On A New Venture (Of Which I Am A Small Part)...

You may peruse details here, if that kind of thing interests you.

On LeBatard, LeBron and the Media

Dan LeBatard has always struck me as a smart guy, and an excellent writer. I even enjoy his loopy persona on Pardon the Interruption. I appreciate his general tendency toward contrarianism in the face of the journalistic orthodoxy. That said, this column is a bit of a scattered mess. First off, what's been real about Barry Bonds since, say, 1991? Second, the reason Chad Ochocinco forms "his own media" is because he is an inveterate self-promoter, and the Internet presents him with the opportunity to form that media.*

Third, Chad Pennington did not lecture the New York tabloids about "fairness"; he lectured them about what a privilege it was to cover the New York Jets, and that they should treat such a privilege with respect, mostly because they were criticizing Pennington for playing poorly at a crucial time of the season. This is New York; this is what the tabloids do. Fourth, Isiah Thomas complaining that articulate athletes like Bill Russell and Jim Brown and Muhammad Ali could never survive in today's media world seems to ignore the fact that much of the sports media in the late 1960s was not only far more conservative, but at least in some cases, overtly racist. Every one of those athletes did have to deal with widespread condescension, even if the media wasn't quite as saturated with the sheer number of opinions as it is today; to say otherwise seems disingenuous, at least to me.

Now I understand--and I agree with--LeBatard's larger point: That the general tenor of media is coarser and meaner than it's ever been**. Most of that has to do with the acceleration of the news cycle, with the proliferation of news outlets and "news outlets"--with, in fact, the same lack of a professional filter that allows athletes like Ochocinco to essentially report on themselves without independent verification. It works both ways: If an athlete wants to shape his own brand, if an athlete refuses to permit any independent access to his world, if he expects us to form an opinion of him through a series of television commercials and publicist-written "blog posts," then he has to expect that the media's judgment of him will be harsher when he strays from that company line. This is exactly what happened with Tiger, of course--the last time we'd heard anything remotely real from him, he was telling dirty jokes to Charles P. Pierce a decade ago--and this is now what's happening with LeBron James.

The other day, LeBron tweeted that he was now keeping "mental notes" about those who had spoken poorly of him. This, of course, has long been the modern strategy for parrying media criticism, whether deserved or undeserved: You invent an enemy, you blame the haters, and then, when you succeed, you lash out at your imaginary blacklist. It's a way of motivating yourself, but it's also a way of denying the fact that there may be a legitimate basis for people finding some of your decisions specious. That's where LeBron's lost his way, and that's really the problem with LeBatard's column, too: He buried some legitimate criticisms under a blanket of condemnation. 

*Though LeBatard is half-right here; the media, and the sports media especially, inexplicably tends to lump harmless goofballs like Ochocinco in with convicted criminals. Twenty-five years from now, I guarantee we'll be looking back with nostalgic wonder at T.O. and Ochocinco and all those self-centered but otherwise harmless products of the Twitter generation. As someone who spent the past several years engaging in Jim McMahon-based nostalgia, I know of what I speak.

**LeBatard also claims sports journalism is now "dumber," but I'm not sure I can completely agree with that. It's just that the best sports media is far smarter than it's ever been, and the worst of what passes for sports media is far, far dumber. Speaking of which, Bill Simmons asked several intelligent questions of Mark Cuban a few years ago, which Cuban then turned into a referendum on how much SportsCenter anchors are paid. So it works both ways.

(Photo: Boston.com)

On the Great Biographical Narratives of 2030

I've never seen the movie Ali in its entirety. If ever there were a biopic that seemed unnecessarily redundant, it was this one, for not only is Ali the subject of perhaps the greatest sports documentary of all time, not only is Ali is the subject of one of the greatest sports books ever written* ... but even his opponents and contemporaries have been the subjects of transcendent literature, from Nick Tosches' intense biography of Sonny Liston to Gay Talese's sympathetic magazine profiles of Floyd Patterson. There was no need for an Ali biopic because Ali pulled into his wake some of the greatest non-fiction chroniclers of the 20th century. Fiction could not compare to the truth, especially when Jamie Foxx was involved.

