That’s the end of that argument

Big Tom, my 6-foot-6, off-the-Toledo-balance-beam brother who played for Rip Engel at Penn State, just had an operation at the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philly to remove an identified and unexplainable floating mass in his pelvic area the size of an orange. Turns out it was an orange swallowed whole in the mid-90s that missed his stomach.

But seriously, a ball of benign muscle cells - should be a T-shirt - of unexplained origin was the final explanation. The operation was performed via robotic arms while the big guy was blown up then turned upside down and everyone can joke “not a pretty sight,” but can any of us pass the abdominal cavity filled with CO2 then hung from our ankles test?

I know if it were a contest the perfect people at Gold’s Gym would train and try to win it. An unanticipated upside to the downside was that Tom’s aching back and compressed and degenerative disks - just like mine - no longer bother him because when 380 pounds pulls away from gravity inner space is created.

Now I’m back to the gym where my favorite exercise is toe rises with 450 pounds across my neck and shoulders. But I don’t know where to hang my body down.

HERE’S THE POINT - If you can handle a basketball alone against full court pressure, dribble with either hand and through your legs, leave defenders standing along with your crossover as you fly down the lane and dunk two-handed in somebody’s face, then you are an athlete.

If you do all those things drawing pressure, then dish off to the open person without even looking at him, you’re an unselfish athlete.

If you can’t do either of those things you are just a person playing a game. And that’s the end of that argument.

RIGORS OF CAMP - I have watched plenty of NFL training camp practices and they are not as rigorous or grueling - not in the way three-a-days were run in high school and college back in the 1960s. There were no shorts and shoulder pad practices, no mesh practice jerseys, no water and no sensibilities to be spared. I was told by a Temple coach flat out why I would never be a great player.

I would just shrug my shoulders like I didn’t understand, hoping to prolong the dumb introspection. Impetigo was a badge of honor in those days. I witnessed many a lineman popping the boils on the back of his buddies and sure, that is a gross image, but it doesn’t mean it isn’t true. Is NFL training camp a grueling experience for multi-millionaires under 30 years old? A grueling experience for those guys would be a real 40-hour-a-week job.

JUMP STREET - Brandon Street is a sergeant - E6 - in the United States Air Force, a 2000 Cape graduate and stationed in Iraq for the last three months. Brandon, always an incredibly fit individual and great athlete but no point guard, is just coming off an eight-month deployment in Afghanistan.

Thanks to this Cape family and all people who hang it out there over the edge to protect the rest of us.

HIRE COACHES - There are young coaches out there, college graduates - some certified and some not - who need full-time jobs and the schools need them. Certification justifications, bogus, unnecessary, what-are-the-point courses in education, are the major sticking points, along with department chairpersons who go home every day at 3 p.m. but have too much say on who gets hired.

I could teach one course titled, “Teaching and Coaching Careers for Normal Not Perfect People” and give them the 411 on how the job really works then grade them on what I think are their survival possibilities and possible impact on the lives of young people.

But right now the system doesn’t work because too many people have input. I was offered the head football job at Jenkintown High School in Pennsylvania in 1975 against the protestations of the head of social studies who had graduated from Penn.

She didn’t like a football coach being foisted on her by the athletic department and I didn’t want her locked on me like Ronnie Lott in press coverage for the next 10 years, so I took a job at Cape where I was told to ”slow down” - there was always tomorrow to complete what was scheduled for today.

SNIPPETS - Don’t trust the Phillies and don’t for a moment think the NFC Eastern Division is going to anyone but the Cowboys.

Friday, Aug. 8 marks the opening ceremonies for the Olympics. Did you know canoe/kayak slalom is an event? Is somebody kidding me? And badminton, which is not a sport unless played with a kitten, I mean as an opponent.

Personally, call me unpatriotic, but I don’t like our professional basketball players representing the country.