Between LeBron, Chris Paul, and practically everyone else in the NBA any time there’s a trade of any significance, I’ve come to a strange conclusion: I’m sick of hearing about championships.
I don’t mean to say that I believe NBA players shouldn’t be thinking about winning or trying to win. By their very nature, every professional athlete should be wired to compete, to dominate, to conquer. If they’re not, they should be making their living doing something else instead.
My problem is with the way championships are now perceived. From what I can tell, the title of every professional sport has become a check box—something that every player with an eye toward his legacy believes he must be able to mark off. If not, the thinking is that the player automatically becomes second-rate.
Since it’s always the default comparison in this case, just consider the difference between how Charles Barkley (off-court issues aside) and MJ are perceived. Barkley’s empty ring fingers seem to have made him a cautionary tale to every pro basketball player of subsequent generations. Yet, during his career, Chuck was an absolute monster. If you don’t believe me, check his stats—and keep in mind while you’re doing it that he was putting up those numbers at power forward while standing a mere 6’-6”.
Unfortunately, the first thing that comes to mind at the mention of Chuck’s name is the glaring lack of a championship on his resume. Now, players like LeBron, Chris Paul, and everyone else born after 1980 look at Barkley like the poster child of some kind of pro basketball “Scared Straight” campaign. (“Don’t lift the Larry O’Brien trophy, and you’ll end up like him!”)
Championships have somehow become the be-all, end-all in every sporting discussion. There’s an entire segment of the population that believes the “Kobe vs. LeBron” discussion is idiotic simply because LeBron is ringless. Therefore, how can he even be considered in the same breath as Kobe Bryant, 5-time champion?
As a result, the possibility of potentially doing something historic, of assuming greater risk for the possibility of greater reward, has become irrelevant. There is nothing—not loyalty, not an emotional connection to a place or a fan base or teammates—as important as a championship. Because without one, what are you, really?
This, I believe, is the primary motivator behind the power moves this generation’s superstars are now pulling. LeBron willing to go to Miami to play a supporting role to Wade? Better than not winning a championship. Chris Paul making every effort to burn the sports fans of one of the most unique and real-life ill-fated cities in the country? At least he won’t be the failure who could never win the Finals.
This isn’t necessarily the fault of the young players themselves. It’s the inevitable result of how we as a sporting culture have set our priorities. In team sports, the teams are obviously made up of individuals. Especially in the case of baskestball, where only 5 men are on the court for a team at any given time, the impact of a single player can be enormous. At the same time, no player is ever alone on the court, so pinning the ultimate success or failure of the team on one person is inherently illogical.
There’s a paradox at work, too, because we certainly honor individual greatness. But in a bizarre way, we respect the individual’s impact so much that his team’s failures become the individual’s fault. It’s even evident in the language when we discuss this topic. Very seldom do we say “Charles Barkley’s Suns never won the title.” We simply say, “Charles Barkley never won the title.” After all, why skirt around the damnation by acknowledging reality?
This is why I’m disappointed in Chris Paul’s trade demands, and in LeBron’s decision to merge with a rival rather than try to knock him out. On some level, I feel like those guys are surrendering. They would rather diminish their own greatness, the possibility of what *could* happen, for what they believe is a guarantee that they’ll be able to check off the championship box. They’re playing it safe—and doing it partially because we’ve all made them believe that that’s the only thing that matters.
It’s also why part of me wants to defend Mo Williams, who begged not to be traded because Cleveland has become his home and he believes the Cavs can get it done; or Byron Scott, who took the Cavs’ coaching job without any security that the team would be a contender next year. For all their other faults, these are men who believe in something greater than popular opinion. They understand that there are possibilities but no guarantees. (As Shaq said this past year, “I won four championships. Three of them? Lucky as hell.”) And above all else, they have values or desires that exceed catering to the fans and analysts and past greats blinded by jewelry. They stand for something.
I wish I could say the same for more of the players who make my favorite sport run.
-T
