The 2024 NBA Legends Brunch Honors Tamika Catchings, Jalen Rose, Reggie Miller, and Larry Bird While Also Featuring ABA Panel Discussion
The NBA Legends Brunch is the highlight of NBA All-Star Weekend. I covered this event six times as a credentialed journalist (2005-10), and I watch it every year on TV when I am not able to attend. TNT's Ernie Johnson is a wonderful host/master of ceremonies, and you can tell that he genuinely enjoys his role.
Retired NBA player Harvey Catchings presented the Pioneer Award to his daughter, Tamika Catchings, who starred for the WNBA's Indiana Fever. Harvey recalled that Tamika had an insatiable love for basketball right from the start; when the whole family went to the gym together, Tamika did not want to leave, imploring her father, "Daddy, can we play one more game?" Harvey said that he never let Tamika win, because he knew that the world can be harsh and that she faced challenges because of her hearing issue and her speech impediment. He told her that she has to set the standard for herself, and that if she does that then she can become one of the greatest basketball players ever.
After receiving the award from her father, Tamika began her speech by remembering when her father first brought her to the NBA Legends Brunch and she wondered why she had to sit next to old people, but she grew to understand that this was a blessing. She said that she could have never imagined standing on the NBA Legends Brunch stage as a Legend, let alone as the Pioneer Award winner. Tamika modeled her game after players that her father played with or against--including Julius Erving, Larry Bird, and Bob Lanier--but her favorite player of all-time (other than her father, she hastened to note!) is Alonzo Mourning. Her father told her that to be a great player you have to be great at more than one thing, and Tamika felt that Mourning's game embodied that.
Read more »Labels: ABA, Artis Gilmore, Bob Costas, Darnell Hillman, Indiana Pacers, Jalen Rose, Julius Erving, Larry Bird, Reggie Miller, Spencer Haywood, Tamika Catchings
posted by David Friedman @ 11:07 AM
Harden’s Hubris, Lillard’s Situational Loyalty, and ESPN Abandons Even the Pretense of Providing Substantive Commentary
NBA free agency 2023 has just begun, but there has already been a flurry of activity. Three stories in particular caught my eye so far, and none of the stories relates to a player who has changed teams (at least up to this point): James Harden once again demanded to be traded after doing little to improve his current team, Damian Lillard asked to be traded after spending his whole career bragging about how loyal he is to Portland, and ESPN got rid of several credible commentators while retaining the services of "Screamin' A" Smith and other no-nothing blowhards.
Harden has never pretended to be loyal, nor has he ever shown self-awareness about his basketball abilities. Harden lusted after the money and accolades of a number one option without ever having the ideal mentality or game to be a number one option on a legit championship contender; instead of staying with the Oklahoma City Thunder to be the third option in an organically constructed "Big Three" with Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, Harden fled to Houston seeking money and individual glory. Harden's sorry elimination game resume--to which Harden added yet another awful stat line in 2023 (nine points, five turnovers, 3-11 field goal shooting in a game seven loss to Boston)--speaks for itself.
As Harden's career winds down, he is shamelessly jumping from team to team trying in vain to be what he should have been all along--the third option on a championship contender; he quit on the Rockets to force his way to Brooklyn (and reunite with Durant, who won two rings without Harden), then he whined his way out of Brooklyn to reunite with his biggest fan (Daryl Morey, who called Harden a better offensive player than Michael Jordan) in Philadelphia, and now Harden has exercised his $35.6 million player option for 2023-24 before making it clear that he prefers to hitch his wagon to Kawhi Leonard and Paul George of the L.A. Clippers, presumably believing that this duo has enough talent to overcome his perpetual playoff choking and deliver him a championship ring.
