LJ b BB: McClain acclaim

Thiel, whose first name is Anton,

tries to control the ball during

La Jolla's win over RBV.

(Photo by Ed Piper, Jr.)

By Ed Piper, Jr.

Reed Farley, look out.

When EPSN (Ed Piper Sports Network) kicks off, there will be competing interviews for the position of top sportscasting anchor on my (facetious) media channel.

The world will now get to know McClain Thiel, the real, the man behind the myth and the legend.

After playing most of La Jolla's final game in the Hilltop Invitational Basketball Tournament Thurs., Dec. 8--though, admittedly, the results were modest, but I can explain that--the senior submitted to a quick end-of-court interview after Coach Paul Baranowski's team chalk talk.

The results there were electric.

While father Paul fiddled with his camera in the corner of the Hilltop gym, the 6'2" self-proclaimed "man without a position" carried on one of the most technically precise interviews I have ever heard.

I asked Thiel for comments intending to hear how he felt about his own play. Instead, though he speaks in basketballese, insisted on focusing on his team's overall performance:

"It was a good game. We had some good practice. (The game was a blowout over Rancho Buena Vista, 62-42. As Paul Thiel told me late in the game, it wasn't even as close as the score.) As a team, we played much better than we have been (playing)."

Finally, after his concise response to my first question, I redirected my question to his individual play. "I've been working on my midrange jumper," McClain said. "We have a lot of long-range shooters, and scorers inside, so I think that will contribute. I feel good."

By my unofficial count, he had four jumpers during the game, and didn't make any. But his form was good, and he was able to knock some of the rust off after sitting most of the tournament.

It's hard to come in and get in the flow when you've been sitting on your behind most of the time.

He said much more, which I'm not relating right now due to time and space.

I had no idea Thiel was this incisive. I had never had a conversation with him before, though I had watched him play in spring and summer league this year and last year. I am finding more and more in these interviews--here and for stories in the La Jolla Village News--that you really don't know a person until you talk to him. It's often very surprising.

What Thiel has been caught in, by his own and his father's account, is a difficult transition from having mastered skills inside as a center when he was in youth league--he was always the tallest boy on his team. Then he leveled off in height compared to the other boys, and entered high school, not as a tall player, but more average.

At 6'2", he could play forward or guard, wing as Baranowski calls his players--guess where?--who are positioned out on the wing in the offense.

A post position is possible, but this means playing on the edge of the paint (we called the key back in the day) often against taller players. Daniel McColl does it at 6'2". Charlie Gal does it, but he measures a bit taller at 6'5".

So, Thiel summarizes the positive point of being in transition, "I think I'm versatile. I don't really have a position."