Basketballs Missionary to Mexico

These Americans don't seem to mind they're playing for teams in cities they've never heard of with teammates they may not be able to understand and under conditions they haven't experienced since pick-up games in the park. They tape their own knees before games, treat their own injuries by scrounging through hotel ice machines and often have to keep after team owners to get their full paychecks. Before and after games, they commiserate with one another. "It's not stretching it to say we are a family," says Hinkle.

But during the games?

"We are competitive—scratchingly and clawingly competitive," says Hinkle. "There is something about the code of the game, the camaraderie, that makes you care about your team—that makes it your team, whether you're playing in Navolato or Guasave or Los Mochis or Obregon. All that said, it's the hardest job I've ever had."

There's a rematch in Navolato the next night, and the game will be interrupted twice during the course of the evening—once when some rain comes in and later when the lights go out. But nobody will suspect it is either a coincidence or a curse on the day after April Fool's Day, either. It's just life, funny and unexplainable, as-is—like the guy sitting beneath one basket, completely silent as he waits for an American player to emit an English-language expletive. "Malo!" he scolds each time he hears a "damn" or a "shit" or a "fuck." "Muy malo!"

"You just have to be really thankful for all of this," Hinkle says, slumped exhaustedly on the Navolato bench after another good game and another victory for the Cañeros. "Because I think the thankfulness is what leads you to your hard work, which in turn leads you to more things to be thankful for."

Hinkle pulls on his sweat suit, puts a stocking cap on his head and signs a couple of autographs. He gets a little wistful.

"I know that a part of this is coming to an end," he says. "But a few months ago, when my friend Antonio named his baby after me, I realized that Mexico is not just going to get up and leave my life. I've spent so much time here—a third of my life; it's crazy—so there is no way I can separate myself from it. And that's a blessing. So I'm just trying to put myself in the best position, you know, to do . . . whatever. Because what else did I ever do to deserve all this? I'm just some dude who—I don't know—I grew!"