It will be fascinating to see how Morey handles this situation. Morey has devoted his career to slavishly admiring Harden, but Morey is known as a tough negotiator who is comfortable being uncomfortable: will Morey stand firm to get the best possible return for the 76ers (which is, after all, the job Morey is being paid to do), or will he cave in and lovingly send Harden to Harden's preferred destination regardless of what the Clippers offer in return? It will also be interesting to see when/if the 76ers' ownership group becomes fed up with being led by the nose by a series of "stat gurus" (first Sam Hinkie, now Daryl Morey) whose devotion to "advanced basketball statistics" has yet to lift the 76ers past the second round of the playoffs.
While Harden is a basketball mercenary/pirate seeking personal glory with little regard to the carnage he leaves behind with each of his former teams, Lillard's brand is built in no small part on his character and loyalty. Just a few months ago, I wrote about Lillard's Loyalty; my analysis of his skills was on point, but my praise for his loyalty was premature. This is not about Lillard's right to seek employment elsewhere, because I am not questioning that; my point is that no one forced Lillard to write an article titled "Loyalty Over Everything" in which he almost broke his arm patting himself on the back for his character, toughness, and loyalty:
I'm
saying, you think you know how deep this goes, but you have no idea.
When I say that I will never, ever switch up on the city of Portland, I
mean what I say. When I say that I will never, ever switch up on this
organization, I mean what I say.
They
might switch up on me. That's business. That's basketball. But I will
never switch up on the city. I don't want it easy. I'm drawn to the
struggle. When I came here, we hadn't won a playoff series since 2000.
You had so many injuries to franchise guys like Brandon Roy and Greg
Oden over the years, and it's so tough to come back from that. Even
going way back, you had All-Stars like Clyde Drexler and Bill Walton who
didn't choose to end their careers as a Blazer.
Well, I'm going to be that. I'm going to carry that. I'm going to bring a ring to this city or go down swinging...
I ain't turning my back on the city, because the city has been riding with me since Day One.
I'm
not for the fake or the pretend. Too much of that going around these
days. I'm for the authentic. It's the same as it was when we were
sleeping four-to-a-motel-room with the Rebels. I'm trying to win with my
people. Everything I ever experienced, every chapter of it, the good
and the bad and the grimy, that's what made me.
At best, the above paragraphs now sound corny and contrived; at worst, Lillard looks like a liar, or at least like someone who lacks the inner strength to stay true to his expressed core beliefs. Don't tell us "I'm going to bring a ring to this city or go down swinging" and then beg to be traded to Miami to hook up with a team that has reached the NBA Finals twice in the past four seasons without you. Going to the Heat is the opposite of being "drawn to the struggle"; it is hitching your wagon to Jimmy Butler's star, and hoping to ride all the way to a championship.
Lillard's trade request makes one reevaluate his whole career, because it is just not clear what he wants or what he ever wanted. It has always been evident to any informed observer that Lillard is not good enough to be the best player on a legitimate championship contender (every time I hear someone compare Lillard or Chris Paul to Isiah Thomas I feel physically ill, because Thomas--in marked contrast to Lillard and Paul--joined a lousy NBA team, stayed with that team his whole career, and won two titles while facing Bird, Magic, and Jordan in their primes). Thus, if Lillard's main goal is to win a title then he should have been taking less money throughout his career so that the Trail Blazers could sign a player who is qualified to be a legit number one option for a championship contender. If Lillard's main goal is to make as much money as possible, then there is nothing wrong with him signing max deals even though that did not leave enough money available to build a legit championship contender--and there is no reason for him to leave Portland, because Portland can pay him more than any other team. More to the point, if Lillard is really the ride or die type of guy that he has always portrayed himself to be then he should never have asked for a trade.
It is not clear what changed to induce Lillard to renounce a central aspect of his public identity; it is not a newsflash that the Trail Blazers have not provided the superstar and role players that Lillard would need to seriously contend for a title--and Lillard never publicly complained about that--so it is odd that all of a sudden Lillard changed his tune and decided to join the team-hopping brigade, which includes LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Kawhi Leonard, Harden, and Kyrie Irving. At least James, Durant, and Leonard can plausibly argue that they bring championship contention with them in their suitcases; Harden, Irving, and now Lillard show up asking (metaphorically) "Who is going to carry me to the mountaintop?"