In this age of miniscule attention spans, I find myself thinking about these kinds of things quite often. What are the stories that serve as metaphorical proxies for their era?** Will we still be discussing the sexual vagaries Tiger Woods in ten years, or will he slink back into a protective shell? Is this a truly meaningful moment in the national narrative, as Bill Simmons hypothesizes? Or did the shock of it all simply amplify its importance? It's too early to tell (though I'd probably lean toward Simmons at this point).

Anyway, here's my point: Certain athletes of this era seem representative of some larger issue, of an evolutionary or technological or societal tipping point. And it's not always the obvious people. So yes, in ten or twenty years, there are many excellent biographies I expect to read (or write) that might capture the Zeitgeist of the early 21st century. But here are the underdogs--if I were forced to sign a contract right now to write a biography in 2030 of an active athlete/coach who isn't Tiger Woods, LeBron James, or Kobe Bryant, these are some of the people I might choose:

1. Allen Iverson. Has there been a more polarizing moment in recent sports history than The Practice Speech? Iverson is the progenitor of a new era in the NBA, of the narrowing authoritarian boundaries between player and coach, of the age of personal expression. That he seems headed for the inevitable tragic fall only makes him that much more compelling.***

2. Donovan McNabb. Not just because of Rush Limbaugh, and not just because he possesses the most famously sensitive digestive system in NFL history--in a city with a checkered racial history, McNabb has come to represent the tribulations of the black quarterback in the modern age. He is an undeniably great player, and yet he is never quite good enough.

3. Peyton Manning/Tom Brady. It would have to be a dual biography, because it is already virtually impossible to separate the legacy of one from the legacy of the other. There is no better rivalry in the modern era. This is essentially Magic/Bird without the racial undertones.

4. Mark McGwire. Jeff Pearlman made a valiant effort to capture the soul of Barry Bonds a few years ago, but the problem is, Bonds doesn't appear to possess a soul. Of all the principles in the steroid era, McGwire still seems like the most sympathetic figure to me, more rent with guilt than any of the others. His return to baseball could prove either triumphant or tragic--I really don't know where it's going.

5. Rick Pitino. Because no one embodies the role of coach as slicked-up mercenary quite like Pitino. He was a trendsetter. Not to mention there's plenty of sex involved.

*I'm currently reading David Remnick's King of the World, which is also predictably excellent.
**One of the reasons I chose to write Bigger Than the Game (now available for pre-order!) is because Bo Jackson always felt, to me, like one of those people who transcended his era.
***I expect Steve James' 30 for 30 documentary on Iverson will be one of the highlights of the series.

On Kobe and Spike

I've always thought that even Spike Lee's failures tend to be relentlessly interesting, but I have to agree with the general assessment (made by Bill Simmons, among others) that Kobe: Doin' Work is both the dullest and the most uncomfortable film he's ever made. In case you missed the worldwide cable television debut, here is the idea: Spike chases Kobe around for a day, toting a phalanx of cameras, gaining unprecedented access to a locker room full of teammates who seem highly amused by this whole notion, and then Kobe steps in months later (on the night of his 61-point explosion against the Knicks at the Garden) to provide voice-over narration, detailing his thoughts and insecurities and quantum theories during a blase regular-season victory over the San Antonio Spurs. In other words, it is ninety minutes of Kobe "encouraging" his teammates by displaying an embarrassingly high-octane level of enthusiasm, ninety minutes of Kobe droning on about execution and laughing hollowly his at his own jokes, ninety minutes of Kobe reinforcing his perceived place as Phil Jackson's intellectual equal. At one point, he actually begins diagramming defensive rotations on a whiteboard. At another moment, Kobe lovingly declares that he and Jackson are kindred spirits because they "both love basketball, and we both love details."

Such are the psychic revelations of Kobe: Doin' Work.

