I think he went upstairs y'know
 [DJ] A very furious mixture of noise
 What Public Enemy producer Hank Shocklee calls
 music's worst nightmare

 "Hey  he's a good kid"

 [Chuck D] Air Hoodlum (repeat 2X)
 [Tony D] Check check  check the elevation (repeat 4X)

 "A player  that can leap  with the best of them"

 Verse One:

 Risin up in the 'Velt  Strong Island  New York
 The hood in case you did not know my base
 There was a ballplayer who had all the skills
 wit the pill to pay the piper, plus all the bills
 Mick his first name, Mack the awesome game
 Practiced in the heat, in the rain or in pain
 Mick so quick, at six foot six
 Down to be picked by anyone but the Celtics
 Oh what a handle could score from the floor
 with people bangin on him, or even hangin on him
 But what he did best, above all the rest was...

 "A player that can leap, with the best of them"
 "As a high school standout..."
 "The skywalker himself!"
 "I felt, he could do, to make this an effective basketball team"

 Verse Two:

 Grades nine and ten, Mickey Mack was all that
 but in class his ass sat way in the back
 How I know, cause I know, I used to flow wit the bro
 He didn't mind I used to read him his own headline
 Cause he could not read em his school wouldn't need em
 if the lines wouldn'ta went like this
 Mickey Mack jumped over the candlestick
 His stack was his stats but his D was still wack
 Grades eleven and twelve he found the wrong clientele and all
 During class, he would dribble in the hall
 But never got in trouble in school, but the trouble was
 it was cool if your brain was just another bubble
 As long as he could score fiddy-two
 get thirty-three rebounds, fuckin around
 Temas lost to him he went right through em
 Division, county, state, that's three count em
 championships for a small town bro
 That's bound to go pro

 "He gets free, turn on the jumper, good!"
 "Streak of lightning when he breaks loose..."
 "We all felt in our hearts we could win this ballgame"
 "They just required me to have the game that I did
 I'm just... that's all I that's all I that's all I can say"
 "That's all I can say"
 "He hauled down fifteeen rebounds, and kept the ball away from everybody"
 "Then he had a triple double!"
 "A-a-a sensational player..."

 Verse Three:

 SAT's didn't matter cause he was all that
 You know the pat on the back
 He was always in the news you gotta know what it means
 it means revenue, and I'm tellin you
 I saw cars and G's come to our school please
 approach Hell with the principal, where's the coach
 Went to college four years wit a scholarship...
 ...and won the championship
 But when it came to his life he didn't care...
 ...cause he took it to the air

 "Cross and a hook, he scores, he's fouled!"
 "From the far corner, breaks West and here's the jumper, good!!"
 "There's the jumper, it's not gonna go, rebound batted back..."

 [Chuck D] Air

 Verse Four:

 The fall began when Mickey Mack fell
 Hell ripped his kneee drafted last by personnel
 Oh how he loved the game, it was fantastic
 until he was cut, and couldn't stick
 Times got tighter and tighter
 he had an attitude was rude, so he turned into a fighter
 School wouldn't give him the job that he needed
 Assistant to the assistant coach, they didn't need it
 Then he resorted to a stick up kid
 Ski-mask and gat, but this game he wasn't good at
 And the drugs on the side
 police ambushed his ride *gunfire* another homicide
 He was over, ghost y'know
 Hometown hero, but now a zero
 To those hypocrites who ripped him blind
 for his skills without the will to develop his mind
 Forever in the news the community views him
 only as Air Hoodlum


 "I don't understand it, the kid coulda been another Jordan