Since I'm Not Hungover Yet...

I have my own thoughts on AI and so I thought I'd vent a little about...yeah, whatever, I completely agree with Tragic - AI vs. Nash is no comparison, at least not these days, and even if it's not a fair comparison (I'd argue they play different positions), the fact is that Steve-O is a better basketball player.

Instead I want to talk about the (Paul Pierce-less) Boston Celtics - really - who by coincidence I've seen play twice this week (in person against the Clips Wednesday and on local cable against the Warriors last night).

1. The Celtics are a terrible team. They've been without Pierce for four games now and have lost all four. (With Pierce they were 10-14, which somehow isn't awful in the East. Had they won their last four they'd top the Atlantic.)
2. They make themselves a terrible team. Let me rephrase: Doc Rivers makes them a terrible team. This is a fact. In recent memory I've never seen a coach more apathetic towards winning. The Celtics are at present two games out of first in the Atlantic. Down by 10 with two minutes to go last night, Rivers pulled his best players out of the game. He subs when he shouldn't, plays players he shouldn't (see: Scalabrine, Brian; Perkins, Kendrick), fails to stop runs - on the road - with timeouts. He's mostly clueless, sure, but also seems unable to decide whether he should be tutoring or coaching, which means either he didn't get the memo from management or else there wasn't one - a problem however sliced.
3. Doc's team is talented and young. Sebastian Telfair is as quick as any player in the league - he just needs to get a bit stronger and be more consistent with his jump shot. (The Blazers, inexplicably so far, passed on Chris Paul and Deron Williams because they had Telfair.) Delonte West can shoot - and already makes good decisions. Tony Allen and Gerald Green are amazing athletes - and Green, drafted straight from high school two years ago, makes threes. Al Jefferson, worthless last year, is looking pretty good now - he's undersized but comfortable and quick in the post, and an intuitive rebounder. With a mid-range jumper and more consistency at the line (he was 6-7 last night, 2-5 on Wednesday), Jefferson will be 20-10 for life.
4. Wally Szczerbiak is completely worthless. Sure he's coming back from injury but I've never seen a player less concerned about a game's outcome and more concerned with getting his - and with his appearance - than Wally. Really, a true gunner who makes Corey Maggette look like Alonzo Mourning on defense. The second best moment of my Wednesday evening was delightfully chorusing "You suck Szczerbiak" as the Mole Man chucked up jumper after jumper in garbage time (he was 2-8 against the Clippers and followed with a 3-17 performance last night against the Warriors). That moment was topped only by...
5. Michael Olowokandi, total douchebag. Yes, it was amusing that the "Clippers Fans" booed The Kandi Man when he entered the game and every time he touched the ball thereafter. However, were I one of them I'd find less humor in the fact that my team passed on Mike Bibby to draft the dead weight that is Olowokandi.

So there you have it. Was that interesting? Not really. Am I a better person for writing it? Of course. Which brings me to my New Year’s resolutions: Along with being a better lover, I’ll blog more. You happy Tragic?

Looking forward to 2007,

The Gumbels

Corned Beef Nash

My man D-Wil picks up the leftovers of the Iverson talk over at Sports on my Mind. The latest seitan (i.e., vegetarian for "beef") has Iverson more deserving of back-to-back MVP awards than Nash. D-Wil rates their averages in assists, rebounds, and points from the two relevant seasons. He winds up with this: “In my estimation there is no comparison between Nash and Iverson. AI played on worse teams and had better overall stats than Nash.”

How can I best deliver my discontent? Perhaps as the Palm Beach mah-jongg crowd might put it, “Feh!”

There are two issues at stake here, and we’d do better to parse them. The first concerns whether Nash deserved the two awards he won (fyi: I’m not convinced). At this point, that conversation is growing mold in the dustbins of history. We’ll shake it off and wipe it clean, I’m sure, when Nash is up for a third next May.

Out of curiosity, I wonder if Iverson will still be playing then?

As for the second issue—is Iverson better than Nash (or, more exactly, are Iverson’s numbers better than Nash’s?)? I’ve made my feelings about Iverson public. So has everyone else with a laptop and some courage. BTW, I suppose we’re left to assume The Last Poet lacks the latter, considering he leaves the crumbs of his beef with my opinions on AI buried in the comments section of another person’s blog (see them here). Hey D., can you tell the cowardly lion to click his ruby slippers on over to my corner of Oz? Come directly to the Wizard when you have something to cluck about, LP. If you only had a brain…

Anyway, back to the question, and the Answer, at hand. D-Wil doesn’t consider two crucial statistical categories in the AI-Nash debate: field goal percentage and TOs. In the ’04-’05 campaign, Iverson shot a paltry 42% from the floor while Nash cashed in on 50% of his attempts. True, Nash took fewer than half as many shots. However, Iverson’s surplus 13 shots only resulted in 4.5 more makes, which is only one bucket more than Nash dished to his teammates. That is to say, Nash handed out 3.5 more assists per game than Iverson (11.5 to AI’s 8), and he did it with 1.3 fewer turnovers (3.3 to 4.6).

Because Iverson’s team scored 11 fewer points per game than Nash’s, each Sixer possession was more significant for the nightly fate of the club. Iverson’s ghastly 4.6 TOs and poor shooting therefore impact his squad more dramatically than the numbers initially let on. If we were to subtract from Iverson’s 30.7 ppg the number of points each turnover and missed shot tallies for the opposition, what would the number look like? What if we added Nash’s 3.5 extra assists to his 15.5 and somehow developed a ratio to account for turnovers and their relative impact on the team’s nightly point production? It sounds complicated, but gauging the (positive and negative) contributions of Nash and Iverson requires a more complete analysis than a simple comparison of points, rebounds, and assists allots.

Iverson’s a better player only if the game is one-on-one.

