Long Live the King…of Hype

I have never hidden my dislike for the National Basketball Association.

I could devote an entire blog to all of the issues I have with the NBA (rest assured I will not). At the end my biggest issue is that the NBA to me is all about hype and glitz and very little about basketball. I think that’s intentional. How do you market basketball when the quality of play is so poor league wide? How do you market basketball in a league where two franchises have won more than 50% of the titles and only seven have won a title in the last 30 years?

The basketball world may marvel at the supreme athletic talents of the NBA players but they also scoff at the brutal lack of fundamentals. There are many great players in the NBA but few true winners. It seems that the only way you win in that league is to find one of the few superstars who truly cares more about winning then about money and fame. Say what you want about Kobe Bryant but the fact is the man is a winner. So is/was Jordan, Shaq, Tim Duncan, and Dwayne Wade. Sadly, there are far too few others in that category.

Which brings us to the NBA’s self proclaimed King…Lebron James. The King represents everything I have come to hate about the NBA, never more so then during his one hour, look at me, feed my ego, buy my products melodrama on the ENTERTAINMENT and sports network last night (which for the record, I refused to watch).

I used to refer to Terrell Owens as the Paris Hilton of sports. That’s because the ENTERTAINMENT and sports networks chronicled his every word and deed…for no particular reason. It was always pointless, self indulgent garbage that had little or nothing to do with sports. It was train wreck journalism based on a troubled, overrated, overhyped case study in insecurity who was best known for ripping his own teammates?

I will not insult James to that level because unlike T.O., I do think he’s one of the most supremely gifted athletes on the planet. He is unquestionably a great player. At the same time, I often wonder why a player who has never won a championship and in fact has never come close garners this much fame and attention? What it comes down to is that much like T.O. and Paris Hilton, Lebron is famous because everyone tells us Lebron is famous.

The NBA along with it’s willing co-conspirator at the ENTERTAINMENT and sports network has spent the last 8 years convincing us that Lebron is the next all time great player in the history of sports. They have forced the Lebron hype machine on us since his senior year of high school. In the meantime, his Cleveland teams have underachieved the last few years and he’s been accused of quitting in key playoff games.

Seriously, why is Lebron so much more famous than Dwayne Wade? Both are gifted players but Wade has won and NBA title and nearly dragged Marquette to an NCAA title (plundering Pitt along the way). Why is everybody so worried and focused about Lebron but Wade is an afterthought? Maybe Wade should have gotten the one hour special. For that matter, why is Lebron so much more famous than Kobe; a signature star who plays in Los Angeles…AND WINS.

I truly believe it’s because the NBA hype machine, along with the ENTERTAINMENT and sports network, wish it to be so. And the sporting public eats it up. Adding to the frenzy is that Lebron seems more than willing to soak in the glory, even without benefit of a championship.

For the last few years, I have complained about the NHL’s overhyping of Sidney Crosby. I think it has done more harm than good for Sid because it goes a long way towards why he is so hated in other NHL cities. If you watch any nationally televised game (assuming you count Versus as national television), especially on NBC or TSN (in Canada), you will hear announcers fawning over every pass Crosby makes like it’s the greatest in NHL history. They will wax poetic about his leadership and how he is the driving spirit of the Penguins, etc, etc.

After watching the Lebron-athon, I will never again complain about Sid. Even the ritualistic summer Brett Favre watch, including the obligatory Rachel Nichols live story from Favre’s driveway, pales in comparison to this debacAL.

There are two differences between Sid (and to a lesser degree Favre) and Lebron. First, Sid goes along with this because he’s forced to, not because he wants to. He is will aware of the constant need to market and push the NHL, a league which does not have Stuart Scott belting out over the top promos 24/7. I honestly believe if given the choice, Sid would just assume avoid all of this and just play hockey. He probably envies Geno for his silent Bob mime routine that has worked for 4 years.

In contrast, Lebron seems to love and accentuate every minute of it.

