyone else. And the older I get, the more I find I have going on. I have dishes to wash, a wedding to plan, a professional and personal life to continue to carve out.

At the risk of cliché, life is too short to spend worrying that much about what team someone plays for, even when you have a decade of good memories watching that player.

*****

I wrote this yesterday on a bus to New York, and as I got up to leave, the commuter sitting in front of me noticed my Mets jacket, told me he was a fan, and asked how I thought they would do without Reyes. I offered my standard line, which is that things are pretty certain to get worse before they get better, but that Alderson knows what he’s doing. My new friend slyly asked if I thought Sandy had something special up his sleeve, and I said no.

We left in agreement that things were lousy, but hopefully better times were ahead. Jose Reyes is no longer a Met, but sure enough, the buses still run. (Not generally on time, but that’s always been a trademark of New Jersey Transit.)

We all want our favorite teams to compete, so we can vicariously thrill in the pursuits of a winner. But there’s literally nothing we can do to make that happen, and you can take it from a Dolphins, Mets and Knicks fan – your team is really only as good as its owner.

The memories of Pujols’ three-homer World Series game or Reyes smoking cigars on the field in ‘06 may fade, but they’ll never completely fade away. There will unfailingly be new moments to treasure. And sure as clockwork, there will be new heroes to root for, new jerseys to buy, ones that we’ll never burn in effigy — or at least that we shouldn’t.

We want our teams to have the best players, players we can love, and we want our teams to be good. But though time doesn’t heal all of our wounds, it takes care of most of them.

And when it comes down to it, the main thing we want is simply to have something to root for.