I presume that this was Spike's attempt to craft a strictly technical film about the game he loves, a profile of a man in his element, sort of a documentary version of John McPhee's classic book-length profiles of Bill Bradley and Arthur Ashe. There is, in fact, no discussion of Kobe's background, or of his experiences outside of basketball, except for some platitudes about his children; as with every other attempt to understand Kobe, it is impossible to ignore the glaring omission of a single event that continues to define him, more than anything else, despite his best efforts to distract us.

Still, Spike had an intriguing idea--a thorough dissection of the complexities of a single NBA game through the eyes of its best player, an attempt to capture Kobe Being Kobe. The problem is that Kobe refuses to reveal himself in any way that even seems remotely real. His persona is either A.) laughably contrived or B.) completely hollow. At times, it is vaguely Batemanesque.* It is almost as if he is trying to make his public self as boring as possible, as if this will somehow negate the sins of his past. There are ways to get at this, to peel beneath those layers and reveal what is perhap the strangest superstar arcs of our time (as Mike Sager did here), but this is not that movie. This is ninety minutes of extremely unsettling small talk, ninety minutes of a man who would clearly prefer it if we just loved him for being Kobe. Whatever the hell that is.

*Though let me make clear: I do not think Kobe is a serial killer. Nor do I believe he is a fan of Phil Collins' solo career.

(Photo: Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE/Getty Images/ESPN the Mag)

On the Tao of LeBron

I don't watch much NBA regular-season basketball. I'm not sure who does, with the exception of David Stern, Bill Simmons, Jack Nicholson and my friends at Slam magazine. Me? If I'm going to spend an hour absorbing something mindless and haphazard, I prefer Chris Matthews.

For the most part, the NBA regular season is a frustrating and defeatist exercise: It is 10 incredibly muscular and athletic men engaging in a glorified rec center pick-up game for 40 minutes, before 2 or 3 of the best dudes on each side choose to actually pick up their feet and play defense and engage in isolated games of one-on-one down the stretch. Sometimes, this lethargy carries over to the playoffs, which explains why one team can suddenly make up a 28-point deficit in the course of seven minutes. In no sport I can think of is the lack of effort such a glaringly obvious--and tacitly accepted--part of the game.

I don't think LeBron James can change this entire culture by himself. But I watched the Cavaliers dismantle the Hawks last night, and what was enlightening about it--what feels different (and strangely disconcerting) about watching the Cavaliers play--is that they actually seem to be playing hard all the time. They chase after loose balls. They throw the extra pass. They take charges (even LeBron, who saved what would have been an otherwise simple alley-oop dunk by stepping in on the passer at the last possible moment). "If the newly crowned MVP is willing to hit the court [and that often hurts] like an undrafted free agent trying to make the team -- it tells everyone else to follow his lead," wrote Terry Pluto. "Later in the first half, 7-3 Zydrunas Ilgauskas hit the court twice for loose balls. Remember, this is the same Ilgauskas who had five foot surgeries in his career."

I think that's what could wind up being most unique about the Age of LeBron (which certainly feels as if its glorious arrival is upon us). More than any other player in the modern history of basketball--moreso even than Michael Jordan--LeBron has a way of making his teammates care, of eliciting the kind of effort that seems almost anachronistic. Jordan accomplished this by being a taskmaster--and often, by being an absolute jerk--but we accepted this, because this was Michael's way, and it worked for him.*

But with LeBron, these things occur organically, given his natural tendency to pass before shooting, given his genial (and often outright goofy) persona. He can be dominant and still somehow be utterly likeable. I'm not sure if we've seen anyone like that in the modern age, with the possible exception of Magic Johnson. And--while I hope against hope that LeBron will somehow be powerful enough to cajole his peers, as well as the next generation of Lil LeBrons, into revolutionizing the NBA--I'm not sure we will ever see anything like this again.

*Kobe, of course, came of age the Era of Jordan, and therefore mimicked Jordan's domineering style. This is why Kobe was not very likeable, even before that, um, thing happened.