It is also not clear what the Heat are thinking if it is true that they are eager to acquire Lillard. The Denver Nuggets bludgeoned the Heat in the paint at both ends of the court in the 2023 NBA Finals, so adding the undersized Lillard and his infamous logo shots to the mix in no way positions the Heat to beat the Nuggets in a playoff series, nor does it position the Heat to beat a full strength Milwaukee team (or any other elite team that uses its size effectively). Lillard could help the Heat's inconsistent offense, but that is not enough to win a title.
Shifting focus to the people who cover the NBA, it is disappointing--but, sadly, not surprising--that ESPN let go several outstanding commentators, including Jeff Van Gundy and Jalen Rose (plus Steve Young, perhaps the network's most insightful NFL analyst). ESPN's NBA analysis is now reduced to Tim Legler--who is outstanding--and a few games per season during which the legendary Hubie Brown provides color commentary. Other than Legler and Brown, when one watches ESPN's NBA coverage one can abandon all hope of hearing intelligent commentary (Mark Jackson is solid, but why isn't more made of the fact that he left Nikola Jokic off of his 2023 regular season MVP ballot?).
Rose was one of the few ESPN commentators who would contradict nonsense even if it was spouted by another ESPN commentator. Rose used the phrase "concert tour" to describe James Harden's ridiculously poor playoff field goal percentages (Harden's numbers look like spring or summer concert tour dates, such as 5-13); that turn of phrase--both funny and insightful--is typical of the perspective that Rose provided. He was the entertaining and intelligent commentator that "Screamin' A" believes himself to be.
Van Gundy had a little Bill Walton in him in terms of going off on whimsical tangents, but Van Gundy consistently provided an elite coach’s insight about basketball. He often declared, "Horses trot, players run"--in reference to so-called superstars who jog up and down the court--and during the height of Kobe Bryant's career his voice provided a lonely but welcome counterpoint to the nonsense spewed by the likes of Bill Simmons, Mike Wilbon, and other nationally prominent commentators who constantly made unfair and unwarranted criticisms of how Bryant played. Van Gundy did not buy into the nonsense that other ESPN commentators spew about in game adjustments. Van Gundy consistently stated that playoff series are not decided by in game adjustments because "You are who you are by this time of the year and you have to go with
your best stuff and expect them to go with their best stuff." It is amazing that Mike Wilbon and Brian Windhorst have been with ESPN for so long yet apparently are incapable of grasping this piece of wisdom dispensed by a colleague who, unlike either of them, coached a team to the NBA Finals.
No one gets everything right in terms of predictions or skill set analysis, but the best commentators view the game in a way that consistently enables them to provide insights that elude many media members and "stat gurus." Hopefully, TNT or NBA TV will pick up the ball dropped by ESPN, and hire Rose and Van Gundy.
Labels: Damian Lillard, Daryl Morey, ESPN, Hubie Brown, Jalen Rose, James Harden, Jeff Van Gundy, Philadelphia 76ers, Portland Trail Blazers
posted by David Friedman @ 11:09 AM
James Harden's "Concert Tour" Heads to Toronto for Game Six
No NBA team has ever blown a 3-0 lead, but if any team is built to make such history that team is the Philadelphia 76ers, whose 103-88 loss to Toronto at home on Monday night turned what had only recently been a 3-0 lead into a 3-2 lead as the series shifts to Toronto for game six.
Philadelphia Coach Doc Rivers led the Boston Celtics to the 2008 championship and he has accomplished a lot during his career, but he is also the only coach in pro basketball history whose teams have squandered three 3-1 leads.
Joel Embiid's brief and undistinguished playoff career has featured him being out of shape and/or injured, and he has never advanced past the second round. He has not been the same in this series since he tore a ligament in his right thumb.
