I was entering the basement dojo through the alley door and was surprised to see Gabriel’s back turned to me, not realizing that he had begun Sunday Wing Chun classes there. Facing me, looking over Gabriel’s shoulder, was a big, tattooed, bald, bearded, muscular man, perhaps six foot and 270 pounds of solid muscle.

At the sight of my grungy, scrawny ass, coming through the back door, he shoved Gabriel down and away gently and charged me and I kept walking towards him calmly, not wanting to call foul or wave him off, saying I was a coach, but intoxicated by this confrontation, figuring on an empty hand post to that giant cranium, when Gabe yelled, “Whoa! At ease Sammy. That’s Sifu James.” And instead of running me over or getting KO’d in stride—I was running that 50/50 probability through my mind—Sammy stopped and shook my hand with a slight bow, “Sorry, Brother—never seen that back door open—thought something was sour.”

Sam is a super good guy with a high loyalty quotient, which almost put him in prison when he finished something a fellow club member had started. Since then he maintains a social association with the old MC, in a kind of semi-retirement.

Every effective MC has a Sammy, who as often as not gets thrown under the wheels of the law enforcement tractor trailer after stepping up to apply force made necessary by a Brother’s reckless trouble-seeking. Riders such as Sammy end up as prison inmates, casual associates or independents, often tolerated as independent’s by their former club members because they have either shed blood or done time for lesser men.