http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/04/sports/basketball/lenny-cooke-star-to-be-who-never-was.html?pagewanted=all

Star-to-Be Who Never Was


 STONY CREEK, Va. — On an otherwise lazy Sunday, dinner took hours to prepare, filling the small one-story house on a remote and wooded street with the aromatic smell of chicken, ribs and all the trimmings. The extended family would soon be arriving, in full, hungry force.
  在一個不尋常的週日，這個晚餐，在遙遠的，充滿了數目的街道上，要花上好幾個小時準備，整間小小的一層樓房子
  都充滿了雞、肋排和配料。整個家族等下將會飢腸轆轆的來到這裡。

Standing tall but cramped in the narrow kitchen at 6 feet 6 inches and not much less than 300 pounds, Lenny Cooke suddenly looked up from his culinary masterpiece.
  高高站在狹小的廚房，但有點跛的是6呎6，但不少於300磅的 Lenny Cooke，突然從他的美味佳餚中看了過來。

“I went from being a superstar basketball player to being a cook,” he said wistfully, unmindful of the play on his name.
  「我從一個超級籃球巨星變成了一位廚師。」他憂愁的說，不經意的用自己的名字雙關了一下。

But cooking is only a pastime, not a profession, and Cooke, who will turn 30 next month, has yet to discover what or who he is supposed to be since it became obvious years ago that he would not fulfill his once presumed destiny and become an N.B.A. star.
  不過煮飯只是消遣而已，不是一種職業，下個月就要滿30的Cooke，現在還沒有發現在他過去以為的，自己會變成一個NBA超級巨星超級多年之後，現在應該要如何過。

A decade ago, many were predicting that Cooke, a New York City prodigy, would become a basketball shoe pitchman and would flaunt his wares and skills at All-Star weekends like the recent aerial show in Orlando, Fla. There was a time, however fleeting, when he was more heralded, or perhaps merely hyped, than any other high school player in America.
  十年之前，許多人預測紐約市神童Cooke，將會變成一個在籃球鞋上的人物，並在明星週末把他的商品和籃球技巧在奧蘭多展示出來。曾經有一個時候，不管已經有多短，他超越了，或是也許只是被高估了，他是所有美國高中籃球員中最強的。

“No matter who it was against, where we were at, once I got rolling, I just felt I couldn’t be stopped,” he said.
  「不管我對到誰，不管我們在哪裡，只要我上手了，我就覺得我不會被擋下來。」他說。

Scant as it was, evidence of that other life was on display in a corner of the living room of the house Cooke shares with his girlfriend, Anita Solomon, and their young daughter, Nyvaeh. The handful of trophies was only a sampling, he said, of the many he had stored away at his mother’s house in Emporia, a nearby town close to Virginia’s border with North Carolina.
  不過稀薄如此，另一個生命就這樣展示在Cooke和他女朋友Anita Soloman，還有他們的小女兒Nuvaeh，一同居住的房子裡面。他說這一些獎盃只是一部分展示而已，還有很多在他媽媽在維吉尼亞接近北卡的Emporia的房子裡。

But on the wall of Cooke’s celebrity corner was his photographic treasure, proof that he had once walked among the most gifted and talented, and still could.
  不過在Cooke的明星角落中，有他照片的寶藏，證明他曾經和這些最有天份的人一起，同時到現在仍然可以一起。

There was one shot of much younger Lenny, his thinner face partly hidden under a low-slung cap, posing with Magic Johnson. And there was contemporary Lenny, bloated in the years after injuries ended a career already marginalized, in the separate company of Carmelo Anthony and Amar’e Stoudemire at a Knicks game last season.
  有一張照片是年輕很多的Lenny，瘦臉下有一些被壓低的帽子蓋住，這是和Magic Johnson一起拍得。然後還有現在的Lenny，
  在結束生涯的傷病之後被忽視，在一場尼克隊球賽，分別和Melo和Amare合照。

“When I see them, I get the most respect,” he said. “They knew how good I was.”
  「當我探望他們的時候，我得到了最大的尊崇。」他說。「他們知道我之前有多強。」

Cooke was a flashy 6-6 guard who struggled with academics and flirted with college before signing with an agent and entering the 2002 N.B.A. draft — only to go undrafted, never advancing beyond the summer-league teams of the Boston Celtics and the Seattle SuperSonics.
  Cooke當年是個6'6的飛快的後衛，成績很爛，在宣佈進2002年NBA選秀前曾與大學球探眉來眼去 ---- 不過他未被選秀，從來沒有超過賽爾提克和超音速的夏季聯盟之上。

What went wrong? How did he miss by so much?
  發生了什麼問題？他為什麼會差這麼多？

Stretched on the couch, glancing at a big-screen television, he shrugged and said, “You had a devil on one shoulder and an angel on another.”
  攤在沙發上，盯著大螢幕電視，他聳聳肩然後說：「你肩膀上有著一隻惡魔，然後另一邊有著天使。」

After arriving with a phalanx of relatives, Cooke’s mother, Alfreda Hendrix, explained that her son had heeded the wrong calling and had mistaken what was given to him as something he had earned.
  在與一群親戚一起出現之後，Cooke的媽媽，Alfreda Hendrix，解釋了為什麼他的兒子他怎樣選擇了錯誤的路，並且把（上天）給他的，當成他自己爭來的。

