Unguarded: The Story of Chris Herren

This week I decided to dive into the ESPN Films series "30 for 30." This is a sports documentary series in honor of ESPN's 30th anniversary. One of the films that caught my eye was the Unguarded. This is the story of former Massachusetts hometown star Chris Herren. Being from Massachusetts myself, I thought that this would be an interesting story having known a little background on Chirs Herren. Herren was a public speaker at my Prep School in 2010. I was privileged enough to hear him speak about his addiction with drugs and alcohol and his fight to recover. However nearly 2 years later this film came out. His speech to my school was so moving, I could not wait to see it through film.

The documentary was filmed in a series of interviews with Herren, his brother, wife, and former coaches and friends that had an impact on his life. These interviews were paired with footage of Herren speaking to various schools, military personnel, and others battling addiction. Director and filmaker Jonathan Hock did a marvelous job of tying in the personal interviews and the footage of Herren speaking into a 120 minute documentary.

Herren's story is one of the most raw stories I have ever heard. Herren the hometown hero of Fall River Mass, was a McDonald's All American. After refusing scholarships to Duke, Maryland, and others he attended hometown Boston College. However, at BC he was kicked out of school for failing three drug tests. Boston College was the start of his 10 year long addiction to drugs. From BC he transferred to Fresno State where he was a college star. However, his addiction continued. Herren told a story about being out all night partying, never sleeping, and arriving to his game that morning with the last beverage to touch his lips was a beer. In that same game he had over 40 points and his team upset a highly ranked team. Herren went on to the NBA after college and played for the Denver Nuggets. After a great rookie season that Herren calls his most clean year since high school he was traded to his hometown team, the Boston Celtics. This is where Herren's life fell apart.

Herren's story is not all bad though. He is now3 years sober after suffering 3 overdoses after being kicked out of the NBA. He has 3 children and is now a picture of hope for all suffering addicts. Jonathan Hock did a remarkable job of displaying this hope in the closing of the film. One of the final scenes shows Herren hugging many of the people he touched with his story and comforting them. Perhaps this was his life path: going through all the pain of addiction to help others with their pain. This documentary was moving, tear jerking, and very real. I recommend everyone to watch it, even if your not a sports fan.

The Critical Mass

The day the world changed

When 9/11 happened the vultures that ruled our country went into a rampage of destruction and deception under the cover of fear. That fateful day the world indeed changed for ever. Change in that case meant that everything that was a promise of compassion, understanding and peace would be sacrificed at the altar of greed and intolerance. Thousands of young impressionable American kids have and continue to be slaughtered in the name of geopolitical dominance.

Hundreds of thousands of people have been and continue to be killed for the sin of living in an oil rich region which happens to be at the strategic center of the Muslim world, a very convenient situation that allowed the Bush cartel to portray them as dangerous because of their beliefs in a "wrong" god (as if there was a "right" one), for dressing differently, for having a different shade of brown in their skin. That was portrayed over and over as a threat to be eliminated, and the masses went for it, giving away their sons and daughters and their economic future to fund the slaughter

But today, the world has changed again, in a reaction so powerful that it might, it just might, restore the balance that we have surely lost. Perhaps it is too late and the damage to our world and to our own humanity is beyond rescue, but there is hope, all around the world, in that world largely ignored by the American people as if it did not exist or matter, that the crumbling empire that is the US might allow the birth of an entirely new world citizenship, that might, just might help guide the world into a hopefully brighter future.

And like Obama said, it is OUR task, that of all of us, not the US, but us, the world, to come together and become what we are supposed to be, the stewards of our only ailing planet.