James Harden is perhaps the worst playoff choker ever and--as Jalen Rose so aptly put it--he has been on a "concert tour" since joining the 76ers: tour dates so far in the Toronto series include 3/9, 4/11, 5/17, 6/17, 7/13. One more March, April, May, or June concert tour date--those are Harden's game by game field goal percentages (placed in "calendar" order, not game to game order), in case you did not get Rose's joke--will go a long way to pushing this series to a seventh game, which could be the grand finale for Harden and the 76ers.
The Raptors enjoy matchup advantages versus the 76ers; that--plus the playoff history noted above--is why I picked the Raptors to win the series. The 76ers are at full strength other than Embiid, while the Raptors played game five without All-Star guard Fred VanVleet, and at times they have also been without the services of 2022 Rookie of the Year Scottie Barnes and potent scorer/scrappy defender Gary Trent Jr., but in the past two games the Raptors have begun exploiting their matchup advantages (they actually began doing so in game three, but Embiid bailed out the 76ers with a game-winning three pointer at the end of overtime).
The percentages may still suggest that Toronto will win game six at home before the 76ers right the ship to win the seventh game in Philadelphia--but if this series goes back to Philadelphia tied 3-3 there will be much more pressure on the 76ers than on the Raptors, because the 76ers are supposedly a title contender while no one outside of the Raptors' locker room thinks that the Raptors are a title contender this season. One of my biggest wishes since Harden sulked his way out of Brooklyn was for him to play in a seventh game as a 76er, so that we can all see once again what Daryl Morey's greatest scorer of all-time does when everything is on the line.
Labels: Jalen Rose, James Harden, Philadelphia 76ers, Toronto Raptors
posted by David Friedman @ 2:00 AM
ESPN's Clown Show NBA Coverage, Featuring Stephen A. Smith and Kendrick Perkins Being Wrong About Almost Everything
The NBA Finals were a treat, culminating in a performance for the ages by Giannis Antetokounmpo. However, ESPN's NBA Finals coverage was often nothing more than a clown show, from the Rachel Nichols/Maria Taylor controversy to the futile and failed attempts of Stephen A. Smith and Kendrick Perkins to utter a remotely intelligent sentence.
Smith's loud and tired act has gone on for too long, and his shortcomings have been well documented here and elsewhere. It is sad that ESPN has sunk to branding a specific edition of SportsCenter with Smith's name, but this is not surprising, as I explained several years ago: "ESPN either hires people who are buffoons and instructs them to act like
buffoons or ESPN hires people who used to be real journalists and pays
them a lot of money to act like buffoons." Smith leads the pack in the first category.
Perkins is a former player who should know something about the NBA, and once in a while he makes sense, but he understands that he is being paid to provide headline-grabbing hot takes, not to provide intelligent analysis. Jalen Rose did a great job of listing just a few of Perkins' hot takes gone wrong about the Milwaukee Bucks and the 2021 NBA Finals:
Young folks like this that have been doing this job, like five years, they get one or two things right, they get one or two catchphrases, then they come over here with their Dr. Seuss lines wearing their 80s pastor suits and think all of their takes are going to be hot. So let me tell you a couple of things that I heard Perk say about this series. Didn't he just slander Coach Bud the entire year about not making adjustments? Hey Perk, the number one adjustment this year was giving the ball to Middleton the last couple of minutes of a game. Jrue Holiday isn't the best two way player in the NBA. Last night you saw the best two way player in the NBA. That's actually Giannis Antetokounmpo. And Khris Middleton is not Batman. That happens to be The Greek Freak. And don't try to flip it and say now he's Superman. You can just say that take was off. By the way, what happened to your guy Deandre Ayton? Is he still David Robinson? I didn't see him. Are the Suns still a dynasty? I don't see that with a 36 year old point guard. So again, it's great to come over here and talk really loud and have all of the catchphrases, but you were so very dead wrong about the Bucks as a guy who said that Giannis should leave Milwaukee. You said Giannis should leave Milwaukee. He stayed and he delivered.