“He was a teenage kid, and every day, he had money in his pocket — and I don’t mean $200 or $300,” she said. “It was whatever he wanted, like the world was his, so he took advantage of it. I guess he didn’t figure that things were going to fall down because people kept telling him it was only going to get better and better. He made a lot of mistakes, but as far as his attitude, he’s changed now. He has matured a lot.”
「他當年是個十幾歲的青少年，但每天，他的口袋裡都有前，然後我不是說$200或300的那種。」他說。「那就像是不管他要什麼，就像這個世界是他的一樣，所以他就利用了這樣的狀況。我想他沒有發現一切好像快要不行了，因為人們告訴他，他將會越來越好。他犯了很多錯誤，不過就熊庹而言，他已經改變了，他現在成熟了很多。」

Yet there remains a restless side to Cooke, a meandering and moody soul, the father of three (a son lives in Brooklyn and another daughter in Maryland) who will wander off for weeks at a time to Atlantic City, where he was born, or back to Brooklyn, where he lived during his early high school years.
  不過Cooke 還是有那個不安悶的一面，在他憂鬱且曲折的靈魂之下，三個孩子的爸（一個兒子住在布魯克林，另一個住在馬里蘭）他一週會回到Atlantic City一次，那是他出生之處，或是回到布魯克林，那是他高中早期的所在之處。


This is where the story, still at its crossroads, becomes more complicated. Nobody seems to know what Cooke is looking for — closure from basketball and the key to his future, or the perpetuation of a legend that was never quite written.
  這就是故事，現在還在十字路口上，變得更加複雜的地方。沒有人可以得知Cooke在找什麼 ---- 籃球結束了，他的未來的鑰匙，或是不朽的傳奇，其實並沒有寫下什麼東西。


Eclipsed Early On
一開始就隕落

The first time Adam Shopkorn read about Lenny Cooke, he could not shake the feeling that Cooke’s story had a big-screen, sequel-like quality, “Hoop Dreams” for the 21st century. Given the widespread raves for his all-around game, Cooke — unlike the popular 1994 documentary that followed two young Chicago players — seemed far more likely to end with a pot of N.B.A. gold.
 第一次Adam Shopkorn看到Lenny Cooke，他沒辦法除去那種，Cooke的故事就是21世紀的，大螢幕上續集等級的"Hoop Dream"。在他有著更全面且爆炸性的籃球技巧上，Lenny ---- 不像那部1994年紀錄兩個年輕的芝加哥球員的紀錄片 ---- 似乎非常更有機會最後能夠進去NBA掏金。

Shopkorn, in his early 20s, quit his job with a Manhattan filmmaker and hauled his equipment up to Old Tappan, N.J., where Cooke, an African-American, was starring for the local public school while living with a wealthy white family. In that regard, the cinematic appeal was more “The Blind Side” than “Hoop Dreams.”
  Shopkorn，在他20歲初期的時候，辭掉他在曼哈頓製片的工作，並且把他的設備搬到紐澤西Old Tappan，身為非裔美國人的Cookem，住在當地公立學校，和有錢的白人家庭同住。從這方面來看，這齣戲似乎更像是「攻其不備」，而非「籃球夢」。


Four years earlier, Cooke had befriended a teammate, Brian Raimondi, on an Amateur Athletic Union team called the Panthers. Raimondi’s mother, Debbie Bortner, helped manage the squad. Cooke had only recently begun playing organized ball but was already more than 6 feet tall and quickly became the talk of the circuit.
  四年前，Cooke幫助了一位AAU球隊叫做Panther的隊友，Brian Raimondi。Raimondi的媽媽，Bebbie Bortner，協助他管理球隊。Cooke才剛開始打有系統的籃球，布過已經超過六呎，同時已經變成了隊上的焦點。

The Panthers happened to have one future N.B.A. multimillionaire on their roster, but Joakim Noah, now of the Chicago Bulls, was only 5-9 on the way to 6-11 and completely in awe of Cooke.
  Panther球隊陣容，剛好有一個NBA千萬巨星，不過Joakim Noah，現在在公牛隊，當年只有5-9，還在長到6-11的路上，然後超怕Cooke。

“I was a 13-year-old French kid from Paris, and all of a sudden, I met Lenny and was watching him play in all of these tournaments,” said Noah, the son of the French tennis star Yannick Noah, whose mother had moved him to Hell’s Kitchen in Manhattan. “He was really my hero because the way he could dominate a game was unbelievable to me.”
  「我當年只是一隻13歲從巴黎來的法國小還，然後突然間，我和Lenny見面然後看他整個巡迴賽打球。」身為法國網球名將Yannick Noah的兒子，他媽媽剛到曼哈頓的 Hell's Kitchen工作的Noah說，「他當年真的是我的英雄，因為他打球宰制的方式在當時對我來說完全是不可思議的。」

Cooke began high school at Franklin K. Lane in Brooklyn and transferred to La Salle Academy in Manhattan to play with Raimondi. By junior year, with Cooke struggling academically, they hatched a plan to become teammates in Old Tappan.
Cooke中學開始是在 布魯克林的Franklin K. Lan，後來轉到 曼哈頓的 La Salle Academy為Raimondi打球。在高二，他課業不太好，他們想到了去Old Tappan打球。

