I liked this post and decided to throw it everywhere.Please note: This isn't really about race. It's more about meatballs, Mark Eaton, and hot wiring an ATV for a joyous jaunt around rural Utah.
Race plays a big part in the perception of NBA players. This is so elementarily evident I learned it the tender age of six. My Dad and I went to Meijer to purchase a basketball pump for my flat sphere of rubber. The time must have offered a market boom in ball inflation as there were five different selections to choose from. I noticed one of them featured a caricature of Michael Jordan alongside a caricature of a white man in a Milwaukee Bucks uniform. I was an NBA expert, eager to rattle off the name, jersey number, and college affiliation of any playoff team, but had no idea who this goofy white man was.
Upon closer inspection it was Brad Lohaus. Brad fucking Lohaus. He of the career 5.9 career PPG was featured next to Michael Jordan, inspiration for the feature film "Michael Jordan: An American Hero" that I watched for fifteen minutes this morning. As a tangent: fifteen minutes of the film offered three scenes of Jordan crying.
Jordan had yet to vicariously break the hearts through mediums of Barkley and Malone so I was still a Jordan fan. His tongue waggling gave a good excuse for my drooling problem. I didn't have a muscular deficiency in my lower lip, I was just trying to be like Mike. My Dad, being the good father he was, instinctively picked the pump with Jordan on it. I told him to put it back. Not even children want any part of Lohaus.
As I grew up with the NBA I was forced to accomodate a series of big white stiffs that were shoved down my throat and marketed to embarassing excess. Shawn Bradley, Keith Van Horn, Christian Laettner, Big Country Reeves, Bobby Hurley, and an assortment of other caucasian ballers played the game with the fire of an accountant and cast a stigma upon white players that follows me to this day upon forays to the local basketball court.
Other players of Hispanic or African origins get compared to Kobe or Ginobilli upon making a great play. I played a dominant game on Wednesday, scoring eight baskets from all over the court. I blocked several shots, drove and dished, and even threw my fat frame into the lane for a stylish reverse layup. After threading an outlet pass the length of the court through two defenders, I felt like Karl Malone 1997 vintage edition.
"Nice pass Manning but save it for the Gridiron."
These backhanded compliments rub me the wrong way but I accepted it as I thought I was wearing my Detroit Dream Team shirt reading "Manning" on the back. Taking it off before the third game I realized the back said "Tomlinson" , leaving no connections to Peyton Manning beside my race and awkwardness.
No matter what the white player does he is being eliminated from the Great Narrative of the game. I can't blame this for happening. They receive undue amounts of praise for intangibles, poise, and solid help defense. I'm a huge supporter of Kevin Love. Minnesota is the perfect situation for him and I see him blossoming into an All-Star with Al Jefferson hiding his downfalls and McHale teaching him beautiful footwork. Still, Kevin Love is overhyped.
Held out hope for the Great White Hope builds mountains out of Kevin Love molehills. I can't delve into discussions of Love's game without first prefacing my unwillingness to discuss sociopolitical ramifications.
I don't know what determines who is hyped and who isn't but focus on white basketball players is usually piled on the wrong citiZens. Joe Alexander, come jump for us. Adam Morrison, come conjure the spirit of Larry Bird. White players get labeled as previous caucasian incarnates but these labels harm the game. Undue pressure on white players to become Bird, Nowitzki, or Stockton is lazily applied to any white player usually because of a silly haircut or similar background. Dan Dickau was touted as the next Stockton even though his abilities are that of a career 12th man.
If an undersized point guard with a glittering smile were to come out of inner city Chicago, there's no way in hell he'd be touted asthe next Isiah Thomas.