Before I indebt myself too deeply to the bookies of the bottle this Christmas Day, I want to offer a celebratory joke for the occasion. Santa Claus never offers my people much on the 25th of December, and our humor has always been the surviving grace. For all the goyim to enjoy, here goes:

Abe Moskowitz calls his doctor one night in a state of panic. He says, "Doctor, Doctor, my son David just swallowed a condom! What do I do?"
The doctor, sensing Abe's urgency, replies, "I'll be right there."
Two minutes later, Abe calls the doctor again: "Doctor, the problem is solved. Nothing to worry about here."
The doctor asks, "What happened?"
With delight, Abe responds, "My wife found another condom."

Have the merriest of Mondays,
TJ

A Forecast in Verse

‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the league
Not a player was stirring, nor shouting, “referee!”
The nylon was stitched on the rims so tall,
Awaiting the new year: the return of old balls.

The Commish was snuggled in thread-count delight
While Carmelo and team reconsidered the fight.
Isiah looked back on a hallowed career,
Worried his coaching gives fans much to sneer.

From across the river, VC, Kidd and their squad
Needed help from old man Thorn, aka Rod.
The entire Atlantic sunk in the cellar,
AI disappeared like Sarah Michelle Gellar.

Way out West the clubs finished far fewer losers,
Surprised by the likes of ‘Mare, Yao, and Boozer.
But the team to beat, the squad with triangle action,
Kobe and Lamar led by Zen Master Jackson.

Mark it down thick, my prediction for the season
The final two twelve, given logic and reason,
Call it a belated rematch, Kobe v. Rip,
Raise the trophy for Phil, remember, his bum hip.

Show and Tell

To begin with the personal—I spent the last week and change in the dark. That’s not meant as a sly allusion to my fantasy team shooting the lights out either (though I did enjoy Gilbert’s 60 earlier in the week...54 last night!). I was visiting my folks in Seattle, where a displaced nor’easter pillaged the power grid and left us without electricity for 6 days. Like Gloria Gaynor, however, I survived; now, I’m back to tell about it. (No word on the whereabouts of the Gumbel Bros though. He’s a co-writer on this here weblog, but I think he’s been in the hospital giving birth to his girlfriend’s baby. Come in from the dark, TGB; it’s cold out there, and the readers are calling your number.)

A fracas in the Garden, a blockbuster deal, more controversy than a custody battle—‘twas the toughest of weeks to go without internet access, right? Lions and tigers and bears!

I don’t even know where to begin. Actually, I do: the fat man in Denver, the Carlo Rossi of the NBA. Is there any coach in the league more deserving of a deep-fryer and a double-wide than George Karl? Class, Karl hath not. He’s a P.E. teacher with an oversized salary and a 52-inch waist. Everything about the man embodies bloat.

Strangely enough, then, I find myself defending Isiah on this one. I don’t blame him for talking tough. Remember a few years back when Bill Cowher looked like he might storm the field to shoulder an opposing team’s breaking player? What’d the boys in Bristol say then? They spoke of Cowher’s “heart,” his “grit” and “determination.” Why shouldn’t we say the same thing about Isiah now? (Answer: because in my world, we take points off for rusty clichés.) Don’t get me wrong: Isiah still belongs on the sidelines of a women’s J.V. team. He can’t coach, and he makes terrible front-office decisions. Nonetheless, taking shit from a classless club in NYC…fuggedaboudit. Let the Nuggets sleep with fishes.

Speaking of the Nuggets, A.I. must be loving the deal to Denver—A.I., as in Andre Iguodala. Watch what happens once Andre Miller gets adjusted to Philly’s players. Iggy’s TOs will go down, his shot selection will improve, and his scoring ought to climb. There’s no reason why Iguodala won’t be a 20-point scorer this season. Add that to 50 % from the field, 2+ steals per, 6.5 rebounds, 5 assists, and a slam dunk title this coming February. Every brother in that city of love will be like Allen who? (Note of disclosure: I happen to have Mr. Iguodala in my fantasy league. Bite me.)

While in Seattle last week, I happened to attend the nationally televised Sonics-Mavericks game on Wednesday evening. Only “attend” might not be the right word for the experience; “participate in” is the better verb phrase. I need to thank the fine people at Lake Partners in Seattle for the night. An old friend invited me on the company dime: third-row floor seats, free beer and food, a halftime chat with Lenny Wilkens and Jon Barry, special parking, a pre-game pep speech to Chris Wilcox (also a fantasy team contributor), and several coy (dare I say, sincere) smiles from the dancing girls. Company dime or not, the whole shebang cost someone quite the pretty penny.

We sat so close to the court—indeed, on the court, in folding chairs—it felt almost pornographic, as if the hardwood action were being performed just for us. We saw the sweat drip from muscled flesh, heard the music of grunts and mumbles in the paint. When they ran the wing on a break, their rushing bodies brewed the air with the smell of gym rats. When they turned the pick-and-roll, the pounding of the ball vibrated rings in the beer at our feet.

Something occurred to me in the middle of those visceral four quarters. As I yelled at the referees, cheered the home-team, and called Dampier by his maiden name, Erica, I noticed an unattractive complacency on the faces of the ticket-holders near me. They were too content, too satisfied with just watching. I wanted a jersey or a whistle or a suit and a seat on the bench; other fans wanted email access. While I shouted “shoot-it!,” the dude next to me chatted with his broker on a Blackberry. While I called “foul!,” he called home.

I know it’s not uncommon for diehards to lament the apathy of the home-town crowd. That’s not exactly what I mean here. My experience with the courtside big-shots on Wednesday made me understand something more specific.

I realized while watching the Mavs what makes Mark Cuban so special. It’s not that he’s the “fan’s owner,” as so many are wont to dub him. It’s not that he shows the “heart” and “passion” of nose-bleeders rather than blue-bloods.

No, it’s more like he’s the owner’s fan—every arena’s exemplary sixth man. He roots like he has something to lose, as the rest of us should. Cuban drinks from the ambrosia of locker rooms, dizzies with the spectacle of pirouetting players, and maddens when the whistle-blowers in stripes wreck the show. What would happen if every Key Arena local wrote Commish Stern about Wednesday night’s game? Told him about the free-throw disparity, and asked why the Mavs shot 34 to the Sonics 10 (five of which came in the last two minutes)? What if all the marketing wizards at MSG volunteered their expertise? Had the country chirping about Miami and L.A. on Christmas day, the way the country clucks for the Yankees and Red Sox in the summer?

