Abad Viquez first set eyes on Derrick Rose as a second grader in Chicago. The Bulls’ then-No. 1 overall draft pick was captured in posters on his teacher’s wall.
It was one of those childhood moments that become etched in our minds. For Viquez, it was the one that set him along a narrative that would push against everything that tried to hold him back.
“I have a disability,” says Viquez, 23, now known as Shorty’A to the tens of thousands he reaches on social media. “It was hard for me to fit in, which is why I looked up to Derrick Rose. Everyone was talking about him, and I didn’t even know who he was. So just watching the game and learning about it helped me connect with my peers and many people down the road.”
Two years later, at 22, Rose was named the youngest MVP in NBA history for the 2010-12 season. He had soared to heights Bulls fans hadn’t seen since … well, you know.
But the rest of Rose’s story, filled with pain but also perseverance, is what led ‘Shorty’A’ to share sound bites, opinions and other tidbits of a life spent overcoming his own obstacles.
“I fell in love with him, and now basketball is a passion,” Viquez tells USA TODAY Sports. “It helped me get to a place that I didn’t think I was gonna make it to.”
Viquez, who was born without a tailbone, has a rare medical condition known as Sacral Agenesis that has affected his growth.
“Doctors told my parents I had less than six months to live,” he says.
Today, you might see him post to his 50,000-plus followers on TikTok as his Bulls try to make it out of the NBA Play-In-Tournament. One of his videos won an AT&T contest and connected him with NBA superstars at the All-Star Game in February.
His is still chasing his ultimate goal.
“I can’t think of anyone in the NBA that has a disability that’s a broadcaster, so I hope to be one of the first ones,” he says. “I want to be able to inspire the next generation of kids and let them know that anything is possible despite their disability.”
He spoke with us about how sports can spur big dreams and why we don’t have to be accomplished athletes to go after a career in them.
‘Show the entire world what you can give them’
“Every time I went to the doctor, he told me that Abad was not going to make it,” his mother, Rebeca Viquez, told the Chicago Sun-Times Times in 2019. “And he’s like, ‘It will be a miracle if he does.’”
She has been there with him, her son says, through every exhilarating high and excruciating low: the first steps and words at age 4, the first shots on the hoop at 8, the 23 surgeries he has endured in his life and the ruthless way some kids have treated him.
At one point, he says, he didn’t have the confidence to tell his mom everything that was going on at school.
“My mom was always stressed out,” he says. “In fifth grade, there was an incident that happened, and it changed my perspective in life. That was the time where I was going through suicidal thoughts, and I really didn’t even tell my mom about it until that one incident that happened. So I ended up telling my mom, and from there, we built a bond and a relationship, and we just connected in so many different ways.”
Rebeca Viquez, a Spanish teacher who knew how cruel kids can be at school, told her son he could cry and feel sorry for himself, “or you just show the entire world what you can give them.”
Live for the moment, not the result
The healing traces back to Rose, too. He tore his ACL in his first game of the 2012 NBA playoffs. He missed the next season and endured what seemed like an endless array of injuries that would dog his career.
Many would say Rose didn’t live up to his potential. But a young fan in Chicago saw him come back, time after time, to drive hard down the lane, be tough at the rim and take the game-winning shot.
“I went through a lot of bullying,” Abad Viquez says, “and on top of (that) having to go to school, having to go to a surgery, and then having to go to physical therapy. So it was just a lot for me mentally and physically.
“Just seeing Derrick Rose just inspired me to keep on going and motivate myself. Just looking at the videos of him training and getting back into shape and gaining all the strength back that he lost, it just motivated me to do the same.”
Basketball became his therapy as he shot on his backyard court, or he watched his Rose. Rose even sunk one to beat the Cleveland Cavaliers and his sister’s favorite player. Frida Viquez, 21, loves LeBron James.
“I never really liked LeBron growing up, because my sister and I always argued,” he says. “I mean, we’ve seen it how many times he’s been to the Finals, how many times he beat the Bulls. So I got tired of him just winning, winning, winning. I’m still stressing over the Chicago Bulls.’