While Raimondi nursed a broken wrist, Cooke was dominating the suburban competition when Shopkorn arrived to make his documentary pitch.
當Raimondi傷了他的手腕，Cooke在Shopkorn來到此地拍攝紀錄片的當下，正在宰制一場郊區的比賽。

“I wasn’t there just to get a quick story, but as someone who wanted to be there for the whole process — let’s call it a two-year process,” Shopkorn said. “It took a little time, but Lenny understood what I wanted to do. He began to trust me.”
「我到那邊並不只是想要快速的得到一個故事，而是要作為一個在整個過程中都在場的人 ---- 讓我們喚他作一個兩年的過程吧。」Shopkorn說。「我花了一點點時間，不過Lenny知道我在幹麼，他開始相信我。」

Shopkorn turned his video camera on Cooke at Bortner’s home, where Cooke and Raimondi had adjoining rooms; at Cooke’s games for Old Tappan, where he averaged 31 points but fell short of a state championship; on Cooke’s visits to his old Bushwick neighborhood — the frequency of which concerned Bortner — even after his family had left Brooklyn for Virginia.
Shopkorn將其攝影機轉向Cooke在Bortner的家中，Cooke和Raimondi房間就在隔壁；在Cooke偽Old Tappan打球的當時，他平均31分，不過在州冠軍賽中落敗：在Cooke回到他Bushwick老家鄉的時候 ---- 回去的頻率讓Bortner有點擔心 --- 即便他的家庭已經離開了布魯克林搬到了維吉尼亞。

Most significantly, and symbolically, Shopkorn was in perfect position to record a moment that would become the most unforgettable, and haunting, of Cooke’s basketball life.
  最顯著的，同時也最象徵性的，Shopkorn正在一個能夠紀錄最難以忘懷的，同時也最強烈的，Cooke的籃球生涯的絕佳完美位置上。

It was the summer of 2001, weeks before 9/11, and Cooke returned to the popular ABCD Camp for the nation’s most prominent high school players at Fairleigh Dickinson University’s Teaneck, N.J., campus as the defending most valuable player, the presumed chosen one.
那是2001年的暑假，911事件的幾個禮拜前，Cooke回到了ABCD營隊中，那是美國最重要的高中球員，聚集在紐澤西的Fairleigh Dickinson University，他是上屆的MVP，被認為是「那個人」。

“He was coming from being the No. 1 player in the country, and we all looked at Lenny like that,” said Anthony, who was born in Brooklyn but relocated to Baltimore. “It was his size, how strong he was, how he could pass the ball and play the point, kind of like Magic, I guess. He was really explosive.”
  「正在變成全國第一的球員的路上，而且我們所有人都認為Lenny是這樣。」生在布魯克林不過搬去巴爾的摩的安東尼表示。「那是因為他的高度、他強壯，他能夠傳球且打一號，有點像魔術強森，而且非常有爆發力。」


Anthony’s team was defeated by Cooke’s group. Cooke dazzled the packed gym and set up a showdown between him and a lesser-known player who was generating interest and who was one grade behind Cooke. His name was LeBron James, out of Akron, Ohio, a comparative basketball backwater.
安東尼的隊被Cooke的隊打敗了。Cooke在體育館內和另一位比較鮮為人知，但正在引起人們注意的，小Cooke一屆的球員來個一打一。他的名字是LeBron James，從俄亥俄州，阿克隆來的地方，另一個能夠相比的籃球員發源地。

During the camp, a person in the James entourage noticed Shopkorn’s shadowing Cooke and wanted to know why. When Shopkorn told him, the James ally said: “You should come up to Akron and shoot LeBron. He’s the real deal.”
  在營隊中，一個James陣營的人發現Shopkorn正在拍攝Cooke，然後想要知道為什麼。當Shopkorn告訴他，詹姆士那邊的人說：「你應該要到Akron拍James，他是真貨。」

Shopkorn declined the offer, electing to go with the known commodity, or at least the commodity he knew.
  Shopkorn回絕了這項邀請，決定繼續他現在有的工作，或至少他是知道的。

“Lenny was local, so you had all the media outlets there, all the newspapers, all the scouts and coaches,” Shopkorn said. “There was this buildup to the game, and it kind of took on a life of its own.”
  「Lenny是當地人，所以你有著所有的媒體、報紙、所有的球探和教練，」Shopkorn說。「這些都是為了比賽而生，且有點正在起飛中。」

Sitting in the stands with Debbie Bortner that day, Joakim Noah says he remembers Cooke’s climactic moment — crossing over James on the dribble several times before draining a midrange jumper. The gym erupted, but it was only the first half of a game that would go down to the last possession, a much leaner James with the ball and his team trailing by 2.
  在Debbie Bortner身邊坐在觀眾席中，Joakim Noah說他還記得 Cooke呼風喚雨的時刻 ---- 跨下運球過了James好幾次然後投一個中距離。體育館爆發了，不過那是上半場，最後一個球權，瘦很多的James持球，他的隊伍落後兩分。

