YOU know when you are in the presence of sporting greatness by the degree of calmness in times of need.
That may sound like some grippy hippy-dippy quote from some hand-wringing motivational website, but it was a sudden realization I had on Friday night after the annual pilgrimage to a National Basketball League game.
I was in Invercargill for the Waikato Pistons versus Southland Sharks game, and I saw a performance that made me realize that you could probably run on the court, punch the Pistons’ and Breakers’ star Thomas Abercrombie in the face several times, and he would get back up, not retaliate, and shoot a three.
Abercrombie is freakishly talented.  It’s a talent clearly based on hard work, but also on a steely focus.  He never loses his rag. He just steps up, shoots, rebounds, dishes out magical passes, and when his team appears to be in the poo, he is the supernatural glue that makes other players look outstanding.
It appears impossible to faze him. On Friday, it was almost as if every body check, every foul, every obstacle put in his path was only there to make his life more interesting.
It has been a long time since I have seen anything like it. That is, until I recounted the above to the boys at rugby on Saturday and one said: “Yeah.  That’s what Dan Carter does.” Another said: “Roger Federer.  No emotion, no yelling. Job done. Every time.”
When you sit down and think about it, that is what separates the great from the others.  In team sports, it’s the guy like Carter or former All Black Nick Evans that has the other 29 players on the field as their personal puppet set. Sure, they do the flash stuff, but they make the team operate by their focus and determination, style and skill.
The Pistons were an OK side on Friday. Abercrombie made them winners. His performance, however, like Carter’s, was without hot-tempered self-interested performance, and when I discussed it with one of my fellow basketball-watchers, they said they liked a bit of human interest – like Dennis Rodman.
Rodman appeared to be a thorn in my argument.  He was brilliant, but had a personality – if somewhat of a volatile one – but I had an epiphany.  Rodman’s NBA championships came in star-studded teams.  Abercrombie and Carter, the quiet ones, have used their skills to make other players look like champions and lead championship-winning teams.
Carter has made some decidedly average Canterbury players into high wage earners in his various backlines.  Abercrombie took the Pistons on Friday from a dogfight to a cakewalk – but handed out the honours to his other teammates who would have struggled to get the win without him.
My grandfather always told me that when a fight was brewing, it was the quiet ones you had to watch out for.  In sport, it’s the quiet assassins like Carter and Abercrombie you just have to watch. Abercrombie is on the verge of greatness – maybe not in the NBA, but certainly for the Tall Blacks.  Let’s hope they can build a team that plays to his unbelievable prowess.
This column was written before the announcement so I don’t know the details, but (if you don’t get the following, Google it) WTF?  Highlanders changing to a green strip?  Was buggering up Southland rugby not enough for Highlanders’ CEO Roger Clark?  Has he made it his life’s work to ruin all rugby south of the Waitaki River?  Sometimes you have to wonder how these people get their jobs. Old boys’ network, anyone?