Perkins was indeed "very dead wrong," and his attempt to respond to Rose was pathetic, focusing on Rose's hair line; Rose's joke about "Dr. Seuss lines" was funny, and he followed it with basketball analysis, but Perkins' jokes fell flat and were not followed by any basketball analysis. Rose may be the only ESPN commentator who directly calls out fellow ESPN commentators. As Kwame Brown recently noted, Rose deserves credit for attempting to set Stephen A. Smith straight years ago about using the words "bust" and "scrub" to refer to any NBA player. Rose has sometimes provided mixed or muddled messaging on racial issues but his basketball analysis is generally on point.
In addition to the foolish commentary that has become as much an ESPN trademark as anything else, the network also foisted on the public a soap opera pitting Rachel Nichols versus Maria Taylor. In my recap of game four of the 2021 NBA Finals I briefly addressed the Nichols/Taylor controversy:
Can anyone honestly say that either Nichols or Taylor consistently add
something meaningful and profound to the telecasts? In 20 years, NBA
fans and historians will still be talking about Antetokounmpo,
Middleton, Booker, and Paul, but it is doubtful that many people will
remember or care who served as the pregame and halftime host for
ESPN/ABC's Finals coverage. It is worth noting that Taylor, ESPN/ABC's
newly anointed NBA Finals studio host,
was the only one out of 100 media award voters who did not select
Anthony Davis for the All-NBA Team after the 2019-20 season (Davis made
the First Team after receiving 79 First Team votes and 20 Second Team
votes). Taylor's excuse for leaving one of the NBA's top five players
completely off of her ballot for the NBA's top 15 players is that she
forgot about him. Anyone can make a mistake, and one hesitates to make
extreme and/or absolute statements, but it must be asked: How can a
media member who "forgets" about one of the league's elite players be
elevated to a job that makes her the face of ESPN/ABC's pre-game and
halftime NBA Finals coverage?
Nichols is not bad at what she does, and she is better than Taylor, but both of them are quite replaceable. For those who are unaware of the basic facts of the controversy, a private phone conversation that Nichols had with one of LeBron James' advisors was recorded--unbeknownst to Nichols, which is illegal in Florida (where Nichols was staying at the time she participated in the phone call)--and then excerpts of that recording were intentionally leaked by at least one ESPN staffer who did not approve of what Nichols said. Nichols asserted that it is written into her contract that she will be the pregame and halftime host for the NBA Finals, and she declared that if ESPN wants to prove its wokeness by expanding Taylor's role then it should find a way to do so without violating that contractual obligation. Nichols praised Taylor's work and at no time asserted that Taylor is not qualified to be the pregame and halftime host; Nichols just claimed that ESPN has no contractual right to give those assignments to Taylor.
I have not read Nichols' contract, but assuming that she knows what is in her contract and that she stated those terms accurately, she has every legal right to feel wronged if her employer essentially demotes her without cause and in violation of a signed agreement. Nichols also has every right to feel violated that her private phone call was recorded without her knowledge and then broadcast to the public without her consent. All of that being said, there is not a little irony that Nichols is facing the cancel culture after she has been so outspoken and politically slanted during many of her basketball broadcasts. Self-proclaimed "progressives" now portray Nichols as a hypocrite, as someone who claims to be down with the cause but is really more focused on herself. Nichols opened herself up to such criticism by portraying herself in a certain fashion and then daring to utter private remarks that do not live up to others' expectations of her. It is never pretty when self-proclaimed "progressives" turn on their own, as we have seen throughout history (perhaps most notably in the Soviet Union, where a person could be a hero one day and literally cut out of state-controlled newspaper headlines the next day).