For this holiday season, I offer you all advice: don’t be like Mike. His playing days are through, and he’s too comfortable as an ivory-tower owner.

Instead, be like Mark.

The Exaggeration

For almost a week, I’ve been listening to commentators talk about Iverson. They all say virtually the same thing.

1) Iverson remains a potent (if not the most potent) offensive player despite his size and the mileage tread under his soles. He’s still capable of averaging more than his age and, on any given night, can drop more than Bird’s.

2) The baggage Iverson carries isn’t packed quite the way the media stuff it. His “no-practice” mantra isn’t for real, and his trouble winning has more to do with Van Horn, Stackhouse, and C-Webb than the Answer himself.

Here’s the thing…or, at least, my thing: I don’t believe it.

The dude can still score; that much is true. But, he’s far from a good shooter. With a career 42% stroke, the Answer throws up more than a $20 million share of junk bonds. At 3.5 threes attempted per, Iverson’s bricks fill a small arena with long rebounds and fast breaks for the opposition. Consequently, his astronomical 4.4 TOs per game is actually a little higher. Insofar as long rebounds, like turnovers, result in easy scoring opportunities for the other team, Iverson’s errant shooting contributes to his already inconsistent defense.

How many Iverson misses lose a ball game?

As far as the baggage goes, well, we’re not exactly talking pocket-books, are we? Iverson comes with a rap sheet of disgruntled teammates, fed-up coaches, jail time, missed practices, tardiness, and an entourage large enough to make Suge Knight quake. And we haven’t even talked partying yet. Iverson and his crew make Paris and Lindsay look like the high school yearbook editors.

Now, I know most of Allen’s bullet biography is ancient text; these days he’s more spouse and father than chair-tosser and truant. Even those misshapen blots on his record—as a player and criminal—weren’t entirely his fault. Everyone keeps telling us that. Bill Simmons, Scoop Jackson, John Thompson—they all keep saying the same thing.

Yet, has Iverson really been stirred from the nightmare of his history? Do the ghosts of his past flee when he changes uniforms? Or do they haunt his locker like the memory of Stephen’s mother and Sethe’s daughter?

Instead of the Answer, I’ve always thought he’d be better dubbed the Exaggeration. Iverson’s game, his past, his look, his posturing—it’s all hyperbole—like neck tattoos and the filigreed ink on the backs of his hands. More bark than the Big Dog with less sting than the Mamba, he zips by perimeter defenders in a single bound. He’s the Answer to the riddle of his own legend.

He’s…the Exaggeration.

Happy Birthday, Larry

Larry Bird turns 50 today -- I know, I know, it's hard to believe. He looks great. We both want to wish him the warmest of birthday wishes. Thanks for all the memories, Larry.

What's the Sound of One Hand Dunking?

I never heard Bird say it, but apparently he thought his Airness was actually a manifestation of the divine, “God disguised as Michael Jordan.” It reminds me of Amiri Baraka, who eulogized James Baldwin as “God’s black revolutionary mouth.” Bird and Baraka—I agree with both of them.

True Hoop pointed me to this 1986 interview of MJ on 60 Minutes. The line from Bird is quoted by Diane Sawyer in the clip. I watched it twice. You should too.

There’s something about the graininess of this video, I think, that seems to infuse it with spirit—as though it weren’t made to be watched but followed or observed. Jordan and Sawyer have an odd, portentous air here, almost auguring the significance of 23’s career, his image, and meaning.

At one point, Sawyer asks, “Are you thinking when you’re up there?” The question chills with its spare note of grace and religion. She’s not interviewing a Bull anymore but an avatar.

The young Jordan answers, “I don’t think; I just act. When I’m up there, I’m up there just to score points.”

Is there any truer expression of will than this? Of enlightenment or clarity? He’s giving us a sutra or a koan, not an answer. He’s offering a way of life and an ethic. I don’t believe he’s not thinking on the court; but rather, his body has become an expression of thought purified. Thinking doesn’t precipitate action, for Jordan, but action becomes a way to enact thought. They happen simultaneously and in union.

Isn’t that one of the distinctions between the greatest players and the mortal mediocre? They become sublime in action. Or, in other words, their actions always transcend the language used to describe them. It's why we resort to the threadbare vocabulary of heart, attitude, and desire. There was no better way to describe Jordan's game than by witnessing it.

New Ball, Old Tricks

My apologies for delivering this news after the deadline. I wish I had known about it earlier. Seems the Garden State was a bit slow mobilizing on the publicity front. From the website of the New Jersey Nets, I bring you the following announcement:

NETS TO HOLD AUDITIONS FOR NEW SENIOR DANCE TEAM!

All dancers must be at least 60 years of age

EAST RUTHERFORD, NJ -- The Nets are holding open auditions for their first-ever senior dance team on Monday, November 20, from 5 p.m. – 7 p.m. at the Nets practice facility at 390 Murray Hill Parkway in East Rutherford. Registration opens at 4 p.m.

The Nets senior dance team will be comprised of men and women who are at least 60 years of age. Those who audition must have some dancing capability. The senior dancers will perform during at least six games this season and will have their ages on the backs of their uniforms.

I'm tickled by the requirement for prospective senior dancers: "some dancing capability." I have to think that "dancing capability" is not the same thing as "dancing ability," but something closer to walking or tying your own shoes or self-respirating.The best part of the announcement is here:

Nets fans are encouraged to come up with a team-name for the senior dance squad and email it to ppope@njnets.com. The fan whose suggestion is chosen will receive two tickets to an upcoming game at which the senior dancers are performing.

As far as I know, the Nets are still searching to name their geriatric group of dancers. Feel free to post your names here, and I'll send them along to the organization. Some possible favorites include:

The Varicose Vixens
The Early Bird Specials
Medicare Mod-Squad
The Rheumatic Rockers
The Prune Poppers

Good luck!

