Jump Shot: The Kenny Sailors Story

Come on, you guys!

You know I can't bend over.

Basketball was just about my whole life

when I was growin' up.

I wanted people to like me,

and like any kid when they're young,

and get a lot of attention, I suppose.

I've been asked over and over again,

"Did you start the jump shot?"

I've had sports writers get pretty upset with me

'cause that's what they want me to say.

What else could they talk about?

There's nobody today hardlyalive that saw me play.

I've experienced much in my lifetime.

I've had to let go of things

that were really important to me.

And I like I say, it'snice to know who you are,

and where you're goin'when you leave this world.

- The shot is the jump shot.

It's up to Jenkins

for the championship!

Look at those little champions!

The jump shot'sin every part of the game.

Puts it up.

Yes!

- Nothing has ever changed a sport

like the jump shot changed basketball.

Smart takes the shot!

When you'retalking about the jump shot,

you're talking about the very fabric of the game.

You don't realizethat there was a time

that there was no jump shot.

When it was sideshot game, you needed space.

You had to be wide open,

or you couldn't get your shot off.

- It's almost like they were playing

in slow motion defensively.

How you allowed that guyto even get that shot off.

- Basketball is a game of innovation.

Before you know it, you've made up something

that nobody has seen before.

- In Kenny Sailors' case, like Edison,

who would have known what thislittle light bulb could do?

There's no question,

it was-- - The uniqueness

was they jumped. - We're talkin'

probably 65 years later,

that's the shot people are still taking.

This shot lasted throughgenerations and generations,

and has made it to theWarriors, to Steph Curry,

the greatest shooter you'll ever play.

Curry switched defense

behind the back!

Fires a three! - If I can't play

above the rim, so the jumpshot is my only weapon.

Oh, he puts it in!

- You can go anywhere in the world,

and they're shooting Kenny's shot.

- Where is-- - Kenny Sailors.

Kenny--- Sailors has few equals.

- He's an American original.

- People just forgot who he was.

He disappeared for so long.- Sometimes history gets lost,

and that's what happenedwith Kenny Sailors' story.

History lost his story.

Yeah, we're talkin'about the jump shot, right?

- Yeah-- - Or the guy

who found the jump shot, or somethin'?

- Do you know who that guy is?

No.

I don't know, 'cause, I mean.

What do you mean

invented the jump shot?

No one invented the jump shot.

- Wait, there wasn't a jump shot at one point?

- First of all, there's skepticism.

Nah, I did.

- How do you know he was the first jump shooter?

I mean, that's everybody'sfirst question.

How you gonna call thisguy the first jump shooter?

- Let me see how dumb or how smart you are.

- I'd never really put a lot of thought into

who was the first guy that ever shot one.

Okay, here's the deal.

Who is the guy that invented the jump shot?

- About eight years ago, I guess,

I started looking at, well,who could've done this?

When I took over theFeatures Department at CBS,

the editor that leftleft me a pile of stories

that he thought would be worth pursuing,

and I was goin' through, and I saw

"Kenny Sailors, inventor of the jump shot".

The first time I ever heard the name.

Are you sittin' down?

People think better on theirass than they do on their feet.

There was a lot of tales andfables about this and that,

but I kept coming to thisstory of Kenny Sailors,

and it just led to Laramie,Wyoming of all places.

You'll have enough wildstories to talk about

when you get back.

Well, now you're next.

That one guy had to go.

No, is that right?

Yeah, he had to go to class.

Okay, well.

He's 90 goin' on 70.

He just keep on goin'.

Right.

Yeah, I'll be up there too much

probably for too long. - See, well, yeah.

Well, you don't know how long.

Well, how long could it be

when you-- - Well, you've probably

gone longer than you thought already.

Oh, well, .

Don't ask me why.

I don't know.

Probably just to harass barbers like you.

Every time he comesin here somebody knows him.

He's pretty popular.

- I'm not popular, that jump shot's popular.

- That's what people are really intrigued with,

basketball and the jump shot.

The jump shot, the jump shot, the jump shot.

His whole life changed that day he decided

to jump in the air, and shoot over his brother.

I grew up about seven oreight miles south of Hillsdale,

and Hillsdale, I don't imagine,

had 50 people in the whole town.

But anyway, basketball was their sport,

because they couldn't afford football,

or these other sports,

and, certainly, durin' the Depression.

My brother was a good ballplayer, and a good athlete,

and the coach liked him there in Hillsdale.

He told him he had a kid brother

who's just learned to play the game,

and that they'd surelike to have a basketball

he could take out, and give to him.

And, of course, we didn'thave any place to play,

but he fixed a backboard,

and we fastened it to the oldwooden windmill that we had.

We'd play one-on-one,

and I never could get a shot off,

and he really enjoyed that,

because he was 6'5 and I was just about,

I don't know, 5'7 probably.

He use to tell me that, "Youbetter find another game".

"This isn't your game."

"It's for big men, tall men."

- But when you think about the way

the game was played back then,

you kinda think of that old news reel footage.

It was the kind that happen, you know,

that paint drying paste.

No shot clock.

No sense of urgency.

Obviously, it's antiquated,because it's where we started.

It's athletic, because there'smovement and coordination,

but it feels slower.

It certainly is grounded.

The standard rule was

you never leave your feet on defense,

and especially on offense.

It's a whole different game today.

They hardly dribbled theball, passed it around.

The guys shootin' set shots.

- They all shot a two-handed shot.

Push out here from the chest.

You know, if you were gonnashoot a two-hand set shot

you had to be wide open.

- I don't know if set shot off today.

Have to be 50 feet away from the guy.

You couldn'thave anybody close to you

who would just put a handup, and block your shot.

- If a shot has to be constructed

over a period of one, two, three seconds,

the game is slowed by definition.

- If you look at some of these guys now,

like a Westbrook, or somethin',

they way they fly down thecourt, and jump on the gym.

Looks almost like a differentsport than back then.

It'll tell you, man, if Iwas born like 60 years earlier

I would've been in the NBA, no doubt.

I think I'd be a monster.

Oh, I would've gotten somebuckets, that's for sure.

- Yeah, I feel like a little step back,

or a between the legs crossover,

we'd throw somebody into the first row.

High on the board, Sailors.

I just made up my mindthat I was gonna find a way

to shoot the ball over the guy.

My brother, he made up his mind,

"I'm gonna frustrate that little squirt,

and not even let him get a shot off".

Somehow, the idea come to me is,

well, if I jump up, and I knew I could jump,

if I jump up high enough outof my dribble, like this,

I dribbled up,

and from here, right on thedribble, I jumped straight up,