The problem--which neither Nichols nor Taylor nor most people who have commented about this acknowledge--is that once you accept the view that hiring practices should be based on any form of proportional representation as opposed to solely based on qualifications then you are going to open the door to resentment, to assumptions that certain people are not qualified for the positions they have, and to a host of other problems. ESPN spends more time and energy trying to act "woke" than it does trying to fill positions based on merit, and that is a bigger issue than Nichols' privately expressed resentment of ESPN's assignment shuffling.
Taylor took great offense to what Nichols said, and Taylor subsequently refused to appear on camera with Nichols. Nichols, who is often outspoken about being woke and certainly does not need a weather report to understand which way the wind is blowing, offered a public apology to Taylor that Taylor neither acknowledged nor accepted. Taylor probably correctly assumed that the apology was not sincere, because if Nichols were given truth serum she would most likely not think it necessary to apologize for privately griping that her employer is violating her contract. We are just watching an elaborate song and dance: Nichols' apology was a necessary damage control move, and Taylor's non-acceptance of the apology was an expected response from someone who feels entitled to be aggrieved despite being elevated to a position contractually promised to another person who has more seniority and experience on the NBA beat.
ESPN removed Nichols from its Finals coverage for a day or two, and then figured out how to ease her back in without having her ever appear on the same show as Taylor. Even though Taylor won the battle to be the pregame and halftime host, it was obvious that this would be her last assignment with ESPN. After the NBA Finals ended, ESPN and Taylor announced that they have mutually agreed to part ways. Taylor will no doubt grab adoring headlines--and huge dollars--regardless of where she goes next.
No one would dream of putting together an NBA team based on some kind of proportional ethnic representation of the U.S. or world population, and it does not make any sense to put together any organization with such proportional ethnic representation as the goal. I don't care if the pregame/halftime host is White, Black, Asian, male, female, heterosexual, homosexual, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or belongs to any other racial group, gender, sexual orientation, and/or religion. All I care about is that the pregame/halftime host understands NBA basketball, and can be a "traffic cop" for the other participants in the broadcast. Bob Costas and Ernie Johnson are the gold standard for the past 30 years, if not all-time. We all know that Nichols and Taylor are nowhere near that level, and it is a reasonable assumption that ESPN bypassed more qualified candidates to put first Nichols and then Taylor in the role--and even if Nichols and Taylor are the best that ESPN has, the focus on "representation" will always leave lingering doubts about how they achieved prominence.
When the focus shifts from creating equal opportunities to creating equal outcomes, we all lose.
I cannot wait until the current NBA media contracts expire, and I hope that TNT will cover the NBA Finals under the next deal.
Just to put a bow on all of this, it should be mentioned that some ESPN basketball commentators/analysts are first rate, including Jeff Van Gundy, Mark Jackson, Tim Legler, and Jalen Rose. Hubie Brown's role has been reduced, but in his prime he was the absolute best, and he is still top notch even now. That is not an exhaustive list of qualified ESPN broadcasters, but the problem is that the unqualified ones are often provided the most attention, air time, and compensation.
Labels: ESPN, Giannis Antetokounmpo, hot takes gone wrong, Jalen Rose, Kendrick Perkins, Khris Middleton, Maria Taylor, Milwaukee Bucks, NBA, Rachel Nichols, Stephen A. Smith
posted by David Friedman @ 2:31 AM
Jalen Rose's Mixed Messages
Jalen Rose often provides insightful commentary and analysis, but he made some baffling statements yesterday on the "Jalen & Jacoby" show. Rose expressed concern and disdain about Michael Jordan's reported role as a mediator between the NBA owners and the NBA players during
the NBA strike. Rose noted that Jordan is the only black person who is a majority owner of an NBA team, and Rose suggested that it seems like white owners are not comfortable talking to a group of predominantly black players so the owners sent Jordan to speak on their behalf.