There is a double standard here. Players get extra credit that applies the same pressure faced by any of the failed "Next Jordans". Are you reading this Harold Miner? Are you there Jerry Stackhouse? Players of no remarkable ability are predestined to the heavens only to be quickly revealed to be nothing more than pretenders. However, idiotic implications of this were quickly realized as we save the Jordan label for the deserving (ie Kobe)
The full scope of this has made me tired of white basketball players as it produces a double double standard. White players only matter if applied with the "NEXT" label. There's a poor imitation of Bird every year. Imaginary Stocktons pass without notice. The result of this jades me from caring about any caucasian prospect this side of Walter Herrmannnnnn. This is not the crime as it is neccesary to lash out against the all-encompassing media, but when a good white player comes along, someoine special and different but lacking the distinction of being an heir apparent, we fail to take notice.
There is no such thing as underrated and overrated. I don't know who would rate these things, let alone give them creedence, but Tayshaun Prince would top most underrated lists. Tayshaun Prince, star of a perennial contender, Gold Medal winner, one of the most hailed players of his era. Tay, I love you, but you ain't underrated. People care, people watch, people listen.
Greg Ostertag.
Darko Milicic.
Jon Koncak.
Joe Klein.
Chris Dudley.
Paul Shirley.
Pat Burke.
Joel Pryzyzyzyzizizbilla
In my years of watching the league, the white center has been ingrained in my mind as the athletic equivalent of a yawn. They get dunked on, get red and silly looking when winded, and even when a white man excells in the post (a la Chris Kaman) they do so in the brute force of quiet servitude. 16, 14, and 3 blocks, never looked so workman like. In the rare case that a white center has some down home gumption or Yugo Street style (a la Brad Miller or Vlade Divac) it exudes peppered with enough passing game and jumpers from the 'bows to render them as ultimately irrelevant abberations. Even Mehmet Okur, paragon of pasty seven footers everywhere gets paid for jumpers.
Seeing a white center I look away from the screen. Give me Bynum (raw oozing potential), Horford (gusto in a sea of Dominican flags), or Dalembert (Haitian like Brock!)
It has taken some work. I glued my eye lids wide open as hour upon hour of Bill Laimbeer's greatest hits (literally and figuratively) flickered on screen and into my cerebral cortex. Post-brainwashing I am ready to remember the white center and welcome them back to the NBA. Congratulations guys, you're relevant!
Andris Biedrins and Spencer Hawes are playing the Center position as well as any young big this side of Young Thunder. It takes some getting used to, some adjustment, but if you open your mind you will see that these two play a very beautiful game. Hawes is maligned for Republican roots and Biedrins is ignored for being Latvian (long whither the Latvians), but between these two the role of the big white stiff is forever being vanquished. It is probably KG's influence ignoring racial boundaries to inspire big men every where, but I don't much care about the reasons. The rtwo are playing c0mplete games. They bang in the post, fulfilling the role of big man as they block shots and board but are till unsatiated with the million dollar contracts afforded to such role players. They take it a step further, ignoring the glass ceiling of Big White Stiffs as they evolve into complete players. Hawes shoots jumpers, Biedrins drives to the basket like a sixteen year old playing drunk for the first time.
Their current stat lines are as follows:
Biedrins: 35 minutes, 16.8 points, 14.8 rebounds, 1.7 Blocks, 1 Steal.
Hawes: 30 minutes, 13 points, 8 rebounds, 2.2 blocks, 1 Steal, and carries a parasol whenever he is outside.
I read an inordinate amount about the NBA and such publications are rife with the development and deployment of the next great big men. The focus is often on Andrew Bynum and Greg Oden. While Bynum is well on the way to All-Star Games and Oden is... supposedly nice. As highly touted bigs they deserve the attention but whither Biedrins and Hawes. They languish in near obscurity as no one can come to grips with the fact that a White Center may actually be good. Such a notion rocks the foundation of our basketverse.
Maybe it'd held if we labeled them. Henceforth: Hawes will be "Rik Smits on Adderall" and Biedrins will be "The Latvian Laimbeer". I know their games have absolutely nothing in common with Smits and Laimbeer but if it takes an idiotic labeling process to get them some attention so be it.
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