Tale Of My Tattoo

DANIEL EWING

Clippers Guard

EWING GOT his first, a panther with the inscription king of the court on his right arm as a junior, at Willowridge ( Texas ) High and hid it from his parents. Then his father saw it and got "so mad, he was at a loss for words," Ewing recalls. His next tat was of praying hands with the words count your blessings and his parents' names (Brenda and George)--which they only grudgingly accepted. "They weren't happy," Daniel says, "but they said at least this one had meaning."

CARLOS BOOZER

Jazz Forward

BOOZER HAS many tattoos, but his pi�ces de r�sistance are on his right and left biceps. His left shows a grizzly bear--an animal plentiful in Alaska , Boozer's home state--that appears to be clawing through his skin; his right depicts a basketball player in front of a skyline and a mountain, a reference, Boozer says, to his hometown of Juneau . Says Boozer, who's averaging 20.5 points, "I wanted something symbolizing my coming from somewhere small and making it somewhere big."

JOEL PRZYBILLA

Trail Blazers Center

THE 27-YEAR-OLD got a tattoo a year from age 18 to 21, then quit inking. On his right arm Przybilla honors shot blocking: Next to not in my house a player wags a finger--"Like Mutombo," he says--after rejecting a shot. Przybilla has praying hands on his left arm. His chest has a tat of a biblical message and another of a heart, flowers and his wife's name, Noelle. "It's my favorite." he says. "But the two on my chest are private. I'm glad they're covered when I play."