I am baffled by Rose's criticism, though I am reminded of the
racially charged comments directed toward Grant Hill by Jalen Rose and several of Rose's college teammates. Rose and others consistently assert that there are not enough majority owners who are black in sports where the majority of players are black. Rose and others consistently assert that diversity is important so that players can see owners who look like they do, who have had experiences like they have had, and who can serve as role models for other black people to become owners and executives. We are also told that there are not enough black head coaches, and that only black head coaches can relate to black athletes.
Given those assertions, one would assume that Rose would be thrilled that a majority owner who is black is playing a pivotal role in resolving the strike. If no black owners were involved then it is almost certain that Rose would assert that at a critical time like this there should be a black voice among the owners. Now, there is a black owner, and Rose diminishes Jordan's credibility by asserting that Jordan is taking a major role not because of Jordan's earned status as a great player and successful businessman but rather as a messenger for the white owners. If a white commentator had expressed Rose's take, that white commentator would rightly be accused of racism for judging Jordan not on his merits as a person but rather for the color of his skin.
Rose's take begins with speculation--I have seen no reports suggesting that white owners felt that they could not communicate with black players--and ends with demeaning Jordan (that may not have been Rose's intention, but that is the plain meaning of what Rose said). Also, contrary to Rose's assumption that white owners would not be comfortable speaking with black players, Milwaukee's owners publicly expressed full support for their striking players; that is just one example, and I am sure that there are other examples.
In an ideal world, opportunities to coach, to be an executive, and to be an owner would be available to whoever is most qualified to fill those roles regardless of race, religious preference, political affiliation, or any other categorization that is not related to competency. In an ideal world, a commentator would not assume that a prominent owner who is successfully mediating between the players and the owners was put in position to do so primarily because of his race. When I first heard reports about Jordan serving a mediating role I assumed that he is uniquely qualified not because of his race, but because he is the only person in the room who has experience both as a player and as an owner.
It is bizarre that Rose repeatedly states that there are not enough black coaches, executives, and owners, and then he makes statements that undermine Jordan's status as an important leader who helped resolve the NBA strike.
Rose is wrong about Jordan, and he is also wrong to simply state that we need more blacks in certain roles. We don't need more black coaches, executives, and owners, nor do we need fewer black coaches, executives, and owners. We need to make sure that the playing field is level in terms of opportunity. To the extent that the playing field is not equal, steps need to be taken to level the playing field. Bill Russell, K.C. Jones, and Lenny Wilkens are three examples of black players who received NBA coaching opportunities and rewarded their teams with at least one championship each. Masai Ujiri is arguably the best front office executive in the NBA. Michael Jordan has not been the most successful NBA owner, but he is certainly not the least successful owner, either.
No objective person who has any sense or knowledge doubts that there are black people who can be productive coaches, executives, and owners--but there should not be some arbitrary number to determine that there are "enough" coaches, executives, and owners who are black. It is a slippery slope to say that there are not "enough," as opposed to focusing on removing barriers to equality. How many would be "enough" and how many would be "too many" regarding one racial group or another?
Also, speaking of being a mediator or a leader, Rose did not say anything about LeBron James but it is fascinating to see and hear the reports regarding LeBron James' role in the NBA strike. In contrast to Jordan's productive contribution, it has been reported that James walked out of the initial players' meeting on Wednesday, and then in subsequent meetings he spoke last--after an action plan had already been formed and agreed upon--and talked down to the other players. In the days, weeks, and months to come we will no doubt learn more about exactly what happened, but these descriptions of James' shortcomings as a leader align with
previous reports about James' shortcomings as a leader in the Olympics, with Cleveland, and with Miami. James is extraordinarily talented, and he has accomplished a lot, but the forced narrative about him being a great leader does not withstand even cursory scrutiny.
