Indianapolis, Indiana, USA

"I feel like I'm obligated to be the best." —Greg Oden

Someday, many years from now, when his fingers are packing championship rings and the figure in his bank account is followed by many zeros, Greg Oden will walk up to David Stern, wrap his eight-foot wingspan around the man and say, "Thank you." He'll thank Stern because he'll remember how worn out he was in 2005, his junior year of high school, when he was universally declared the best high school center since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar was called Lew Alcindor. He'll recall the magazines that featured his teenage face on the cover, the three nationally televised games he played, the Gatorade Player of the Year award, the yearlong series The Indianapolis Star ran about his life and the barrage of questions all of the above spawned about his future, and he'll thank Stern for ensuring that 2006 was nothing like 2005.

He'll thank Stern for giving him his senior year.

The 18-year-old Oden might have a tough time imagining such a meeting right now. He opposes the NBA's 19-year-old age minimum, saying that if a kid's got the talent to go pro, he should have the right. But down the road, Oden will realize that no one needed the age minimum more than he did. The more the game's swirl-street agents, boosters, beat writers, even the fans-reached out for Oden last year, the more he retreated.

During his junior year at Indianapolis' Lawrence North High School, Oden worked hard to make seven feet look small. He knew everyone wanted to see him dunk and bang his chest and parlay that sweet assortment of short-range skills into 35 a night. Instead, he did the opposite, making his game as quiet as his personality. It drove his coach, Jack Keefer, crazy, and it caused Lawrence North, which started as USA Today's No.7 team in the nation, to end the regular season unranked.

Keefer had coached a seven-foot star beforeformer North Carolina center Eric Montross-but not one so passive. It was as if Oden was trying to draw attention away from himself when he was on the court as a preemptive strike against all the coverage he was receiving off it. After one mid— season game in which Oden scored 10 points on only five shots, Keefer threatened to bench him if he didn't take at least 15 the next time out (he did).

On March 4, 2005, Lawrence North played Arlington High, the third-ranked team in the country, in the second round of the Indiana Class 4A sectional playoffs. With opposing fans booing him-and signs in the stands that read, "Aren't you guys over the salary cap?"-Oden had his first bad shooting game of the season. He opened with three straight misses, all from inside the lane. At halftime, Keefer stood in the center of the locker room and stared straight at the

phenom: "Greg, you havin' fun?" Oden didn't look up. Although Lawrence North won, 60-45, Oden hit only three field goals. After the game, Keefer knelt before him, put his hands on Oden's shoulders and looked him in the eye. "I got on you during the game. I didn't like that down look you had. Everybody else notices when you're down. You can't be down. You have to have fun."

But by then it was too late. The fun was gone. Oden knew it. Keefer knew it. At the end of last season, Oden said, "I feel like I'm expected and obligated to be the best."

WHO OBLIGATED him? Who didn't? Oden told everyone who asked that he was heading to college, no matter what Stern ruled, but privately he wished he could play one game in the NBA, just for a taste, before becoming a big man on campus. His best friend, Mike Conley (Lawrence North's point guard and the son of Oden's AAU coach), was planning to attend Ohio State and Oden wanted to go with him. But none of Oden's confidants--Keefer, Lawrence North's athletic director, Grant Nesbit, Mike Conley Sr. or Lawrence North assistant Ralph Scott--thought college was a realistic option. "We thought the industry wouldn't allow him to go," Nesbit says.

Many felt his home life wouldn't allow college either. Oden lives with his mom, Zoe, and 16-year-old brother, Anthony, in a small two-bedroom apartment. He shares a room with Anthony, who is 6'9", and slept on a twin bed until Nesbit got a friend to donate a larger one. Oden's father, Greg Sr., lives in Buffalo, where Greg Jr. was born. Oden's parents separated in 1996, when Greg was 8. Now his mom supports the family by working as a rehabilitation technician at a local hospital. Money isn't plentiful. When Oden won his Player of the Year award, he didn't have a suit to wear to the ceremony. (A local tailor sold him one for $300 after a Pacer had it custom-fitted but never picked it up.) During his junior year, Oden was always complaining about being hungry, and many in Lawrence North's athletic offices wondered if he was getting enough to eat at home.

