Twelve men. Twelve men thrown together one summer 20 years ago. Twelve men who stumbled out of a Pearl Harbor barracks three times a day during training camp and then onto a basketball court with screen meshing for walls and with bloodstains on the sidelines from the '41 attack by the Japanese. Twelve men who ate and bitched and slapped at mosquitoes together, who awoke in Munich to terrorists' gunfire together, who suffered perhaps the worst injustice in Olympic history together.
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Twelve medals. Twelve medals, each made of 197 grams of silver, 2.99 inches in diameter, 5.9 millimeters thick, worth $28 apiece on the silver market. Twelve medals still lying in a bank vault in Switzerland, waiting for 12 men to claim them.
One decision. Should the 12 men accept the 12 medals now? Are two decades enough? Has the point been made? Or does a principle, like a prayer, need to be murmured again and again?
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