Dirk Nowitzki Birthday Party: Our All-Time Best 'Fish Story'
DALLAS - There is, of course, no end to the library full of Dirk Nowitzki anecdotes that describe his iconic basketball skill, his impact on the sport, his legendarily self-effacing goofiness and his sneaky-fast level of competitiveness.
The retired Dallas Mavericks "face of the franchise'' is too humble to bow to the idea of an actual library, of course; the statue that has been erected in downtown Dallas and this summer’s induction into the Hall of Fame will have to suffice.
But "My Dirk Story'' - and we all have them, all of us, almost a quarter of a century of them, media and fans and friends and co-workers and citizens of the world - isn't really about sports at all.
It's about cancer and creativity, about this man's heart's ability to celebrate health and about this man's brain's ability to navigate in a non-linear way.
Well, and kinda about baseball, if you can call Dirk's brand of playing that sport "baseball.''
A few years ago, Dirk had generously agreed to take over from retired Dallas Stars legend Mike Modano as the poster guy of the "Heroes'' charity, which raises money for all the right reasons with the "Heroes Baseball Game'' the centerpiece of the efforts. Like Modano before him, Dirk's presence drew stars from the Dallas Cowboys and from Hollywood and from everywhere in between to participate in the early-summer event that, of course, by now has become one of DFW's most special get-togethers.
In the 2014 run-up to the event, my (now late) friend Will Chilton asked me for a favor that I could not possibly deliver on: Would it be possible for me to arrange a "Heroes Game''-related surprise for his wife, Marci, a cancer survivor? It would serve as a wedding anniversary gift from him to her. All very lovely.
What Will wanted was for his wife to meet a bunch of her favorite athletes. OK, doable. And to be on the field, in the introduction line. Hmm, tough.
And to throw out The Ceremonial First Pitch.
Errr, no way.
But, fortified by the fact that Will was also planning to make a nice donation to the Dirk Nowitzki Foundation, I mustered up the courage to contact Dirk. Not surprisingly, Nowitzki responded immediately - and not with a suggestion that I "call his people'' or "quit bugging him'' or "Fisher, how the hell did you get my contact information?'', all of which can be standard-operating procedure for perennial All-Stars, All-NBA First Teamer, NBA MVPs, NBA Finals MVPs, World Champions and future Hall-of-Famers.
No, Dirk's only bad new for me was this: "The Taller Baller from The G'' informed me, apologetically, that a sponsor had already made a donation to secure the honor of throwing out the ceremonial first pitch. As a wonderful consolation prize, Dirk told me he could personally assure that Marci would participate in some meet-and-greet, and maybe even get to do so in the dugout. I told him that was once-in-a-lifetime stuff, shared Will's contact information with him, and called it a day.
And then, a little bit later, Dirk's non-linear brain (and maybe his lack of understanding for baseball tradition) kicked in. You know, the "Basketball is Jazz'' brain that had him develop his hoops skills by playing musical instruments while standing on his head and paddling a canoe, all at the same time, legend now has it.
"Fish,'' he said, an almost tangible 7-foot high lightbulb going off above his head, "why can't we just have two people throw out the first pitch? Is there any reason there can't be 'two firsts'?''
Well, because you can't have ... No, wait. You're Dirk. You can break the standards and mores, for good reasons. You can re-write the rules of sports and charity, for good reasons. You can do whatever the heck you want to, because you are Dirk Nowitzki. .. for good reasons.
And so he did. A cancer survivor wish granted. … Touching a million lives, scoring 31,000 points, and designating that a baseball game can somehow have two ceremonial "first'' pitches.
Happy birthday, GOAT.
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