They used to call him Noodles. Inspector Go Go Gadget. String Bean. Brittle (short for Brittle Bones). Praying Mantis.
Mikal Bridges was so skinny and lanky and his arms were so long—"freakishly long," Bridges tells me—that his Villanova teammates roasted him with a range of nicknames. The 6'7'' swingman was an easy target then: a freshman. A young freshman (17 years old). About 185 pounds. Gangly shoulders, little head (they called him "Pea-head," too).
His mother, Tyneeha Rivers, sympathizes. "My wingspan is the same as World B. Free," Rivers tells me, referring to the wiry 76ers legend, as we sip tea at a Starbucks in Philadelphia in February.