But sitting in front of a mountain of team memorabilia during our Zoom call, he smiled at the thought of Rose’s career.
“Unfortunately,” he said, “I don’t have the hops like him.’
The birth of ‘Shorty’A’
Viquez could move fast, though, in his power wheelchair. When he got to high school, kids started calling him names like, “Speedy,” “Speedy Gonzalez” and “Turbo.’ He liked them.
“But it was just so many different nicknames,” he says. “And I was like, ‘What is one nickname that I could go by?’”
His mind drifted back to elementary school, when kids would make fun of his height.
‘I was always the shortest one in the room,’ he says. ‘So I was like, ‘Back then, it used to bother me, but not much anymore.’ ‘
Viquez put ‘Shorty’A’ on his Instagram account, which he started in 2019 to post his his trick shots. His first video was reposted by Overtime Sports, and it went viral.
The next year, he says, Overtime posted a video of him on TikTok, and it got more than 4 million views.
“I didn’t have TikTok because I thought it was only just for dancing,” he says. “So I then downloaded TikTok and started posting all of my trick shots videos and people were recognizing me from the video that Overtime reposted. From there I was posting consistently and my followers and views were growing and growing.
‘Heading into college, I didn’t tell anyone about my nickname, but as soon as they followed me, they were like, ‘Oh my God, you’re Shorty’A.’ ‘
It’s a lesson he learned from Rose: Keep putting yourself out there.
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How a round ball can create a new life
Viquez graduated in 2024 with a major in journalism and minor in sports communication from Columbia College in Chicago.
While he looks for a job, he helps design and sell merchandise — hoodies, shirts, pins, phone cases, bags — through his own brand, YDDDY (‘Your Disability Doesn’t Define You’). He donates proceeds to a charity called Free Wheelchair Mission.
He’s filling up TikTok with clips, which include his broadcasting highlights.
He reached out to SeatGeek when he hit 30,000 followers, and the ticket sales website started sponsoring his commercials.
He submitted a prize-winning entry for AT&T’s NBA Dreams experience contest and invited his mom, sister and a cousin to sit with him at the All-Star festivities in San Francisco. When they arrived at Chase Center, they received an invitation to watch courtside from MVP favorite Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.
‘I showed my sister that email, and I was like, ‘I think I just won,” he says. ‘And she was like, ‘Nah, this gotta be fake.’ And then I was looking at the people that were CCed into the email, and their email literally ends with AT&T.com. So I reached back out, and the rest is history.’
Along the way, Gilgeous-Alexander learned of his goal to become a sportscaster.
‘Sports play such an important role in connecting people,’ he said in a statement to USA TODAY Sports. ‘I’m glad we could make it happen.’
It was likely a close No. 2 to the January day Viquez walked into a pop-up “flower shop” in downtown Chicago. He was freezing, having waited in line for four hours in 20-degree weather.
Then he saw Rose standing in front of him. A Chicago native, he was giving away free flowers to fans as part of a farewell celebration to end his career. It lasted 15 years.
‘I almost cried in front of him,’ Viquez says. ‘When I met him, I just started to thank him for everything that he’s done for me.’
Viquez asked for a signed jersey.
‘He said he wasn’t allowed to autograph stuff for his fans, but he would do it just for me,’ he says. ‘Once I got in the car, I just started to break down and I was crying.’
He had never seen Michael Jordan play, or the Bulls reach the NBA Finals. But he had seen Rose. That was more than enough.
‘A round ball helped me in many different ways,’ he says. ‘I never thought that I would have over 50,000 followers on TikTok, and it’s all to thanks to Derrick Rose.
‘He changed my life.’
(This story was updated to add new information.)
Steve Borelli, aka Coach Steve, has been an editor and writer with USA TODAY since 1999. He spent 10 years coaching his two sons’ baseball and basketball teams. He and his wife, Colleen, are now sports parents for two high schoolers. His column is posted weekly. For his past columns, click here.