Basketball, it's a beautiful game full of beautiful egos and people. It's also full of talent, opinions, hot dogs, high socks, wrist bands, Championships, and life lessons!
In honor of Playdough (a Dallas native and huge Mavs fan)'s new CD, Hot Doggin', I bring you this post.
My topic today, Lebron James. Actually, let's start with 2006, shall we?! The Dallas Mavericks were playing the Miami Heat in the NBA Finals. Many of you probably remember this series. Dallas went up 2.99 games to 0 on the Heat. They won games one and two at home and had the Heat on the ropes in game 3, up big in the fourth quarter. DWade goes all sorts of crazy in that game in the fourth and the Heat came back to win that game and never look back in the series. The won the game and the Mavs became fodder for the writers. Dirk will never win. He's just a soft European. You can't win when your best player is a 7 footer who plays like he's 6-6. It got even worse in 2007 when the Mavericks became just the second 1 seed to fall to an 8 (1994 Nuggets anyone?). That's when it all came back down onto Dirk and the Digglers. Dirk was done, the Mavs just needed to start over and rebuild.
Fast forward to today. The Mavericks are the NBA Champions. Dirk is the second coming of Larry Bird. Tough as nails, never lets his team lose. Top 20 player of all time. Greatest import player in NBA history. The writers are all over him! After projecting his future as just another really good player who crumbled when the pressure came, the media is now hailing him as one of the greatest ever. He earned it for sure.
Now, Lebron. This guy came into the league with more hype than Flava Flav! The King, the Chosen One, we are all Witnesses, on and on and on. The media made him into the greatest player ever before he even played a game. You know why? Because he was/is a FREAK of nature. 6'8, 270 lbs, runs and jumps like Mike, fluid, unselfish, and he has, by and large, not let us down. I am NOT a Lebron apologist or hater. Actually, I think he could go down as the greatest player of all time. True story. Guess what, I still think he might.
True, he's got an ego and he's a bit of a hot dog at times. But year and year out, he is the best player in the NBA. The eye test says so, the stats say so, and the MVP voters usually do. So, why now is he Scottie Pippen? The media everywhere is writing this guy off like just another good player. Are you kidding me? Even people are saying, Jordan never would have let his team down in the fourth quarter. Yes he did! Jordan was 27 when he won his first championship. Lebron is 26. Jordan, who in my opinion is the greatest ever, was known early on as just a great scorer who would never win the big one. Ummm...the pundits were wrong.
I know that the writers and talking heads are paid to sell ads, but what happened to just reporting on what's going on?! Now a days, we expect these guys to play the prophet and pontificate on what's going to happen rather than what just did happen. Right now, the Mavs are the best team in the NBA. The Heat are close behind in second. Lebron played some bad games, Dirk played some great games. Does that mean that Lebron is a bum who will never win the big one? I don't think so. Did anyone see the Cavs play this year without him? He's' a special player who probably needed a shot of humility.
So, goodonya to the Mavs for playing well and jelling as a team. Goodonya to the Heat for playing hard and solidifying what I think will be a dynasty in the NBA. I love basketball, I love hip hop, I love hot dogs, and I love my kids. That birthed this post and this video.
The song is off Playdough's latest and greatest Hotdoggin' and my son is hooked on the CD
0 comments:
Post a Comment