The Worm in the Machine

D-Wil at Sports on my Mind has some comments on the unfair labor charges that dropped at the end of last week. They’re worth the read. I was too busy all weekend trying to find the perfect shoes to match my new fedora. I finally decided to have a pair tailor-made, so I emailed the Field Museum in Chicago to see if my leather guy could use dinosaur skin for the soles. Should be the only cat on the red carpet with brontosaurus under my toes.

The discussion at True Hoop on Friday asked why more athletes aren’t political. The NBA has Etan Thomas, yes, but for the most part, the guys would rather be like Carmelo on defense and avoid the topic altogether.

It wasn’t that long ago, however, when Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf (née Chris Jackson) protested the national anthem. For him, the red, white, and blue represented an obscenity, “a symbol of oppression”—not stars but scars and stripes. Last I heard, Abdul-Rauf serves as an imam at a mosque he helped build in Mississippi. No word on how his congregation takes to the shakes and curses.

Speaking of obscenity, the conversation about politics and the NBA has thus far avoided the ground floor, the earth matter of the issue: The Worm.

Bad-as-he-wants-to-be Dennis Rodman embodied resistance during his years under lights. Everything about the man’s game suggested struggle. He didn’t play basketball so much as he digested it. His game was all appetite and desire, all labor and profanity. The dude made Frank Brickowski and Karl Malone look like primadonnas.

Rodman feasted on the wreckage of the game, its flotsam and failures. The skills at which the Worm excelled—rebounding, defense, irritation—were all predicated on the mistakes of others: missed shots, turnovers, and offensive fouls. If Michael’s game symbolized perfection, ease, and finesse, Dennis’s incarnated impurity, inelegance, and messiness. If his Airness floated toward the rim as though Isaac Newton told lies, the Worm looked to invite the sting of gravity, slithered for loose balls, and flaunted the hustler’s stigmata of gym-burns, bruises, and sweat.

If Jordan was the corporate face of the NBA, Rodman was a pain in the league’s ass.

Part of the reason Rodman inspired antipathy no doubt had to do with the gawkiness of his play. He moved like a person under attack, a thousand elbows all out-of-sync—kicking, tripping, and flopping when he had to. Rodman was a tempest in a 94-foot teapot.

Yet, as the novelist John Edgar Wideman once put it, Rodman also played Caliban to David Stern’s Prospero, and incited ire from his celebrity antics as much as his court tactics.

But shouldn’t we keep those antics and tactics together, joined in the transgressive coupling that was the Worm? The man brought sexual dissidence, gay rights, and color to the sterile, black-and-white world of the hardwood—and that’s just talking his hair alone.

To the homophobic gala of professional sports, Rodman came dressed in drag, swapping spit with Madonna and fantasies of male lovers. While other athletes expressed discomfort about playing against Magic, Dennis embraced survivors and tattooed his support on televisions across the country. The Worm championed dis-ease in all facets of his life.

Rodman may have been more partier than poet, but a part of our conversation about politics and players he remains.

R.I.P. Eazy-E

Because life is what happens when you're busy making other plans, I give you last night's line:

Lakers 132, Jazz 102.

Kobe dropped 30 in the 3rd quarter; 52 in 34 minutes played. That's why we pay him the big bucks.

The West runs through Staples, fellas. It just does.

Etan of Bricks

Etan Thomas’s recent column for Slam Online recounts what he believes was an example of racism in the NBA. In my opinion, the incident seems unworthy of the reading he provides—i.e., the ref’s comment seems more anti-jock than anti-black. In fact, the ref probably isn’t even anti-jock (why work ballgames if you can’t stand muscle?) so much as stupid and avuncular.

That does not mean, however, race wasn’t significant in Thomas’s encounter with the referee; it just wasn’t significant in the obvious way.

Race proved to be a significant category for the way Thomas interpreted the experience, rather than for the way the ref did (at least on the surface of things). In other words, the ref wasn’t thinking of Thomas’s race, in my opinion (and Free Darko’s), when he made the comment. Nor was he thinking of his own. He’d probably say the same thing to Jason Kapono, Wally Szczerbiak, maybe even his own nephew.

Nevertheless, Thomas extracted meaning from the comment because of the way race filters the way he (and all of us) comes to knowledge about the world.

Don’t twist what I’m saying. I don’t mean Thomas is actually the one guilty of stereotyping while the white ref makes off like a colorblind freedom-fighter. That’s Limbaugh / O’Reilly bullshit, and I’d bury them and their bullshit in Grant’s tomb.

Thomas actually points us to the way race provides a meaningful lens for understanding the hum and buzz of daily life. Race can bring knowledge, nuance, and subtlety to experience. That’s why a complete education requires that the classrooms get filled by students from the streets and suburbs alike...the same classrooms, I mean.

It’s why you can teach Kate Chopin in New Haven for the rest of your life and still not understand what a fourteen-year-old boy from the 9^th Ward might know about New Orleans.

These are the philosophical grounds for arguing against Ward Connerly and his minion—those who think the ideal world would be colorblind and without race.

Instead, I’d argue that the ideal world is without the hierarchies of privilege, status, resources, class, and power that are attached to race—but not without race itself.

We learn from race and its many histories. The perspective race provides offers insight not otherwise available without it. There are rich differences of life-interpretation that are developed via race—differences in both cultural practice and knowledge production.

A colorblind world would look a lot like the San Antonio Spurs: a cohesive group, solid in fundamentals, but in the end, not that much fun. (And totally ignorant about the legacies of racism and how they continue to benefit some at the price of many.)

It’s liberation from the oppression and inequality based on race that demands a struggle, but not liberation from race as a concept for understanding the world.

The very fact, I think, the referee would make the same comment to Kapono (though Kapono is as dumb as he looks) doesn’t mean race wasn’t / isn’t important. Rather, it suggests the way white people tend not to see whiteness as crucial to the way their life is experienced. That’s why the ref made the stupid joke in the first place, failing to imagine how Thomas’s race might lead him to view the encounter differently—perhaps even more accurately.