James had already outscored Cooke, 21-9, but he saved his best for last. Guarded by Cooke, he dribbled out of the backcourt, to his right. Just as he approached the 3-point line, with a step on Cooke, James went airborne, kicked his feet back and floated the ball toward the rim. He hit nothing but net — game over — while Cooke’s jaw dropped.
  James已經以21-9比Cooke得分還多，不過他把最精彩的保留在最後頭。由Cooke守他，他運過後場，往右。就在他接近三分線的時候，離Cooke還有一步，他飛起來了，把腿往後踢然後把球投往籃框。他投了個空心，比賽結束，Cooke的下巴掉下來了。

“How’d he make that?” he said to a friend afterward, mixing in profanity. “Oh my God.”
  「他怎麼作到的？」他跟他朋友說，有點不敬的說，「喔我的老天啊。」

Sonny Vaccaro, the former sneaker company executive who founded the camp, was stunned to learn that Shopkorn had footage of what he considered to be a historic shot. He called it the “one physical moment that symbolized the beginning of LeBron and the downfall of Lenny Cooke.”
Sonny Vaccaro，贊助此營隊的前球鞋CEO，知道了Shopkorn有著他認為是一個歷史性的時刻的影帶感到相當吃驚。他稱之為「一個象徵LeBron的開始，以及Lenny Cooke的衰敗的關鍵時刻。「

“He beat Lenny on his own turf,” Vaccaro said. “I mean, you can say it was one shot, one game, but in a way, Lenny never recovered.”
  Vaccaro說：「我在Lenny的地盤上打敗了他。」，「我的意思是，你可以說那只是一球而已，一場比賽，不過一種說法是，Lenny從來沒有東山再起過。」

James would land on the cover of Sports Illustrated and star in a nationally televised high school game on ESPN. With his scholastic eligibility exhausted, Cooke was limited during his senior year to all-star classics and pickup games.
James將會降臨在運動畫報封面，並在ESPN的全國轉播高中比賽中演出。在他的學業合格耗盡之後，Cooke在高中最後一年，只能在明星經典賽和友誼賽中出現。

He would never again be considered the next brand name. Anthony, who left New Jersey the day before the Cooke-James showdown, said, “After that, we just didn’t hear very much about him.”
他永遠不會再被認為是下一個品牌名稱。安東尼，在Cooke和James那場比賽前一天離開紐澤西的他，表示：「在那之後，我們就沒什麼聽到他的消息了。」

With the benefit of 20-20 hindsight, Cooke can plainly see now that the angel on his shoulder was Debbie Bortner.
在20-20後見之明之下，Cooke能夠痛苦的看到他肩膀上的天使是Debbie Bortner。

“I look back and wished I would have listened to what she and other people were telling me about school,” he said. “It’s up to you to make your own decisions about who you’re going to surround yourself with because your image is more important than anything else.”
  「我回頭看並希望我當時能夠聽從她和其他人告訴我有關學校的事情，」他說。「對於誰要在你身邊，那是你的決定，因為你的形象比任何東西都重要。」

Whether Cooke would have repaired his academic record enough to play at St. John’s — the university he said had interest in attending — is impossible to know. But it all became moot when in the early spring of 2002, he suddenly packed up the neatly stacked row of jerseys and sneakers in Bortner’s home.
不管Cooke是否能夠修補他的學業成績，到可以打St. John;s的水準 ---- 那是一間他表示他有意願就讀的大學 ---- 已經不可能得知了。不過就在2002年的早春，他在Bortner的家中，突然打包了他的球衣和鞋子，一切都沒有意義了。

Moving On
出發

He went to Flint, Mich., to live with a new benefactor, a former college player and recruiter named Terence Greene, seemingly to pursue a high school equivalency diploma.
他前往密西根的Flint，跟一個新的贊助人，他是名叫Terence Greene的前大學球員和招募人，似乎要追尋一個高中同等學歷。

Cooke had grown tired of hearing that he was Lenny of Old Tappan, not Lenny from Brooklyn. His family chafed over the news media’s focus on Bortner, who nonetheless pleaded with him to stay.
  Cooke對於一直以來聽到來自Old Tappan的Lenny，而不是Brooklyn的Lenny感到厭煩。他的家庭對於新聞媒體一直注意在無論如何求他留下來的Bortner上，感到相當惱火。

“We never had an argument; it was never angry,” Bortner said. “Lenny hugged me when he left. We both were in tears. I knew he was making a mistake, but it was more like when you have to let your own child go to find out for himself what the world is like. Unfortunately, people misinterpreted it as Lenny being disloyal, and that he wasn’t a good person.”
  「我們從來沒有爭吵；當時從不惱火，」Bortner說。「Lenny 離開的時候抱了我。我們都流淚了。我知道他正在作一件錯事，不過納更像是你必須要讓你的小孩離開，去尋找他自己，以及這個世界是長怎樣。不幸的是，人們錯誤解讀以為Lenny是不忠誠的，還有他不是個好人。」

Vaccaro said the perception only worsened when Cooke arrived in Chicago soon after to play in an all-star game, the Roundball Classic, firmly in the clutches of people pushing him in the direction of the draft.
  Vaccaro說事情在Cooke到達芝加哥，並且很快的打了Roundball Classic的一場明星賽之後，一群很堅決的人將方向推往參加選秀。

