Big Brad a gentle giant

Brad Bridgewater is excited to be part of the journey at the Pakenham Warriors. Picture: COURTESY OF PAUL MAARTENS

Brad Bridgewater has a physique that belies his manner. He’s big, imposing, and intimidating – but in talking with him, chances are he won’t get through more than a single sentence without saying the word ‘mate’ and flashing his trademark grin as RUSSELL BENNETT discovers…

 

Brad Bridgewater’s story is one that has taken him all the way around the world, just to continue playing the sport he loves most.
And through basketball he’s found a new home in Australia.
Now 36, the 205-centimetre Pakenham Warriors man mountain has done it all, from high school, to the US college system, to the professional ranks of the Euro League, to the surreal world of the Harlem Globetrotters and the Washington Generals.
But in Melbourne’s south-east, at the final stop of his playing journey, the big man is making perhaps his biggest mark yet.
“I started playing basketball when I was eight,” he explained.
“My original sport was tee-ball and baseball, which is probably pretty American!”
He laughed, but given he was born and raised in a small country town just outside of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, it’s only natural he had such an affinity with America’s favourite pastime.
But it wasn’t to last.
“I played tee-ball right through until I transitioned to baseball,” he said.
“I think we were probably about three or four games in and I was playing shortstop and there was a pop-fly ball. I went back to try to catch it and the sun got in my eyes and the ball hit me in the head. I was out.
“When I came to, I threw my glove off and never played baseball again – not even at school. I just wouldn’t participate. To say the least – I’m not a fan of baseball. I don’t even watch it on TV!
“My dad told me I needed to pick a sport – to play something. My dad is about 6’3” and my mum is close to six-foot, so I guess they figured I’d have some sort of height.
“Dad told me to try basketball and the first time I stepped on the court I just fell in love with it.”
One of the main reasons why he fell head over heels with the game was the mateship and camaraderie of it.
“I’ve always been a social guy,” Bridgewater said.
“There are guys I played junior high school basketball with that I haven’t seen in 15 years, but I’ll go home to the States and run into them and it’s like we haven’t missed anything.
“I think that’s a big thing for us now at Pakenham – it’s a great group of guys and we want to play for each other.
“It’s not about ‘I’m Brad Bridgewater and I’ve played all over the world, and I have to get 20 points every night’.
“We have none of that at all.
“You’ll see a guy with an open shot but then he’ll make the extra pass for an even better one.”
Bridgewater has put up huge numbers all over the world, but when he started out as a player, he struggled. Badly.
“When I was first introduced to it I started out as a point guard because – believe it or not – I was quite small,” he said.
“I was always on the cusp of being that big kid, but I don’t think I gained much height until between the eighth and ninth grade, when I went from 5’6” to 6’1” in a matter of three months. I came back to school and I was this 6’1” awkward, skinny, gangly kid who could barely put one foot in front of the other.
“I was learning how to handle the ball, but as soon as I had that growth spurt all the co-ordination I’d developed just went out the door. I couldn’t talk and walk at the same time without fumbling, and I wasn’t strong either.
“In the States if you’re over six-foot you’re in the post because high school teams are dying for height.
“That’s basically what happened to me and I got pushed behind.”
Bridgewater had to bide his time – waiting until his senior year for his time to shine.
By then, he’d grown into his body and he played like it – averaging 25-30 points on a great percentage from the floor, double-digit rebounds, and a few blocks per game.
Through school he’d been involved in track and field and football, as well as basketball. They all led into each other and made him a more-rounded athlete.
After high school, Bridgewater stayed in Louisiana and attended college at LSU – the former home of Shaquille O’Neal.
The school had a real emphasis on attracting local talent, and Bridgewater opted for the basketball route there despite also receiving football scholarships from the likes of Baylor and Oklahoma.
Bridgewater could easily have accepted a chance to play at Rutgers in New Jersey, but his tight bond with his family kept him close to home.
“I’m a lot older than the rest of my siblings – between me and my next sibling I’m almost six years older, my sister I’m 10 years older than and my other brother I’m 13 years older,” he said.
“They were still very much young kids so I decided to go close to home. LSU was just a 45-minute drive away. I could always go home and help them out if they needed me for anything.”
Bridgewater spent five years at LSU after a horror start saw him miss his whole junior year after blowing out his knee.
“I think I matured a lot in the year I sat out and I got to see the game from a different perspective,” he said.
“It helped me think about the game more than just being in the moment of it.”
Then, it came time to take the daunting step into the cut-throat world of the professional ranks.
“Every guy’s goal over there is to try and make the NBA,” he said.
“I probably had that slight window and opportunity.
“Shaq would always come back (to LSU) and give us advice and when it came time for it, he helped me get into the Lakers’ camp over summer.”
Bridgewater was named co-MVP of that camp in 2003, but his approach to the ruthless world of professional basketball worked against him.
“The other guy who was named MVP had an agent,” he said.
“I never had an agent because I could never wrap my head around paying somebody to go and get me a job. It’s great that guys go and get these people but you should be picked on the merit of your game – it shouldn’t be because I’ve got this guy who can work out this massive deal.