White people don’t often see the importance of whiteness because they don’t have to. That’s called white privilege, and it’s the result of racism and institutionalized white supremacy. And it ain’t right.

You may not see race when you see white Wally; you may not think whiteness matters or impacts your life in anyway at all. But that doesn’t mean it didn’t help you get that loan for your house in the suburbs.

Ask the owner of the Clippers about that.

The NBA Cares

Mostly because I have difficulty letting go, I’ve continued to think about the issue of autonomy and the NBA. I’ve been active over in the comments section of True Hoop, and I thought I might let the cream rise to the surface here.

In response to a comment I made, which I’ll reproduce in a second, one reader and scribe offered this to retort: “Its a matter of scale. The NBA's earning 2.4 BILLION from ABC/ESPN and another 2.2 BILLION from TNT over 6 years for broadcast rights, and that doesn't include endorsement, licensing, & direct ticket sales. There's 442(I think) players in the NBA altogether. That's a really small workforce ultimately responsible for a multi-billion dollar product. Is it fair to say that Shaq is somewhat more responsible for that product than other players? Is it absurd to say he's simply receiving his fair share? What does the federal minimum wage possibly have to do with this?”

For me, the issue of player autonomy has everything to do with the minimum wage—not only those who earn it but also those who make significantly less. The issues (autonomy and minimum wage) are related for both economic and moral reasons.

Put it like this: ESPN and TNT aren’t spending $6.6 billion to televise tall dudes playing a game. They’re buying the entire product the NBA puts out. It’s important to remember that Shaq’s hands aren’t the only hands helping to create that product. Even if you had all the hands that dribble, pass, shoot, block, steal, and rebound in the league, you still wouldn’t have the NBA.

You’d have basketball players.

In other words, if we’re discussing the hands that create the NBA, we need to acknowledge the hands that tear tickets, mop floors, sell soda, sew jerseys, bind leather, and so on. True, these folks might not possess the talent or training of the tall dudes in shorts.

But are they any less valuable to the NBA as a product?

And how much less valuable?

Shaq made $11,300 per minute played last season. If the person who stitched his sneaks lived in the U.S. and made minimum wage—which in all likelihood is not the case; they probably lived in Southeast Asia and made far less than our minimum wage—they wouldn’t earn that all year.

Show me a working definition of fairness, equality, or justice that tolerates this discrepancy in income and privilege. Tell me whose autonomy is being violated.

Keep in mind, I’m not mad at Shaq for cashing in. Diesel won three championships for my team not too long ago, and we remain close to this day.

I’m furious, however, with the idea that his autonomy is somehow eroded just because he’s forced to don Armani and not Fubu…when he’s not even doing his job but nursing it…when he’s earning 11 Gs/minute for wearing pinstripes.

It seems to me that it’s the autonomy of all those hands who stitch Shaq’s shoes and mop his sweat that we ought to think about. The very fact it’s so easy to dismiss the regular-sized hands that make the NBA a product—the hands that don’t make it on TV, the ones that burn from the glues used in making the new ball, the hands that work other jobs after the tall guys go home and pussyfoot with personal chefs and valets—suggests that their autonomy is already at risk.

People died in the Superdome. But the autonomy of the guys who play in it is violated?

I wonder what the minimum age (and I mean age, not wage) for stitching Shaq’s shoes is. You think it’s high enough?

Watch a game on ESPN Classic tonight from 30 years ago. You’ll notice a difference from today’s game. Maybe the talent wasn’t as good then; maybe the players didn’t train as hard or jump as high.

But that’s not the only difference. It’s not even the most significant difference. The difference I notice has to do with the NBA as a product: the jerseys aren’t as glossy, the floor not as polished, the shoes don’t look new, the arenas aren’t as comfortable, the broadcast not as nice, the video games non-existent, the wives not entertained.

It’s the product that sells not the players. You take those same players from 30 years ago and put them in today’s product, and the NBA still sells. Why? Because most of the people buying it want the product, not the talent. That’s why the video games sell more than the stadiums.

Why wasn’t the NBA international in the ‘80s? Why weren’t people in China sporting Bird jerseys? Is it because Bird wasn’t as good as Dirk? C’mon now, you know better.

It’s because the product wasn’t as developed or as polished; the NBA didn’t look all that different from the YMCA in anything but talent. And talent doesn’t sell jerseys or make them. The product does.

As long as we’re talking about the NBA as a product, which we always are unless we’re strictly talking talent (and television is never about talent), then you have to talk about all the hands that help to create it. Therefore, the conversation about player autonomy needs to begin with—or at least include—the autonomy of the people who make all the shit the NBA sells: from jerseys and jackets, to popcorn and Pepsi.

Shaq doesn’t make $11,300 per minute played unless someone is stitching his shoes for nothing. Remind me again about the dress code.

I wonder how many hands fit inside Shaq’s left shoe. Is their annual labor the same value as Shaq’s labor per minute? Is their autonomy bought with rookie wage scales? Are these questions even humane?

Tell me I’m wrong, Professor.

Stirred, Not Shaken

Wow! This has been quite the exchange for a still-green blog like ours. I’m excited that seasoned blog vets and busy people like Michael McCann and True Hoop’s Henry Abbott took the time to respond. It’s great when basketball fans move outside the box, and box scores, to discuss meaningful issues that fall below the usual hardwood radar. To me, our conversation thrills more than any regular “who’s-the-next-Jordan” debate, and I’m thankful the Internets act like techno-bartenders and help to facilitate our discussion in arenas beyond where the usual debates are confined. In the spirit of bartenders, I’d like to clink glasses again and continue our conversation by offering a response to the responses. Call it a meta-response on player autonomy but don’t try whistling at the same time.

I want to begin with the last point McCann makes, mostly because True Hoop also took issue with it. Both disagree with the following comment I made in my review of McCann’s article: “I find it off-putting to employ the discourse of labor rights in a conversation about multi-million dollar athletes. I prefer to save the efficacy of that language for underpaid blue-collar laborers, undocumented immigrants, and sex workers—just to name a few.”