“There was already a mystery about him when he left Debbie, people starting to wonder about his character,” Vaccaro said. “That’s not to say he was a bad guy — because he wasn’t. Just one of those kids who listens to the last person who tells him something. And there were people all around him — agents, runners — glorifying him, giving him things. He took everything.”
「在他離開Debbie的時候就已經是一團迷霧了，人們開始揣測他的個性，」Vaccaro說。「哪並不表示他是個壞人 ---- 因為他不是。他只是一個聽從最後一個告訴他什麼的孩子之一。然後當時所有人都在他身邊 ---- 經紀人，推銷員 ---- 讚美他，給他東西。然後他照單全收。

Vaccaro recalled a conversation with Cooke — a lecture, really — in which he warned him about making a good impression in Chicago, not doing anything to fuel the already burning speculation.
  Vaccaro回想起了他跟Cooke的一段對話 ---- 實際上是一陣責罵 ---- 他警告他要在芝加哥留下好印象，而非做出任何能夠損害他他已經不太好的聲望。

“I told him, ‘Every N.B.A. scout is here, and they’re watching you,’ ” Vaccaro said. “I said, ‘If you’re going to do something stupid, don’t do it this week, or do it in your room.’ And what happens? It’s 1 o’clock in the morning, people are hanging around in the lobby of the Hyatt, and here comes Lenny with his entourage, all the partiers, all the jewelry. I said: ‘What the hell are you doing? We talked about this.’ ”
  「我告訴他，『每個NBA球探都在這，然後他們已經在盯著你了，』」CVaccaro說。「我說，『如果你要去做一些愚蠢的事情，本週不要幹，或者是在你房間裡作。』」然後發生了什麼事？凌晨 1點，人們在Hyatt酒店的大廳閒晃，然後Lenny和和他的狗黨們出現了，都是些派對和珠寶。『你在幹嘛？我們討論過這了。」』

Cooke by that time was driving a new Mercedes and with Bortner had distanced himself from his personal documentarian — though not before Shopkorn recorded his choreographed declaration for the N.B.A. draft at Junior’s restaurant in downtown Brooklyn. Tears rolled down Cooke’s cheeks as he held his young son, Anahijae, and told reporters that he was ready to run with the world’s best.
  Cooke當時正開著他的新賓士，Bortner已經遠離他的紀錄片主角 ---- 雖然不久之前Shopkorn才紀錄了他在布魯克林市區的Junior's餐廳精心策劃的參加NBA選秀宣告。Cooke抱著他的兒子，Anahijae，眼中泛著淚水，告訴記者他已經準備好要和這世界上最強的人一較高下。

June 26, 2002. Cooke waited anxiously at a Manhattan hotel, expecting his name to be called in the lower part of the first round or early in the second. Yao Ming was the first pick that night, going to Houston. Stoudemire, one of Cooke’s main rivals in his grade, went ninth to Phoenix, also out of high school. The night dragged on. Players Cooke had never heard of — some from countries he had never heard of — were selected, 58 in all.
2002年六月26日，Cooke在曼哈頓的旅館中焦慮的帶著，希望他的名字會在第一輪後段和第二輪前段被提到。姚明是當晚的第一輪第一順位，去了休士頓。Amare，他是Cooke那屆的主要對手之一，在第九順位去了太陽，一樣也是高中畢業。當晚就繼續拖著。有些Cooke從沒聽過的球員 ---- 還有一些從他從沒聽過得國家來的球員 ---- 被選了，總共有58個人。

“I waited, I waited, I waited,” he said. “Like on Christmas Day, you think you’re getting this toy, and then Christmas comes, it’s not under the tree. It breaks you down emotionally. I broke down, realized I got bad advice. But you wonder, why not? Why didn’t my name get called?”
  「我等，我等，我等。」他說。「就像聖誕節，你覺得你會拿到一個玩具，然後聖誕節來了，聖誕樹下沒有。那在精神上會把你打垮。我崩潰了，我知道我獲得了壞的建議。不過你想，為什麼沒有？為什麼我的名字沒被喊到？」

No longer a commodity, no longer surrounded by those seeking to cash in on an prospective fortune, Cooke was soon looking for new representation and a place to play. He tried the new N.B.A. developmental vehicle, known as the D-League, but carried a star’s sense of entitlement. Or maybe it was a case of not enough desire. In one of Shopkorn’s many recorded scenes, Cooke responded to a request for a 6:30 a.m. training session at a camp with incredulity, wondering why the start time couldn’t be changed to 8.
  再也不是個商品，再也不被那些想要利用他未來的財富賺錢的人包圍，Cooke馬上找著下一個可以表現自己和打球的地方。他試過NBA的新發展工具，名叫D-league的東西，不過僅有一點點收入。或者是其實是因為沒有足夠的可望。在許多Shopkorn的紀錄影像中，Cooke對於要求六點半就要報到的訓練營課程的回應是，懷疑為什麼時間不能被改成八點。