So on the last day of school, Oden, worn out from a cold, sat in Nesbit's office. A yellow legal pad separated them. Written atop the left column was College: +/-. On the right side was NBA: +/-. For an hour, they built their lists. Under College + Oden wrote, "Fun. Win national title? Love Ohio State. Develop as a player and person. Can make an immediate impact. Only need to be 18 to get into Ohio clubs." Under College - he wrote, "Can get hurt. Nowhere to go but down."

Under NBA + Oden scribbled, "Set for life. Play against the best. Longer career." Nesbit glanced at the list. "Do you want to beat Kareem's record?" he asked. Oden was silent.

"Greg, do you know who Kareem is?"

"Yeah," Oden said. Then he wrote, "Could be all-time leading scorer." Nesbit reminded Oden that the decision would be the biggest of his life. So they put the pad down, figuring they'd talk with the members of Oden's family and decide in a few weeks. But Stern made the decision for him, and eight days later Oden agreed to join Conley in Columbus.

With reporters unable to pepper him with their favorite question-Are you turning pro?-Oden had one of the best summers of his life. Worried that Oden was running on empty from the high school season, Conley Sr. eased up on the Spiece Indy Heat's AAU schedule, giving his players a week off here and there and entering only major tournaments. Oden traveled more than 15,000 miles anyway, from Chapel Hill to Vegas, from the ABCD Camp in New Jersey to the ESPYs in LA. He lunched with Kevin Garnett and rode in a limo with Baron Davis. On the rare days he was in Indy, he was content to earn $8 an hour trimming trees and mowing lawns for a landscaping company owned by assistant coach Scott. "We wanted a balance for him," Conley Sr. says.

Stern's ruling gave Oden a chance to be 17 and free of stress for maybe the last time in his basketball-playing life. He believes he can still become a great player, but on his schedule and not everyone else's. He's already realized one benefit: "Now that I know what I'm doing," he says, "this year has been so much easier than last year."

Lawrence North has let the senior be a kid too, or at least as close to one as a towering superstar can be. Back before Oden's junior year, Nesbit called Grant Innocenzi, who was LeBron James' athletic director at St. Vincent-St. Mary High in Akron, Ohio. Innocenzi told Nesbit to be careful about flying the team around the country for high-profile games. So while James' alma mater made a reported $400,000 during James' last year, Lawrence North will pocket an estimated $100,000 in Oden's last two years. Nesbit and Keefer opted to play only a February date against Glenbrook North in Evanston, Ill. Last May, they met with attorneys to discuss trademarking Oden's No. 50 Wildcats jersey so the school could control production and reap some revenue. In the end, they passed on selling them this season. "I never want to be the guy who makes people say, 'He exploited Greg,' " Nesbit says.

Funny thing is, Oden has been so loose this year that he probably wouldn't even care. Yeah, that was him skipping a marquee AAU game last summer to attend his cousin's graduation at the University of Buffalo, the first of Zoe's family to finish college. And that's him boasting about trying for a 4.0 this semester--it would be his fourth perfect GPA in a row. That's him showing up for Peyton Manning's charity bowling tournament. And that's him in the stands at Ohio State basketball games, sitting among the fans he'll be entertaining next year. "The last time I was there," he says, "some girls were pointing at me and yelling, 'I want you!'"

Turns out, life as a basketball phenom isn't so bad after all. In a nationally televised game against North Central High in January, Oden didn't have to be dragged out from inside his locker for the pregame interviews, like he was a year ago. He controlled the game from the tip, yelling at teammates to defend better and showing off a midrange jumper he polished at 6 a.m. practice sessions over the summer. He finished with 33 points, 12 rebounds, 4 blocked shots and 3 assists. The game never slipped out of his hands for a second. After the game, before Keefer could begin his talk, the team started a chant. "Speech by Greg!" Oden stood up and said, "We came out and played physical. I was a little worried in the second half, but"--he paused for comedic effect--"then their entire team fouled out."

All the while, a line was forming outside the locker room. When Oden walked out, everyone took a step up: girls from just-beaten North Central, men twice Oden's age, kids who barely reached his waist. Nearby, 12 of Oden's relatives from Buffalo who'd flown in for the game, all of them wearing red "Oden 50" hats, stood by and waited their turns.

Oden signed every game program and posed for every picture. As the gym lights dimmed--a janitor's way to announce closing time--Oden didn't move. He kept signing and posing, making it clear that no one is going to rush Greg Oden.

He'll leave when he's ready.

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