True Hoop responds by writing, “There is not a rate of pay that makes exploitation OK. Wrong is wrong, and if it's wrong for an employer to test an employee's DNA, then it's wrong for the Bulls to test Eddy Curry's DNA, right?”

Well, sort of. I agree that exploitation is exploitation no matter which way the cheese is dealt. And I’m wrong to suggest that articulations of labor rights should be saved only for certain workers—as though labor rights were somehow like oil and in danger of running out if used too extravagantly.

That said, I also believe exploitation takes many different forms, and it doesn’t always mean the same thing. Exploitation, like autonomy, is situational, I suppose. For example, if my boss demanded I drop and give him twenty, I’d phone the EEOC; Eddy Curry probably wouldn’t. If my boss demanded celibacy, I’d cry foul; for others, celibacy is merely the flipside of living closer to God.

Which is all to say, I don’t think it’s necessarily wrong to test Curry’s DNA just because it’s wrong to test the DNA of telemarketers or cabbies or cat-sitters. The distinction here is the crux of McCann’s argument about the dress code, right? It’s why some in the sports world petition to wear suits and others protest them.

McCann responds to my point about labor rights by writing, “You are basically saying that the fact that these guys make a lot of money means their autonomy is not really a concern for you. Aren’t they still people or do they somehow become less human because they make a lot of money?”

Definitely still people, Professor—on that much, we agree.

In fact, I agree with you on the other point as well: the autonomy of NBA players isn’t really a concern for me. Luckily for them, it doesn’t have to be. The millions they make means they have access to resources most of us do not. These resources include lawyers, justice advocates, foundations, academics, Al Sharpton, the mainstream media—you name it.

What bothers me is that those folks most in danger of being exploited (e.g., blue-collar laborers, undocumented immigrants, sex workers, etc.) are also the people who lack the resources to prevent their exploitation. They don’t even have assistant coaches or trainers or ball boys, let alone legal counsel. That’s the reason why I think it’s socially irresponsible to discuss the labor rights of multi-million dollar athletes without considering the human rights of people on minimum wage.

McCann also asks, “is it their wealth as much as who they are that bothers you: would you feel the same way about Bill Gates as you do about Allen Iverson?”

Yes, I do feel the same way about Bill Gates—billions of times more so, in fact. That much wealth in the hands of one person, whether Paul Allen or Malik Allen, irritates me to no end. Frankly, I’m surprised you don’t agree with me.

The autonomy of all of us is eroded when wealth is distributed unequally, Professor, especially in a country where health care is directly tied to how much money you make. Fixing the problem is structural (which is why Gates and the NBA can donate so much cash and so many sneakers, and still dissatisfy me), of course, but it also demands that Gates and Iverson take pay-cuts.

Next time you’re in Los Angeles, Professor, take a ride by the old Forum in Inglewood. Don’t you think there are material connections between the spectacular economy of the Showtime Lakers and Inglewood’s economy of unemployment and blight? My man Magic knows this. Cassius realized and became Muhammad. Even Iverson has come to understand.

As much as I root for the Lakers, I save my advocacy for those who don’t play under lights. You dig?

McCann also corrects me by saying that his statistics were verified by the dudes in suits at ESPN. Fair enough. I care more about the stats of my fantasy basketball team anyway.

As for McCann’s definition of the term “autonomy,” well, it still remains hazy (or “amorphous,” as McCann puts it). I suppose it has to for his argument to have traction.

McCann cites another example of the erosion of player autonomy in his response: the rookie draft. To be fair, I’ll quote the paragraph in full before I respond: “First off, consider that some would argue the draft itself is an infringement on player autonomy. Players have to play for a particular team in a particular city, neither of which they may like, and the only alternative would be to play minor league hoops or play in Europe; it’s like being a law student at UCLA and planning to practice in L.A., but then there is a law firm draft and you get picked by a law firm in Bismarck North Dakota, and have to stay there for at least four years or you can’t practice law in the U.S. (or at least practice law in the U.S. without having to give up 95% of your salary). For related commentary on this, check out Alan Milstein’s post Reggie Bush Sweepstakes from last December.”

If I follow his point correctly, the fact some players call Staples home while others are forced to live near Charlotte is proof the players are losing their autonomy. Dude, you stagger me.

Many high-profile jobs require that employees live in certain areas. For instance, if a college student from Bismarck really wants to work in publishing, he’ll probably have to say goodbye Dakota, hello New York. That’s the breaks. Part of choosing a profession requires decisions like these. I’m guessing most ballers decide early on that the perks of cheerleaders and paychecks outweigh the bummers of relocation. Autonomy has nothing to do with it.

When we choose career paths, we also make decisions about the desirability of the lifestyle (sorry, I hate that word too) that comes with the job. That’s why not everyone with charisma and smarts wants to be a law professor. And not everyone with size wants to be a bodyguard or a cop.

Ideally, I suppose, we’d all have our choice of profession, region, dress code, wage, and qualifications. It kind of just seems like that’s not really possible, no? And if it is, Scalabrine’s contract probably isn’t moving us any closer, right? Might even be setting us back.

McCann’s argument about the erosion of autonomy implies that all social contracts reduce the autonomy of those who enter into them. McCann would have us believe that signing million-dollar deals doesn’t realize or empower player autonomy but erodes it. I find that difficult to believe. Just as Ben Wallace knew about Skiles’s rules before he signed with the Bulls, athletes know about Stern’s when they declare their dreams.

Yes, Marcus Camby might hate wearing a suit, and sure, he didn’t bargain for it when he picked up the ball long ago. But, wearing a suit to work doesn’t mean he’s up against the Leviathan—especially with $9.3 mil in his double-breasted pockets.

Question: How many sweatbands must an NBA athlete buy before he goes bankrupt?
Answer: I’m more concerned with the people in sweatshops making all of those sweatbands.

Aren’t you?