He didn’t last long in the D-League and landed in the old United States Basketball League the next spring. He scored 47 points one night for the Brooklyn Kings, with the original Brooklyn King — the Knicks legend named Bernard — watching from courtside, intrigued by what he saw while pointing out the schoolyard tendencies that haunted Cooke’s game.
  他沒有在D-league待多久，下個春天就轉去已經不在的了USBL。他為Brooklyn Kings某個晚上得了47分 ---- 就在原來的布魯克林之王，尼克傳奇球星 Bernard，在場邊觀戰之時，引起了他的興趣，同時也指出，Cooke的比賽一直有著街球的風格。

But Cooke averaged about 30 points a game in the U.S.B.L., and that earned him a shot with the Boston Celtics’ summer-league team. He had a couple of decent games and relished the challenge of matching up against Cleveland and James, the top pick of the 2003 draft. But Cooke did not play a minute. James, already hailed as the King, took a moment to console him.
不過Cooke在USBL每場得30分，也讓他能夠進去Celtics的夏季聯盟。他有著幾場不錯的比賽，同時也有著和騎士隊的LBJ，2003年第一輪第一順位挑戰的機會。不過Cooke沒上場，詹姆士當時已經被稱為小皇帝了，抓住了機會。

Cooke played a season in the Philippines, then drifted to China for a spell. By December 2004, his now-transient life took him to Southern California, where he headed out for dinner on a rainy night after a game with a teammate from the Long Beach Jam of the American Basketball Association. Cooke was not wearing a seat belt when his teammate Nick Sheppard crashed his car into a light post.

Cooke在菲律賓打了一季，然後去中國打了一下。2004年十一月，顛沛流離的他到了南加州，他在一個下雨的比賽晚上之後，和他在ABA球隊的隊友Long Beach Jam前往吃晚餐之際，Cooke沒繫安全帶，他的隊友 Nick Sheppard把車開去撞路燈柱。

Cooke awoke from a coma, spent months in a wheelchair, fortunate that his shattered left leg did not have to be amputated, as doctors first feared. Limping, still dreaming, he returned to the Philippines, then tore his Achilles’. Back in the old Continental Basketball Association with the Rockford Lightning, the coach, Chris Daleo, saw that Cooke had never properly rehabilitated his leg. He was overweight.
  Cooke從昏迷中醒來，好幾個月在輪椅上，幸好他粉碎的左腳沒有讓他像醫師一開始害怕的殘廢，他仍然有夢，回到了菲國，然後傷了他的阿機里斯腱。回到美國CBA去打Rockford Lightning，他的教練 Chris Daleo，發現Cooke的腳沒有好好的復健。然後他過胖了。

“I put him with our trainer and thought if we could get him back in shape, he still might play somewhere,” Daleo said. “Lenny was a likable guy, somebody you wanted around. You just wished you could turn back the clock for him. Even when he was out of shape, dragging his leg, you could see he had the tools. LeBron is what you had, only rawer.”
「我把他交給我們的訓練員，然後看他能不能回復體態，他可能還可以在哪裡打點球。」Daleo說。「Lenny是一個討人喜歡的人，你會想要跟他作朋友的。你只是希望他能夠回到他應該到的軌道上。即便他已經過胖了，拖著他的腳，你還是可以看到他的能力。LeBron是你有的東西，只是粗糙了點而已。」

But after the team moved to Minot, N.D., Cooke blew out his other Achilles’. Bad luck compounding imprudent decisions, his career was over, a half-dozen years after his showdown with James. The question echoed: was Cooke ever really that good or merely the beneficiary of the New York buzz?
不過在該隊移到North Dakotak的Minot之後，Cooke的另一條阿機里斯腱也炸了。衰運加上輕率的決策，他的生涯結束了。就在他和LeBron對決的6年後。問題來了：Cooke真的有那麼好，還是他只是所謂的New York謠傳的受益者？

“You can’t put him in the group of New York guys that were overhyped,” Vaccaro said. “What it came down to was a complete mistrust in who and what he was. Teams were afraid.”
「你不能把他和那些被過份描述的紐約人放在一起，」Vaccaro說。「最後變成的是，他不相信別人和自己。球隊們會怕。」

Vaccaro insisted that Cooke’s shattered hoop dreams were far more authentic than those of William Gates and Arthur Agee, chronicled by the director of “Hoop Dreams,” Steve James.
Vaccaro堅持Cooke粉碎的籃球夢比Hoop Dreams的導演Steve James所拍的 William Gates和Arthur Agee更加可信。

“Lenny was on the pedestal because he was one of those elite guys,” Vaccaro said. “He was damn good. I just think he blew it all.”
「Lenny被我們崇拜是因為他是那些菁英球員，」Vaccaro說。「他超強，我覺得他只是搞砸了而已。」

Future in Question
未來堪慮

Amar’e Stoudemire did not recognize the smiling man advancing toward him, dressed in oversize clothing to camouflage his ample girth. Recognition only came when the man could lean close and say, “It’s me, Lenny Cooke.”
Amare沒有認出往他走來的笑臉人，穿著過大的衣服以掩飾他巨大的腰身。一直到他走到他身邊然後說，「我是Lenny Cooke。」

