This morning Reporter photographer Chad Coleman (check out his blog Focus Northwest for more great pictures) and I ventured down to the Community Center to check out the Nate Robinson basketball camp. Robinson himself walked into the gym just a head of us and much to delight of the little boy on the stairs who got his UW hat signed, he was willing to take a minute for a pint sized fan.

The gym was pretty full with 130 kids of all ages learning and drilling in the basics of basketball as you can see in our video here:

I talked to Nate Robinson, of Rainier Beach/Boston Celtics fame, a couple of weeks ago for a story that comes out in today’s paper. He’s currently enjoying his summer break after a longer than usual season with the Celtics (thank the NBA playoffs for the extend playing time).

Of course when I sat down to figure out what to talk to him about, other than the fact that he’s returning for his basketball camp on Mercer Island for the third year, the Sonics came up. It’s probably become status quo these days to ask anyone affiliated with the NBA their opinion about the Sonics, and it might be becoming a cliche, but I was still curious.

“Of course I want the NBA to come back,” Robinson told me toward the end of our conversation. “It would be the highlight of my life.” He said he wasn’t sure how they could just take a team away, especially when an NBA team would be so good for the city.

“It’s a great place and teams have a lot of good support,” he said, pointing out everyone from the Mariners to the Storm who all have large fan bases.

For the full story see tomorrow’s edition of the Reporter and you can follow Robinson on Twitter.