Michael McCann and Player Autonomy

Sports attorney and law professor Michael McCann writes for the Sports Law Blog, a fascinating website devoted to “all things legal related to the sports world.” A graduate of the University of Virginia law school, a former visiting professor at Harvard, a member of Maurice Clarett’s legal counsel, and a current professor of law at Mississippi College, McCann is a distinguished young attorney and outspoken scholar of sports law, torts, and social psychology. His research is primarily concerned with the cognitive and social causes that influence popular beliefs about professional athletes. In the past, he's been most vocal about his support of players who jump from high school to the NBA.

Following a tip from Henry Abbott at True Hoop, I dug into McCann’s recent article, “The Reckless Pursuit of Dominion: A Situational Analysis of the NBA and Diminishing Player Autonomy,” published in the University of Pennsylvania Journal of Labor and Employment Law (Summer, 2006). Given that most bball junkies probably lack academic library access, and even more choose not to find their hoops buzz in scholarly journals, I thought I’d do the labor and offer my thoughts on McCann’s piece here.

McCann wants to argue that the last decade or so of NBA basketball has witnessed a steady erosion in player autonomy. McCann finds evidence for his argument in the 1995 implementation of a rookie wage scale, last year’s mandated dress code, the newly elevated minimum age for draft eligibility, and the Chicago Bulls decision to require that Eddy Curry undergo genetic testing (for heart disease) before signing him in the summer of 2005. All four measures, according to McCann, are indicative of the NBA’s insidious plan to control players and usurp their autonomy.

As far as I’m concerned, McCann’s article might be divided into two parts. The first part consists of his sophisticated analyses of the rookie wage scale, the dress code, and the minimum age for draft eligibility. The second part represents his use of these analyses to support an argument about limitations in player autonomy. Because I found the larger stakes of the article troubling—and I’ll discuss why toward the end—I want to tease out these separate parts, acknowledging the elements I believe praiseworthy while questioning those that came up short.

McCann is best when describing how the NBA manipulates the fans and sports media to support the policies the league implements. According to McCann, certain social “knowledge structures” and “cognitive biases” oversimplify complicated issues and lead to the production of inaccurate systems of belief. These belief systems ultimately make it easier for the NBA to usurp player autonomy by disguising the league’s policies as common sense.

For example, we tend to see the collective bargaining agreements of the Players Association—such as those that led to the rookie wage scale in 1995—as serving the best interests of all NBA players. Yet, for McCann, our faith in collectively-bargained rules represents an “attribution error,” or a failure to analyze the more nuanced and less-observable aspects of the negotiation process. McCann wisely points out that the players often affected most by these agreements are those without voice in the bargaining process—namely, the soon-to-be rookies themselves. Furthermore, because of the absence of viable alternative basketball leagues, McCann suggests, even those players represented in bargaining agreements are more likely to capitulate to league demands.

McCann also illuminates the subtle knowledge structures supporting the establishment of a dress code. The common association of hip-hop culture and delinquency helped to validate David Stern’s new dress code, first announced last summer. Hoping to cleanse the NBA of this thuggish appearance, Stern’s decision relied on simplified and erroneous assumptions about the morality of men in “street” clothes. Moreover, although the dress code emptied the players’ closets of hip-hop fashion, the league continues to approve of hip-hop-inspired halftime shows, videogames, and endorsement deals. The double standard went unrecognized in Stern’s announcements, not to mention his choir of yes-men in the media.

Similarly, the decision to raise the minimum age for draft eligibility depended on the unfounded belief that younger players are especially susceptible to nefarious activities. For the commish and many media commentators, college is necessary for teaching hardwood fundamentals, as well as for providing character-building life experience. To complicate this assertion, McCann not only proves that the most notorious NBA players (guys like Spree, Ruben Patterson, and “Mighty Mouse” Stoudamire) were in fact four-year college graduates, but also indicates how college athletes often fail to receive the education experience Stern believes is promised them.

By and large, I am impressed by McCann’s analysis of the underside to the rookie wage scale, the dress code, and the elevated minimum age. His reading of the implications in Curry’s mandated genetic testing is also very impressive, though too lengthy for me to detail here. Let it suffice to say that genetic testing raises a host of difficult ethical questions the NBA is not yet equipped to deliberate.

While I approve of McCann’s evidence, as well as the way he interprets it, I am bothered by his argument about the diminution of player autonomy. First, I'm forced to bang my academic gavel on the term around which his entire argument pivots—autonomy. McCann never defines what he means by autonomy yet gets considerable truck from the concept.

At times, McCann’s notion of autonomy seems synonymous with something like self-determination (admittedly, just as vague). At other moments, the word suggests more material freedoms, like personal expression and the right to work. However, these are all very different ways of imagining autonomy. For instance, the exercise of self-determination might actually result in a willful decision to undercut one’s autonomy. The defense of right-to-die legislation works with ideas of self-determination and autonomy in precisely this manner. In this light, the two are hardly synonymous.

Without a concept like autonomy clearly defined—though so crucial to his article—McCann’s argument is able to bend in a number of ludicrous positions. If freedom of expression and the right to work are all that’s at stake, I wonder why McCann stopped with the dress code and age requirement. When the Knicks go small and bench Curry, doesn’t that decision usurp his autonomy? What if they bring in Kelvin Cato only to foul Shaq? Would that constitute the erosion of Cato’s autonomy? More appropriately, is Coach Skiles’s prohibition on headbands a violation of Ben Wallace’s autonomy? It certainly violates his freedom of expression. What about alternate road jerseys if players prefer their standard away threads?

Second, McCann benefits from some statistical sleight-of-hand. At one point, for example, McCann writes, “objective data suggests that prep-to-pro players outperform other NBA players. In fact, they average more points, rebounds, and assists than does the average NBA player or the average player of any age group.” I think it’s fair to call this a dubious statistic, not only because McCann cites his own research to prove it. There has to be some way of adjusting these averages to account for sample size; otherwise, the disproportionately high number of players with some college experience dilutes the averages in question. Furthermore, McCann neglects to indicate whether his prep-to-pro numbers include the Ndubi Ebis and TajMcDavids of the world—high school blue-chippers who, after declaring for the draft, saw little to no time in the NBA. Similar trouble with statistical manipulation (either specious numbers or inappropriate contexts) runs throughout the article.

