Courtside

Last night, we went to the Detroit Pistons vs. Dallas Mavericks game. The tickets were from a guy who works for the Mavericks and uses the facility where I work to produce video pieces for the Mavericks games. He gets tickets to give away as a benefit. And since they are will-call tickets, you never know where you are going to sit. This time, we ended up in a suite!

We invited Charlie and Erin Hellmuth, the youth pastor and wife at IBC to go with us. As we picked them up to go, Charlie said he got a call from Lance Oullete, who volunteers as a leader for the Youth Group. Lance’s family is still part owner of the Mavericks, owning about 4%. As a result, they have courtside seats. Lance was going to invite Charlie to the game, but Charlie told Lance that he was already going with us. Lance proceeded to tell Charlie that he was going to leave at halftime and could give his two tickets to Charlie at halftime.

So halftime came, Lance called Charlie, and off Charlie and I went courtside. We had first row directly across the Mavericks bench! First row as in if I stretch out my legs, I am going to trip a player. Charlie continually gave Rasheed Wallace a hard-time. I like the Pistons though, so I didn’t talk any trash. During a timeout, a camera guy came over to Charlie and I and we hoot and hollered for the camera. Our mugs were on the big screen. I had a feeling it was Tom, who gave us the original tickets and works these game in the broadcast area, told the camera guy to go shoot us. And I’m sure Tom was confused as hell as to how Charlie and I ended up on the first row.

For the fourth quarter, Charlie and I were going to switch out with our wives. So we went back up to the suite and then Erin said for me to just go with Sarah since she had already been down there in a prior game. So off Sarah and I went. One time the ball came flying over to us and I picked it up and handed it to the ref. It brings a whole other dimension sitting down there as to how big and fast these players are.

When the game ended, Mark Cuban came running over to the seats behind us to say hello to some folks. As he was about to leave, I shook his hand and told him “Congrats on the win.” He said, “Thankyou” and then we left.

In my lifetime I thought I would never get courtside seats. But it happened last night. It was almost surreal. Thanks Tom and Lance for that opportunity!