Stoudemire did a double take before embracing Cooke.
  Amare在抱他之前，又多確認了一次。

“It had been a few years, and he had picked up a hundred pounds or so,” Stoudemire said, recalling the moment. “It was a little shocking.”
  Amare回想起那一次：「已經過了幾年了，然後他大概多了一百磅左右。」「我有點嚇到。」

The courtside scene that took place after a Bulls-Knicks game at Madison Square Garden last April repeated itself with Anthony, who would say: “Just to see him now, not doing anything, as far as basketball goes, and so much bigger, it just seemed sad. You wondered why.”
 這個場邊的場景發生在上個四月的MSG，當Lenny又對Melo做了一樣的事情，Melo會說；「我只是看看他，沒有作其他事情，只是籃球的事情，只是更大隻了，似乎有點悲傷。你會思考為什麼。

Trying to answer that question was Shopkorn, who accompanied Cooke to the game to record his reunion with Stoudemire, Anthony and his long-ago fervent admirer Joakim Noah. With Shopkorn was Josh Safdie, a New York-based independent filmmaker brought on board by Shopkorn — along with Safdie’s brother, Benny — after Shopkorn reconnected with Cooke and resumed his long-dormant project.
試著要回答這問題的事 Shopkorn，他和Cooke一起進入球場並且紀錄了他和Amare，Anthony、還有很久以前的仰慕者Noah的重逢。和Shopkorn一起的是Josh Safdie，一個由Shopkorn帶出來，以紐約為據點的獨立製片家，還有Safdie的兄弟Benny，就在Shopkron重新和Cooke搭上線，並且重新開始他已經冬眠很久的製片計畫。

Friends would occasionally ask Shopkorn, who had become an independent art adviser and curator, whatever happened to the documentary “with the basketball player.” Some would remember the name, Lenny. Others would mistakenly say LeBron. They only knew it was someone who was supposed to be famous.
  有些時候朋友會問Shopkorn，他已經變成了獨立藝術顧問和評議員，那個「那個籃球員的」紀錄片怎麼了？有些會想起他的名字，其他會錯認為LeBron。他們只知道那個人曾經有名過。

On the afternoon that Cooke was preparing dinner for his family, Shopkorn and Josh Safdie made the now-familiar drive trip from Manhattan to Stony Creek, a town of around 200. It was late December, the sounds of televised football providing a daylong soundtrack. Cooke was clearly delighted and energized by the camera as he played with his daughter, prepared the dinner and shared his career perspective with a reporter.
在一個Cooke為他家人煮食的下午，Shopkorn和Josh Safdie驅車前往現在已經很熟悉的從曼哈頓到Stony Creek，約莫200公里左右。那是十二月底，電視轉播的美式足球提供了一整天的背景音樂。Cooke，一邊和他女兒一起玩，顯然的對於攝影機的拍攝感到高興和精力十足，一邊準備晚餐一邊和記者分享他的生涯回顧。

“At first it was difficult,” he said of the years after he stopped playing. “I saw guys I grew up playing with, guys I was better than. I couldn’t watch anything LeBron would do — know what I’m saying? I thought I should have been where he is.”
「一開始很困難。」他在說他不再打球的那幾年。「我看到那些我一起打球長大的，一些我那時比他們強的。我不能看任何LeBron的比賽 ---- 你知道我說什麼嗎？我認為我應該要在他在的位置上。」

Cooke never did get to play against James again, or to know him. But he insisted that he never resented his runaway success and dismissed criticism of James’s playoff failures.
Cooke再也沒有機會和他對上，甚至是看到他。不過他堅持他對於LeBron離他很遠的成功並不生氣，同時反駁了那些對LeBron在季後賽的失敗的批評。

“I mean, look at where he is, how much money he makes and where he came from,” he said. Cooke grew quiet, then shook his head. “From where I’m sitting, right here, I wish the only thing they could say about me was that I have no championship ring.”
「我是說，看他在哪裡，他賺了多少錢，還有他從哪裡來，」他說。Cooke漸漸沉默下來，然後搖了搖頭。「從我現在坐的這邊，這裡，我希望他們能對我說的就是我沒有冠軍戒指。」

Cooke’s weight ballooned because he was inactive, deflated and took full advantage of the culinary skills he had honed when he was in the Philippines and China, and would call his mother for tips on home cooking. When he would Google himself online, the only easy-to-locate video of him in action was of his first game at Old Tappan.
Cooke的體重就像吹氣球一樣，因為他沒在動、洩氣和因為在菲律賓和中國訓練出來的，還有會問他媽媽的烹飪技巧。當他可以在網路上Google自己的時候，最容易找到的比賽就是他第一場在Old Tappan的那場。

Most online references to Cooke identify him as the inverse of James, which he has come to accept as his legacy with a mix of resignation and resolve.
  大部分的網路上介紹都是說Cooke是James的反面，他也漸漸能夠接受這是他混合了放棄和退讓的遺產。