Lastly, I want to ask McCann what is gained by acknowledging the erosion of player autonomy, if such a thing can even be said to exist. How might the problem be amended? If he means merely to encourage a more nuanced recognition of the knowledge structures influencing league decisions, why bring in terms like autonomy and “labor harmony”? If higher salaries are an answer to autonomy usurpation, isn’t there something socially irresponsible at work in McCann’s argument?

Do corporate CEOs experience a loss in autonomy when whistle blowers uncover corruption? Was Martha Stewart’s autonomy violated by the outing of her insider deals? What, in other words, prevents the application of McCann’s argument to these more disturbing spaces and cases of high profile employment?

I do not mean that McCann advocates for law breakers and criminals. Instead, I want only to express why I find it off-putting to employ the discourse of labor rights in a conversation about multi-million dollar athletes. I prefer to save the efficacy of that language for underpaid blue-collar laborers, undocumented immigrants, and sex workers—just to name a few.

Although McCann successfully demonstrates the complexity of issues like the rookie wage scale, the dress code, and the minimum age requirement, he ends on terms I cannot endorse. Fortunately, the NBA and its players aren’t hurting for endorsements.

Thus Spake Isiah

"We haven't been patient enough force-feeding the post," former Pistons Bad Boy and current Knick coach Isiah Thomas whined after last night’s road roasting of the Celtics. "Tonight, our post-patience play was very good."

Force-feeding? Post-patience play? Does Isiah have the foggiest clue what he’s doing? Can you imagine any other coach using a phrase like post-patience play?

Doesn’t it feel like the Knicks have traded places with the cast of Saturday Night Live? That they aren’t really a basketball team but just play one in a Christopher Guest movie?

Some of their players don’t even look like athletes. Eddy Curry (pronounced almost like "Calorie"), for one, and Quentin Richardson, for another, look more like guys impersonating athletes. These men remind me of bloated has-beens, still ruling the playground courts with their oversized bodies and monumental sweat. I once saw Curry called for two charges in the same half-court set. I know it sounds like Kersey and Nies blew the call, but once you’ve seen Curry play (I'll take the poetic license), it makes sense.

The irony of the Knicks this season is that they are actually the perfect team for New York. The squad is stuffed with stubborn individuals, too marooned in their own feisty self-reliance to acknowledge they work in the same place. It’s like Isiah fell in love with boy-comes-to-the-big-city stories and tried to replicate the formula on the hardwood. He brought in different versions of the same diva. Steph, Franchise, Jalen (like other New Yorkers, he's wintering in Phoenix), Jamal, Q—they'd all prefer to have next in your local And-One game. Forget about screens, ditch the off-ball motion, and leave the boxing out for your restaurant’s leftovers.

There is no “I” in “team,” but there are far too many in “Isiah’s.”

His best five come off the bench:
PG: Nate Robinson (the only player worth watching on the Knicks)
SG: Jamal Crawford (one of the quickest crossovers in the game)
SF: Renaldo Balkman (who resembles Humpty from Digital Underground a little)
PF: David Lee (game like Cedric Ceballos)
C: Channing Frye (sidelined for 3 to 6 with an ankle roll)

The only thing that might make the Knicks worse is if Clyde Frazier announced their games, and, alas, he already does. The other night against Denver, he referred to Marcus Camby as one of the best “block shotters” in the game. Repeatedly.

Block shotters? Post-patience play?

New Yorkers love a good joke, but this one harldy seems practical!

Mr. Answer Man

In a post-Heisenberg world, there are few questions with certain answers. Is she a woman? Would you like red or white? Are those real? We’ve all been asked questions like these—sent stumbling before their uncertain answers.

I thought I’d offer my list of the five most reliable questions—that is, questions with the simplest answers. They just don’t come any easier.

1. Can I tell you a secret? Show me someone who doesn’t like hearing secrets, and I’ll show you a liar. Secrets might be the reason people get married. They are certainly one reason we get divorced. Hearing another person’s secret helps us feel more human, more in touch with the closet mysteries of others. If nothing else, secrets help us feel superior to other humans. At the cutting edge of someone else’s secret is a competition you can’t lose. Consequently, the answer is always “yes, tell me.”

2. Do you want to go upstairs? No brainer. Wishing you had said “no” is infinitely better than regretting you didn’t answer “yes” – unless, of course, the person asking is Shawn Kemp and you want “upstairs” to include child support.

3. Can I buy you a drink? Tough call on this one. I’ve heard reasons why “no” is a possibility. You might be too pickled to stomach another; too married to accept cocktails from strangers; too loyal to drink with your best friend’s sister (read: too boring, not loyal). But that’s not really what’s at stake with this question. Someone is offering to give you something, and though there may be strings attached, they’re only fastened with Velcro. Just say yes.
   

4. Did you think you were going the speed limit? Other derivations of this question include, “How fast did you think you were going?” and “Do you know the speed limit in this area?” It makes no difference. The answer is either “yes” or “the speed limit.” Why would you respond otherwise? Nothing is gained by answering “no, I thought I was speeding.”

5. Do I know you? If you’re answering “no” to this question, you lack imagination. And even if you lack imagination, just memorize a few possible responses to the question. You might try, “It depends. Do you watch much porn?” How about, “No, but I know your wife” (add an elbow jab to accent “know”). Or, “Dad, I think it’s time for your pill.”
   

Have fun and be safe.

Yours,

TJ

More Klum(s)

The second piece of proof that Seal isn't too, well, endowed is upon us. On Wednesday Heidi gave birth to the couple's second child, Johan Riley Fyodor Taiwo Samuel. He joins their first, Henry Günther Ademola Dashtu Samuel. (You know, just so the kids have options.) Seal announced the birth on his website, paying his wife the highest of compliments:

"She is so good at having babies, I feel so blessed and fortunate to have a wife like her"

Yup. Just another reason to be thankful for Ms. Klum.

TGB