The other difference is that Sid actually has earned the praise. He’s won the Stanley Cup, been to the finals twice, and scored the gold medal winning goal while captaining the Canadian Olympic team. And he works his rear end off every day, and truly is a fantastic, team oriented leader.

I’ll go a step further and remind people that Brett Favre did win a Super Bowl and played in two. And the man has started 8,000 straight games and is still starring at age 40 in the most gruelingly physical sport on earth.

In contrast, Lebron has sold shoes and soft drinks and been dunked on by a high school player.

I will not hide from my growing bitterness towards the NBA. It never ceases to amaze me that people prefer that game to hockey. Hockey players, especially in the playoffs, play every shift like its life and death. They fight through injuries that would keep most of us in bed for weeks. They support their teammates and throw everything they have into winning a championship. They get paid for their efforts but with the notable exception of Ilya Kovalchuk, appear to be far more interested in winning then they do in money.

In contrast, the NBA is a paycheck league. It is populated with me first superstars who care only about getting their “respect” (read, dollars). If you ever want to be truly enlightened about the NBA, I highly suggest reading Sam Smith’s famous book, The Jordan Rules, written about the 1991 Bulls. It chronicles a season of greed, selfishness, pettiness, and any number of other dysfunctional behaviors. And that was before the internet era and the me first aura of today’s NBA…on a team that was winning its first of six championships in 8 years. That was back when ESPN actually cared about sports. One can only imagine what goes on today with the Knicks.

It’s spurred on by a television network that once cared about sports but now cares only about sensationalism and hype. The ENTERTAINMENT and sports network devoted months of coverage, across its many media, to speculating on the end destination of a player who has never come close to a championship. It’s par for the course in a league where the games are the least important thing. And this gets shoved down our throats while hockey is flat out ignored.

In the end, that’s the main reason I can’t stomach the NBA anymore. I can not stand the fact that so many people pay attention to the crap, solely because ESPN tells them to. How can you not get interested when every Sports Center includes 30 minutes of interviews with so called “EXPERTS” all mindlessly speculating on Lebron’s end destination. How about the standard live cut-away to Shelly Smith in Cleveland explaining to us that Lebron did in fact meet with the Knicks and they even had lunch delivered?

And of course not a single relevant piece of information is delivered. Which ironically enough is irrelevant.

Imagine if ESPN devoted 10% of that effort to promoting hockey, instead of the garbage that is the NBA. And before you say that they are simply responding to the needs of the public, I remind you that they have been endlessly promoting the World Cup all summer. This to a country where probably 80% of the population could care less.

When Emily and I were sitting at dinner last night talking about where Lebron would sign, I realized just how powerful the ESPN brainwashing is. We don’t like the NBA, we could care less about Lebron, and we were talking about it. Somewhere, a program director was smiling.

I used to be amazed when Skip Bayless would rip James on a daily basis. I can’t stand Bayless, another ego maniacal idiot who never lets the facts get in the way of a good story, but with each passing day, he looks more and more correct on the King. Until James wins something, he’s nothing more than great talent and spectacular marketing. Of course, Bayless is one of 200 ESPN talking heads who are debating amongst other things, whether James is overhyped. And there for the grace of Mike and Mike go I.

The comparisons of James to Jordan are insulting. Jordan, for all his personal flaws, was maybe the most determined athlete of all time. The man had a single minded focus to win. I watched him carry an aging Bulls team to its 6th championship by the sheer force of his will and his uncanny ability to step-up in the highest pressure moments. James is what Vince Carter would be if he could stay healthy.

You may notice that I never mentioned where James actually signed. Why should I since that does not matter anyway. It was never about where James would sign; it was about speculating on where he MIGHT sign.

In the end, there really never was a story here, just manufactured sensationalism to fill dead summer air. This was about the so called King and his marketing crown. It was about the Lebron brand, not winning championships. It never was and never will be about basketball.