“As long as every time I go on the Internet and somebody is talking about Lenny and LeBron, I guess my name’s still being mentioned with this guy — you know what I’m saying?” Cooke said. “Give my kids something to read, some way to know without me telling them that I was there with LeBron, a guy with a $100 million contract. It used to bother me when they said, ‘Lenny Cooke was supposed to be something and he isn’t.’ Not anymore. I’m living my life.”
  「每次我在網路上的時候，有些人在討論Lenny和LeBron，我猜我的名字仍然和這個人一起被提到 ---- 你知道我在說什麼嗎？Cooke說。「讓我的孩子有些東西能夠讀，某些我不用開口，就能告訴他們我曾經和LeBron，現在領個一億的人同個等級。過去這句會很困擾我：『Lenny Cooke應該要達到某個程度，不過他沒有。』再也不會了，我現在在過我的生活。」

Cooke could yet attach a more lasting meaning to his aborted basketball life, said Noah, who has expressed conditional interest about participating in Shopkorn’s film.
  Cooke能夠為他已經休止的籃球生活添上更多意義，譬如說Noah，他表示他對於參與Shopkorn的電影有著有條件的興趣。

“I mean, there’s so many kids out there getting — I’m not going to say raped by the system — but really getting taken advantage of,” he said. “That’s the question people don’t ask enough when they talk about Lenny Cooke. I mean, this isn’t the story of a kid shooting hoops in his backyard in the Midwest. There was so much thrown at him when he was so young.”
  「我說，有許多孩子在那邊 ---- 我不想說被體系強暴 ---- 不過真的被佔便宜了，」他表示。「那是當人們提到Lenny Cooke的時候，他們沒有往下追問的，那不是一個關於孩子在中西部的自己後院丟球的故事。那是關於在他太年輕的時候就丟了太多東西給他的故事。」

Father Figure Missing
遺失的父親形象

Noah recalled traveling with his father on the tennis tour as a young boy and rooting for him to lose in the first round so they could spend time together.
Noah回想起他作為一個小朋友和他老爸在網球巡迴的時候，多希望他能夠在第一輪就被淘汰，這樣他們才能在一起。

“Debbie tried to do that for Lenny, but he never really had that male figure,” Noah said. “Those are the things Lenny needs to talk about, but if it’s going to be for the benefit of kids he’s also got to have a positive message at the end.”
  「Debbie試著要對Lenny作同樣的事情，不過他從來沒有那種男性的形象，」Noah說。「那是Lenny必須要討論的，不過如果就算他沒有辦法對孩子有什麼幫助，他至少要在最後有個正面的訊息。」

That is easier said than done when Cooke is still at a crossroads. Last summer, when Cooke was spending time in Atlantic City, and jogging up and down the court in a recreational league, a friend arranged for him to speak to children at a Boys and Girls Club. He arrived by limousine and — as he occasionally still does — spoke of returning to his former playing weight of 200-plus pounds and making a comeback.
對於還在十字路的Cooke來說，說比作容易。上個夏天，Cooke在Altantic City，在一個菜市場聯盟打歡樂的慢跑球的時候，一個朋友邀請他到一個男女俱樂部講話。他坐著Limo到場 ---- 和他有些時候仍然會的一樣 --- 說著要回去他過去200磅的體重然後試著要回來打。

Cooke worked for a food distributorship after returning to Virginia but is currently unemployed. Solomon, his girlfriend, commutes about an hour to a hair salon in Richmond and hopes to open her own closer to home.
  Cooke在回到維吉尼亞後，曾經以遞送食物維生，不過近日沒工作。他的女朋友Soloman，每天通勤約莫一小時去一個Richmond的美髮沙龍工作，她希望能在附近開一個自己的沙龍。

Daleo, his former coach in Rockford and in Minot, said he had been contacted several times in recent years by people interested in doing one project or another on Cooke.
  Daleo，他在Rockford和Minot的教練，說他曾經在那些對於培養關於Cooke計畫上，聯絡過他幾次。

“To be honest, I wish some of these people would just give Lenny a job,” he said.
  「老師說，我希望這些人能夠給他一個工作就好，」他說。

A decade ago, Shopkorn was willing to stake his future on Cooke. Now Cooke lobbies Shopkorn to stay longer when the time comes to leave after a day of shooting video. Cooke said he was excited by the chance to spread his message — stay in school and steer clear of the industry flesh peddlers — far and wide. But the attention is intoxicating.
  十年之前，Shopkorn願意將他的未來賭在Cooke上。現在Cooke在遊說Shopkorn能夠在一整天的拍攝工作後留下來久一點。Cooke說他對於能夠有機會散佈他的信息很興奮 ---- 留在學校，並和那些吃人的人遠離一點 --- 越遠越好。不過這種關注是讓人興奮的。

“I do know that by coming back and putting cameras in his face and providing him with all this attention, it’s inevitable that there’s going to be a return to the feeling that he’s the star again, like he was in 2001,” Shopkorn said.
  「我知道藉著回來並且把攝影機對準他的臉，提供他這一切的關注，不可避免的會讓他回想起2001年的時候，他還是個明星。」

But he believes this is one cautionary tale of the tapes that should be told. All that is lacking is the happier ending that Noah, Bortner and the others still in Lenny Cooke’s corner are hoping for.
不過他相信這是一個關於要小心注意的影帶。缺少的是Noah，Bortner和其他還在Lenny Cooke這邊，還在期待的人。

Or more to the point: a promising new beginning.
或者是更切進重點：一個大有可為的新開始。