Child Like Faith Willing His Team to Win!

by Chantai Snellgrove Print This Article

Ethan and his mother stand together, both wearing jerseys.

Ethan has an undying faith in his team and a special gift of predicting winners.

My son, Ethan, is 22 years old and has been diagnosed with mild autism. In addition, he is moderately, mentally challenged, and has a bi-polar disorder with mania. Despite these challenges, he has the gift of “picking winners” in several sports: the NFL, men’s college football AND basketball and horse racing (with a 70% winning average, I might add). He was even in ESPN’s The Magazine Behind The Bets by Chad Millman in 2007. He has also been featured on KXAN News in Austin, Texas. We happen to live in Horseshoe Bay, Texas which is about 45 miles away. Since then, he’s picked the winner of the Super Bowl 7 years in a row!

Most recently though, he’s been interested in the NBA. Ethan has been a fan of LeBron James ever since he was playing with the Miami Heat in the Finals Game against The San Antonio Spurs. A game they happened to win. I should say that MY team happens to be the San Antonio Spurs. Last year he was upset because the Spurs beat the Heat. Well, as most people know LeBron James moved back to the Cleveland Cavaliers. Well, so did my son’s loyalty. Now he is a fan of the Cleveland Cavaliers. He watched every game he could (we have DISH Network so some games were blacked out). A couple of months ago, my husband bought him a Spaulding NBA basketball and Ethan began practicing on his own. One day, he mentioned that he was playing for his team to win. I didn’t think much of it until I recently noticed that he seemed to be practicing a lot more than usual. I noticed that when The Cavs was losing, he’d run outside and shoot baskets to “help his team win”. He wanted them to win so badly that he thought by simply practicing more, somehow there would be a connection and they’d win. Well, it sure seemed to work a lot because they won more than lost. He even did it for my team. It turns out that, as a “53-year-old mom” with chronic to moderate RA, watching them play seemed to help my pain. Ethan sensed that and would practice so my team would win and I would feel better. It was such a special gesture, and he told me “Sorry, mom your team didn’t win to get to the finals.” I told him “it was ok because now I’d fight for his Cavaliers to make it by watching them play the same way I watched when my team played”. It’s been a bonding experience and it has brought me around to love watching the NBA games. It’s his world, and I had found a place in it.

I hope this story is inspiring to all who read it. It speaks to the universal feeling that if you believe hard enough and have faith in something special to you, it just might happen. Simple child-like faith is all it took, and this can be a lesson for us all to learn: Just believe!

As this is written, the Cavs are up 108 to 81 with 3 minutes left in Game 4 of the playoffs.

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Child Like Faith Willing His Team to Win!

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