Labels: Grant Hill, Jalen Rose, LeBron James, Michael Jordan
posted by David Friedman @ 1:10 AM
Grant Hill's Open Letter About ESPN's Fab Five Film Speaks Volumes
ESPN's "Fab Five" documentary examined the impact that Michigan's 1991 freshman class had not only on college basketball but society in general. During the film, the four members of the Fab Five who participated in the project* graphically described how they felt about the Duke basketball program and some of Duke's players. The opinions that the Michigan players expressed--specifically that the Duke players lacked toughness and that the black Duke players were "Uncle Toms" (a powerfully negative allegation for one black person to hurl against another black person)--are ignorant; the Duke players proved their toughness by beating the Fab Five every time Duke faced Michigan (including the 1992 NCAA Championship Game) and the "Uncle Tom" slur is ridiculous: less than four decades ago, Civil Rights leaders marched and died precisely for the purpose of ensuring that blacks would have equal opportunities in the educational system and the work force, so it is foolish to belittle anyone who correctly took advantage of opportunities to create a better life for himself and his family. Duke star Grant Hill was singled out for a lot of verbal abuse by the Fab Five players and he authored an eloquent response that refuted everything they said without personally attacking them; frankly, if I were in Hill's shoes I am not sure I would have made such a measured response. Here is a brief selection from Hill's essay:
I come from a strong legacy of black Americans. My namesake, Henry Hill, my father’s father, was a day laborer in Baltimore. He could not read or write until he was taught to do so by my grandmother. His first present to my dad was a set of encyclopedias, which I now have to remind me of the importance of education. He wanted his only child, my father, to have a good education, so he made numerous sacrifices to see that he got an education, including attending Yale. This is part of our great tradition as black Americans. We aspire for the best or better for our children and work hard to make that happen for them. Jalen’s mother is part of our great, black tradition and made the same sacrifices for him.
It is unbeknownst to me what Jalen meant by his convoluted reference to black players at Duke considering how little he knows about any of them. My teammates—all of them, black and white—were a band of brothers who came together to play at the highest level for the best coach in basketball...My mother always says, “You can live without Chaucer and you can live without calculus, but you cannot make it in the wide, wide world without common sense.” As we get older, we understand the importance of these words. Adulthood is nothing but a series of choices: you can say yes or no, but you cannot avoid saying one or the other. In the end, those who are successful are those who adjust and adapt to the decisions they have made and make the best of them.You can read Hill's complete rebuttal
here.While Hill focused specifically on the slurs that the Fab Five directed toward him and his teammates, Jason Whitlock
declares that the "Fab Five" film rewrites history:
The legacy of the Fab Five is that they were on the cutting edge of America’s unashamed embrace of style over substance... The Fab Five are taking credit for the real accomplishments of John Thompson’s and Patrick Ewing’s Georgetown Hoyas.It was Thompson’s all-black, Ewing-led teams a decade before the Fab Five that shook the foundation of college basketball, changed the complexion of starting lineups across the country, opened coaching doors that had previously been closed to blacks and paved the way for black sportswriters at major newspapers.It's easy to forgive Rose for his lack of self-awareness. It's America. In this country, self-awareness and common sense are our most rare commodities.What's not easy to excuse is the clueless robbery of what Thompson, Ewing, Bill Martin, Reggie Williams, Horace Broadnax and David Wingate accomplished.They won championships--conference and national. They scared and intimidated the establishment. They were the inner-city black kids who left a legacy of jobs and playing opportunities for other impoverished minorities that exposes the lack of substance in the fads popularized by the Fab Five."Hoya Paranoia" is the story that deserves celebration and should serve as a teaching tool. Fab Five is a safe, harmless story celebrating black kids for choosing style over substance.-----
*Chris Webber, who later pleaded guilty to a criminal contempt charge relating to his false testimony about hundreds of thousands of dollars that he received from booster Ed Martin, declined to be associated in any way with the film. The court fined Webber $100,000 and ordered him to perform 300 hours of community service; the NBA suspended Webber for three games without pay after Webber pleaded guilty.
Labels: Chris Webber, Duke, Fab Five, Grant Hill, Jalen Rose, Jimmy King, Michigan, Ray Jackson
posted by David Friedman @ 4:48 AM
