Black Nike sweatpants, a black shirt with red capital lettering screaming, “BALL IS LIFE” with AND1 Streetball shoes on. A 6-foot-6-inch junior weaves through the halls spinning a basketball around and around on his fingers. Frankie LeBeau is a magician whose tricks revolve on a single basketball.

LeBeau, junior, first spun a ball on his fingers at age 12. Soon after, he discovered streetball freestyle, a sport which individuals perform tricks using a basketball, such as taking targeted shots off a wall or spinning three balls at once, all of which LeBeau can do. For LeBeau, streetball freestyle is an entertaining hobby for him and for others around him.

“I don’t consider myself extremely good at this compared to others in the whole world,” LeBeau said. “I just do it because it is fun and it entertains other people and myself.”

LeBeau has never played on a basketball team; instead he is in a group, Unprotected Hoops, where professional freestylers and players post videos of their tricks, including LeBeau’s.

“What I like the most is nobody considers themselves better than anybody else because everyone has their different style,” LeBeau said.

He connects with other spinners through Facebook, where a photo album he posted of his tricks is a popular hit with around 4,000 likes.

“[Other streetballers] can all do [my tricks], obviously, if they felt like it,” LeBeau said. “But no one has ever made an actual picture album like I have, so they will just say that is a cool and new idea.”

Jordan Olsen, junior and camera man for LeBeau’s pictures and videos which are posted on his Twitter and Facebook page, has been friends with him since second grade.

“I think it is kind of fun to experiment with photos and doing different shots and camera work,” Olsen said. “There are a lot of kids that follow him around when we are walking down the halls and tell him to spin the ball.”

LeBeau has maxed out his number of friends on Facebook at 5,000 because of his website, Twitter account and Facebook pictures. He has countless unanswered requests, some of which are from St. Louis, but others are from countries around the world, such as Indonesia and Iraq.

“I have at least one person from every state, including a bunch from California and New York,” LeBeau said.

Alex Shehadeh, junior, created a website featuring LeBeau’s photos, videos and accomplishments, EnigmaStreetball.org. He has seen the best and worst of LeBeau’s tricks. Shehadeh’s favorite trick is when LeBeau puts a pen in his mouth with a spinning ball on top.

“It has gone wrong a couple times where the pen has exploded in his mouth,” Shehadeh said, “but it’s a cool trick when it goes right.”

LeBeau can spin three balls at once, one on each foot and one in his hand. He can balance a spinning ball on top of an umbrella while opening it up at the same time. He can make a spinning basketball balance on the tip of his biology book, a chair leg, or even on a cell phone antenna. All of these pictures can be found on his Facebook page.

LeBeau does not spend much time practicing his tricks. Instead, he studies YouTube videos of streetball freestylers, Bavo, Snake and Lunatic, and attempts to mimic their tricks.

“I try to stick to the ones that are easier to do,” LeBeau said. “They just look cool physically to everyone else, but they’re not hard to do.”

Besides basketballs, LeBeau collects baseball hats which he wears sports daily. Each hat is custom made and custom fit. While speaking with me during our first interview, he wore a midnight black hat with the word “Magic” written in a silver graffiti font.

“When people ask me how I spin a basketball,” LeBeau said, “I just say, ‘It’s magic.’”