“It should be because I can play, and I’m a good person and I’ll be a good fit for your team.
“But I learned that in my first year as a professional – it’s all about their business.”
He soon learned that his co-MVP had been picked on the Lakers’ Summer League team, only to be cut within a week.
Bridgewater was offered an opportunity with the Globetrotters but was forced to knock it back given that he’d already signed a deal in Croatia.
“I thought it was going to be a great opportunity in the top tier and the top division in Europe, and I thought I’d worked out a crackerjack deal making $4000-$5000 per month US dollars, no tax, a car, and a place to live … I thought it was the greatest thing ever,” Bridgewater said.
It wasn’t.
“I got over there – they gave me some spending money and a little place to live,” he said.
“I was there for three months and didn’t get paid any of it.
“When payday came around after the first month they said they had club fees and this and that to pay, and me being a gullible young new kid I said no worries. They said they’d pay me double next month and not to worry. Next month came – same thing.”
After the third month without being paid, Bridgewater booked a flight back to the US. He didn’t know where to turn next.
“That put me in a really, really dark place and in hindsight I’d say I went into depression – I didn’t leave the house for about two months,” he said.
“Finally all the guys came out and said I couldn’t do it anymore.
“I had a couple of team-mates from LSU who came over because my brother was pretty concerned. They came over and said it wasn’t the end of the world – that I’m a good athlete and an even better person. I guess in my mind I thought I’d failed and I didn’t know about life after basketball that soon … I was 23.”
Bridgewater soon latched on to a team that travelled across America playing against college teams in pre-season games. There wasn’t a lot of money involved, but there was the chance to keep his dream alive.
“We were in Vegas playing at UNLV and right before the game the owner of the Globetrotters walked up and asked if I remembered him,” he said.
“He asked me when the tour finished up and I said that was our last game and I’d probably be back home in about two days.
“He asked me my address, and he said there’d be a plane ticket for me when I got home. ‘You’re on the team’.
“Just like that it turned around for me and next thing I knew I was playing for probably one of the most well-known teams in the world.”
What followed was a whirlwind 12 months – playing, and partying, in a different city every night.
“It’s like your life is in fast forward,” Bridgewater said.
“You didn’t really get to see your family, and my transition into the team was pretty tough. Guys didn’t like the way I came into the team because they had to go through training camp – even if they’d been on the team for 10 years.”
But Bridgewater stood his ground, and earned their respect. Ultimately, he walked away after that year in favour of a stable job with more financial security.
“I hung up my sneakers and told myself to get a real job, so I started working in the insurance industry,” he said.
Until one day, a seemingly random phone call brought him back to basketball.
“I was just sitting there at a computer talking to clients,” he said.
“I’d had almost a whole year off.
“I literally just switched off from basketball – I didn’t go to games, I didn’t play, nothing.
“I was only 24 or 25 and still in shape and knew I could still be playing, so I just distanced myself from it. My brother was playing and I didn’t go to his games – it was crazy.
“I just started working and put all my effort into work. Because insurance was a pretty competitive industry I thought I could scratch my itch through there.”
But then he answered a call from an old friend that brought him all the way to Australia.
“It was Dave Patrick, and he said he had a team in Australia looking for a big man and they didn’t need to see any game film,” he said.
“I had to get on the plane in six weeks but I hadn’t played 12 months and said there was no way.”
Two doors down from Bridgewater’s office was a personal trainer – who he then worked with through lunch breaks and after work to be able to return to the sport he loved.
In 2006, Bridgewater came to Australia and has been here ever since.
He met his now wife and started his family here, and his future in the sport – for the foreseeable future – is here.
Bridgewater bounced around before landing at Pakenham prior to the start of the season.
“I played with (Pakenham Warriors coach) Brent Russell in the Baptist basketball tournament – he was a team-mate of mine both times I played,” he said.
“He’s an awesome guy and probably one of my closer friends now.
“We formed a pretty good relationship and the way we think and look at the game is really similar. He picked my brain a little bit at the tournament and liked the things I was saying – how I felt about the game of basketball in Australia and how we, as players and coaches, could make the game better and make the kids coming through the ranks better.
“I basically came to Pakenham because I knew my glory days were over.
“I just always said to myself that I wanted to finish at a club where I could make a real impact. That’s my thing – I feel like I could make a big impact mentoring kids.
“I just try to teach the guys to play for each other. If you’re that sort of player, you’ll enjoy your career whether you score 20 points per game or five, or if you’re sitting on the bench most of the time. If you play like that you’ll love what you do and you’ll love playing the game.
“There are clubs everywhere who’ll give you an opportunity to play. No, you might not play in their first team, you may not play representative ball, but you’ll play domestic. We don’t have that in the US – you’re either playing high school basketball or AAU. That’s it.
“I think the Warriors will thrive in such a fast-growing area and we won’t lose kids to Dandenong or Casey.
“I think that was a big draw and a big pull for me, and I think Pakenham is somewhere I’ll hang around even after I’ve stopped playing.”