One-Armed Hoopster: 'You Have the Power to Change Lives'

He was born dead with one arm.

 

Kevin Laue came from a broken family — his parents divorced when he was 4 years old — and he watched his father die of cancer when he was in the 3rd grade. He was the brunt of jokes in school and was cut from his 7th grade basketball team, told by the coach that the game was a two-handed sport.

 

Now, he’s a self-made millionaire at age 25, the CEO of his own shoe company, a board member for the Special Olympics, and a spokesperson for the Boys & Girls Club. He’s met the president of the United States. And he’s also the subject of an award-winning documentary and a future feature film.

 

But it wasn’t easy getting there.

 

“I closed myself off to the world when I was a kid,” said Laue, who couldn’t read until the 3rd grade. “I didn’t fit in, didn’t stand a chance to be successful, and felt I couldn’t catch a break.

 

“Sports changed my life.”

 

Specifically, it was AAU coach Patrick McKnight who took a chance on Laue, the self-proclaimed 6'4" “giant creature,” and offered him a spot on his team.

 

McKnight taught the 12-year-old Laue to use his left arm — the same arm he lost during childbirth due to a restriction of prenatal blood circulation — as a weapon.

 

“He made me the world’s dirtiest basketball player,” Laue joked with Brunswick students during his October visit to all three of the school’s campuses. “I used my ‘nub’ as a dagger.”

 

From there, Laue took off and became one of the best and most noticeable players in the state of California, ranking in the top five in shot blocking by the time he was a high-school sophomore.

 

At that point, too, he began being followed by a documentary-film crew, who recorded his every move and placed him on the proverbial pedestal.

 

Eventually, the attention took its toll.

 

“I became egotistical and big-headed, which is very easy to do in a situation like that,” Laue explained. “I’m not proud of it.”

 

Soon, though, Laue was brought back down to earth, receiving a phone call — out of the blue — from a woman he’d never met. Tearfully, she explained that her son, Sean, had been born with one arm — just like Laue.

 

Sean, a 2nd grader at the time, walked home alone every day, sobbing and pleading with his mother to withdraw him from school.

 

Laue visited Sean’s school to speak with the student body and presented the one-armed boy with an autographed basketball.

 

The result? A miracle of transformation unfolded in just 30 minutes: All the bullying, pitying, and mocking came to an immediate halt.

 

“It took just a half hour of my time to change Sean’s perspective on life and the way everyone treated him,” Laue said. “Having that kind of impact made me feel better than sports ever could.”

 

Two other young men, too, did the same during Laue’s senior year in high school for a 16-year-old boy named Josh, who was inflicted with Syndrome X, a rare condition causing a person to have the appearance and mental abilities of a toddler.

 

Laue’s classmates attached a purple flag — symbolic of the colors of Amador Valley High School in Pleasanton, Calif. — to Josh’s electric wheelchair, and helped him rally the fans at football and basketball games.

 

“He became our mascot,” Laue explained. “I didn’t play for myself anymore. I played for Josh. Those two kids changed his life simply by raising their hands and giving him a flag.”

 

Boys like Sean and Josh became the focal point of Laue’s inspiring message to Brunswick students — a message even more powerful and compelling than that of his own personal milestones and accomplishments.

 

Laue earned a scholarship to Manhattan College, where he graduated in three years as an Honors Student in 2012, and became the first person ever to play Division I collegiate basketball with a disability.

 

“All of that doesn’t mean anything,” Laue concluded. “There’s nothing better than impacting another.

 

“You are the future, and I’m going to hold you to that standard — not academically, not in success, and not in how much money you have in your bank account.

 

“You have the power to change lives.”