Midas Touch

Everyone knows that your boy Burney is a master prep prognosticator and an all around high school sports guru, but did you know that he also has a Midas touch when it comes to grooming outstanding athletic talent from a very young age?

Well, Burney himself didn't even know about this crazysupercool hidden skill of his until he realized it the other day while walking his old stomping grounds of Roeper Summer Day Camp on Woodward Avenue in Bloomfield Hills.  It all came back to me in a rush of memories. I couldn't believe that I had found yet another fascinating and unique part of my own life story. YEE HAW, BURNEY!

Ya see, I used to work as a counselor at the camp when I was a teenager back in the 1990s and if memory serves correct – which it always does by the way – I mentored quite a few awesome area athletes as youngsters.

Now, let's break the situation at hand down a little bit more so I can continue to give myself shameless PROPS!

It started when I was 15 and a CIT and in the group of six year olds I had the privilege of looking after was a kid named, Charlie White. Yeah, the same Charlie White who just recently won a silver medal in the Winter Olympics a few months back in ice dancing. White could also get his Puck On as a prepster in the early-2000s and played forward on a state championship hockey team for BH Cranbrook.

Then a few years later, when I was a full-fledged counselor I had Ryan Zinser and Aiden Murdock – both all-conference studs in basketball and baseball respectively this past year – in my group.

This is all not even mentioning the fact that my CIT when I was a counsel for Zinser and Murdock was Joe Tate, who would soon go onto have an all-state football career as an offensive lineman at Southfield-Lathrup before suiting up as a two-year starter at Michigan State on the college level.

NOTICE TO ALL PARENTS READING THIS BLOG WITH CHILDREN THAT ARE ASPIRING VARSITY ATHLETES: If you want, you guys can pay Burney a couple of hundred dollars an hour and I will gladly take your child under my wing for the summer and with my proven track record personally guarantee that in 10 years from now they will be starring in the local prep ranks in whatever their chosen sport......LOL