Childress is go-to guy for high tech By STEVE HUMMER The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Published on: 01/30/06 Josh Childress is showing off his new phone, whose many functions include, incidentally, making and receiving calls. It opens more ways than a Swiss army knife, this model that he said is the newest on the market. You need three years at Stanford just to retrieve your messages from it. "It's pretty sick," proclaimed the Hawks guard/forward/tech support. Translation: Sick is good. Out here on the cutting edge, one 22-year-old NBA player might shake a few preconceptions about how life is lived in The League. Teammates don't flock to Childress to find out about the hottest club or to admire his body art (no tattoos — "I'm scared of needles," he says). But if they have any personal technology questions, they all seek out the kid with the silicon-based mind beneath all that throwback hair. "His younger brother calls him a closet geek," said his mother, Teri Childress. "He talked me into getting an iPod for starters," rookie Marvin Williams said. "I didn't want to buy one. He took me to his house one day — he's got a lot of music on his computer, a nice computer and a real nice entertainment center. He put on all the music for me." This is going to play havoc with Childress' image. He has enough going against him already in a sports marketplace that seems to increasingly feature the loud and the tough and the defiant. Since the Hawks took Childress with the sixth pick in the 2004 draft, they have moved him around like a coffee table at Ethan Allen. Currently averaging 28 minutes a game off the bench, and 8.6 points a game, he has adapted to whatever the Hawks have asked with remarkably little noise. "The good thing about Chills: He listens, he's coachable and he comes to work every day. Those three qualities, you got a chance to be a player in this league a long, long time," Hawks coach Mike Woodson said. Last week had featured such diverse experiences as chipping a front tooth on the head of Indiana's Jermaine O'Neal and throwing his slight frame against Cleveland's LeBron James. Childress thus far has played not to the level of stardom, but rather that of a solid pro on a team with the second-worst record in the NBA, "I think I've handled it OK," he said. "One of the selling points on drafting me, I can do a bunch of different things. That's my job, go out there and do what I can. Whatever they ask me to do, I do. "Night in and night out, I have a different role. It's a challenge for me. It will make me a better player." And now, on top of such reasonableness, he has come out as one of those guys Best Buy keeps cloistered back with the broken laptops. But, so what? "I don't have any 'street cred' anyway," he said, laughing. "I'm me, take it or leave it. I don't need the streets to accept me. I'm me. I've always kind of gone against the grain." His mother, who moved to Atlanta from Southern California last year to help Josh get settled into his new life, is a retired cytotechnologist. With a title like that, it's little surprise she encouraged her son to go to a better high school a half hour from their neighborhood in order to bulk up the educational part of his program. The son was more than willing. "He's not swayed by his peers. He makes up his own mind," she said. "When I was younger I grew up in the 'hood or whatever you want to call it, not the best neighborhood [in L.A.]. It was home. I was viewed as the basketball player, the guy who just loved to play ball. I didn't go to school in my neighborhood, because I had planned on going to a good [university]." Stanford qualifies. While he was a sociology major, some of the hard science must have stuck to the bottom of his shoes during his time in Palo Alto. A quick test for Childress just to set a starting point of his gift with gadgets. If you care to feel old, read on: Know what "LP" stands for? "No." That probably answers this question. Have you ever owned a vinyl album? "No." Ever used a rotary phone? "I have, only because my aunts who lived in Arkansas had one that I used when I was younger." Ever play Pong? "Yeah. My uncle [again in Arkansas], he must be in his 70s now, he had it. I played Pong, Frogger all the old games. If not for that, I wouldn't have gotten to play them." That is all such ancient history in this era of instant obsolescence. Childress, for one, has been able to keep in step with change, and even learn to enjoy the march. Leaving Stanford after three years, he is 57 units short of a degree. He can pick up three more during the season by taking a sports psychology course online, studying on his laptop during road trips. The plan is in place for Childress to finish his degree program with a combination of courses online, at a local university and one more finishing kick during an offseason at Stanford. When JChill — as the hip call him — chills at his Smyrna town home, he does it in a fully equipped electronic womb. He can videoconference online with a couple of his old Stanford teammates, one here, another overseas. Or play "Halo" on the newest game box. Or watch his favorite show, "Family Guy," on a television screen flatter than a bottle of New Coke. "I always like to have the newest cellphone. I'll have this one for a while, nobody else has it," he said. "One of my biggest things, I like to stay current. I like to stay new with the technology." (The only item he collects that doesn't require a plug is shoes. Hundreds of pairs of them, every Nike make imaginable, neatly cubbyholed in his closet.) Add to his interests a growing lust for travel. Childress plans to embark on an NBA tour of China this offseason. His excitement is understandable. Think of all the ancient wonders there are to behold — the Great Wall, the temples, the art collections of long-dead dynasties. "I'm definitely going to pick up some gadgets there," he said eagerly. 資料來源 http://www.ajc.com/hawks/content/sports/hawks/stories/0130childress.html -- 翻。 --

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