Baseball love, basketball glory: A change in sports has Davis rising for the Flash

By Eric Eames

Growing up in the Bahamas, Bennet Davis, Jr. came with a ball attached. Except it wasn’t a basketball.

The Flash forward fell in love with baseball early. He practiced the game everyday. He enjoyed basketball too, but that was merely a game of recreation. A game he played because he knew he could. Baseball, though, was a game of business, and in the Bahamas baseball diamonds abundantly abound.

“Baseball was my first love,” Davis admitted. “I had dreams of playing in the major leagues one day.”

At 16, he became a starting pitcher on the Bahamian National Baseball team, a senior-level team that represents the country in international competition. Davis threw an 80-mile per hour fastball with a splitter and a looping curveball. When he wasn’t pitching, he played first base. But by this time, Davis was developing a fine figure of a basketball player, and others took notice. He stood 6-6. His long, gangly presence in the batter’s box just seemed a bit out of place.

With some persuasion from coaches and his father, who played basketball at Minnesota State-Mankato, Davis left the Bahamas before ever playing a game for the national team to go to a Miami high school to pursue his basketball potential. Getting off the islands and playing in the United States was necessary in order for him to get noticed by colleges.

“Any athlete on the islands would try and finish high school in the U.S., so they could have a better chance of making it to college,” Davis said.

He finished up high school basketball by playing at Notre Dame Prep in Massachusetts. From there he earned a scholarship to play at Northeastern, where he started each year and lead the team in points per game (15.0) during his senior season. He also became the second best shot blocker in the school’s history, with a total of 170.

This knack for blocking shots is one thing that keeps him in the regular Flash rotation.

“By the end of the season Bennet is going to be one of the better big men in our league,” Flash head coach Brad Jones said. “He comes in and works everyday. He works early. He works late.”

Jones attributes Davis’s success to his workman-like approach and physical structure. Now 6- 9, Davis has an albatross-like wingspan complimented with a cat-quick leaping ability around the rim. But there is no use in asking Davis how he learned to block shots.

He attributes it to timing, which seems built into his DNA and a competitive resolve. For example, when an opponent within his vicinity scores, it tears him up inside.

“Anytime someone scores on me I take it really personally,” he said. “Being good at blocking shots comes with having that type of mentality. It comes from never giving up on a play. So for the most part it comes down to having that drive and trying to not let your opponent score on you.”

As Davis advances into adulthood, he stays close to his father. He receives constructive evaluation of his game from his dad, who watches his son play online through the NBA Futurecast. After every game, Bennet Jr. is on the phone with Bennet Sr., constantly learning from a father who taught him how to play and love art.

“He tells me what I need to work on and do,” said Davis, who graduated college with an art degree and makes caricatures of teammates in his spare time. “He helps me a lot. He is a really good coach.”

For a guy who makes his living pounding for position or trying not to give ground inside the paint, Davis’s relaxed island attitude and accent are still apparent. He is incongruously patient and talks about himself with ease and with no sense of amazement.

“I always talk to him about how off the court it is okay to have that island attitude, but on the court you have to have a street fighter attitude,” Jones said. “Off the court he is a perfect gentleman. He is someone you would want your daughter to date.”