June 30th: Holding Out for a (Football) Hero

Hockey season is over. Basketball season is over. Too much of America is baseball illiterate. Which means it is officially time to start beating the football horse to death.

Training camp is right around the corner, and teams begin to get their first look at what the 2015 season will look like on the turf, as well as on paper. This is, of course, assuming the players show up.

Some don’t, you see. Some players are going through contract negotiations, and choose to sit out of training camps and workouts, in favor of holding out for a bigger contract. Some are worried about their health, and don’t want to hurt themselves during an active contract conversation. Others feel under-valued, and are going to remain off the field until they get what they believe they so rightly deserve.

Adrian Peterson tried the tactic, hoping to get traded by the Minnesota Vikings, a team he felt didn’t do enough for him while he was experiencing legal problems last season. Martellus Bryant, the Bears Tight End, stayed (loudly) away from optional mini camp, telling reporters that he was looking for a new deal. Dez Bryant, after being franchise tagged by the Cowboys, feels slighted that he isn’t able to provide for his family (yeah, he tweeted about how 13 million won’t cut it because, ya know, #Family1).

As a football player, you are being paid millions of dollars to play the sport you love. You sign a contract to play ball and come to practice, and are asked to do your job. For these men to refuse to play or participate because they are engaged in discussions for their NEXT contract is ridiculous. You have a job to do, and you should be executing on it.

If I were an executive for a day, I wouldn’t entertain the notion of a holdout. You want to take yourself off the field to get more money out of my team? Good luck with that. Teams should have no faith in a player who is willing to put his own paycheck ahead of the team that he is already under contract to play for.

You don’t see baseball players hold out. Baseball players talk contract during the off-season, then put it on hold from March to October. Hockey players and basketball players don’t hold out. They wait until the offseason to do their contract work. Sure, football is a more violent sport, with a much greater chance for injury, but that doesn’t change the fact that players know what they sign up for.

Even more importantly for the sports world: fans don’t hold out. You don’t get to stop going to work because you don’t think you get paid enough or don’t think you have enough job security. Go ahead and try it if you want; you’re going to get fired. Football players should be held to the same standard. You signed a contract to play football. So go play football. If not, don’t expect to play football later.

I understand the need to take care of one’s family, especially in a sport as violent as football. Football players have an average career length 3.3 seasons long (according to the NFL Players Association), so players have to do everything they can to line up their contract before injury catches up to them. That can’t come at the expense of the team dynamic, though, and should be all squared away by the time players are ready to take the field. If they aren’t, then it is time to play out the contract you have, and prepare for next off-season, when you can get the chance to look for a new one. Any player who holds his team hostage because he is unhappy with his current deal isn’t really aware of the way the business world works, and should not be expected to contribute to the team in a positive way.

Players are a vital part of the football experience, of course, and teams should be doing what they can to look out for the individuals that make the game what it is. That being said, the players need to remember that a contract is their agreement to be on the field when they are expected to be there, and should be honored, regardless of a desire to get a new, better one.

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March 5th - King of His Castle

LeBron James exploded on Monday night. A 61 point eruption, leading the Heat to a thumping of the Charlotte Bobcats, 124-107. This was his third game wearing the new facemask that protects his nose, which he broke in a contest earlier last week against the Thunder (a game in which he also was scoring at a prolific rate.

For much of this season, Kevin Durant has made a case for unseating LeBron James as the reigning MVP of the league. Druant’s own offensive exploits have led the Thunder to a top seed in the Western Conference, carrying the team while Russell Westbrook was out with an injury. The ever-secondary star is finally attempting to take what many believe to be his “rightful” spot alongside James as the best in the business.

That is, of course, until LeBron went off. He has scored 30 or more points in six of his last seven games, and is leading the Heat to another long win streak. For yet another season, James is launching the Heat into viable contention for their third straight championship, again despite the injuries that have caused missed time for Dwayne Wade.

LeBron has only won the scoring championship one time, in 2007-2008. Durant has won it 3 times. Carmelo Anthony has won one, Dwayne Wade has won one, Kobe Bryant has done it a few times. When looking at LeBron’s game, though, it is pretty easy to see why he may not be padding the stat-line: LeBron would rather win the ring than win the hardware.

In 2010, when LeBron James made a public spectacle of his decision to “take (his) talents to South Beach,” he made it very known that he was taking a little bit less money, instead favoring a chance at a championship. If James was interested in winning scoring titles, he would have stayed in Cleveland, where that is the only kind of champion that really belongs.

The NBA already suffers from a focus too much on players, rather than the success of a team or organization. This only makes the number of showboat players, looking to beef up their own personal record book (Carmelo Anthony is a perfect example) all the more prevalent. LeBron James doesn’t fit that mold. He is an all-around player who does what it takes to succeed. One night, he’ll lead the team in points. The next, he’ll be an assist machine, spreading things around.

No player is as explosive and purely entertaining as King James. No player is more influential to his team. No player can create a stat bio like James. There may be other players who excel at one element of the game in better ways, but it is the holistic playing experience that makes James a player without comparison.

The Most Valuable Player in the NBA is, has been, and will continue to be LeBron James. He doesn’t care about the hardware though. He is having too much fun playing the game to be focused on winning a personal award. He also has his eyes set on a much bigger prize: a third ring.

February 13th - Old News

Waking up in America, Olympic events are just wrapping up. Some events happen just as most Americans are getting up, but the majority are taking place while we sleep. To help keep us in the loop, NBC and its affiliates have been compiling the best of the competitions to be put on the air during the domestic primetime spot. This allows fans to get in on the action and catch up on what they may have missed.

This would be great if it weren’t for one problem: anyone who actually cares about the games already knows what happened. ESPN is well ahead on that issue, sending alerts and updates on most major Olympic events as they happen. Before I even have time to turn on the TV, I’ve already been updated on the night’s festivities.

The 24-hour news cycle that has become the standard no longer allows for the notion of “primetime television,” at least not in terms of rebroadcasting. If something is happening, the public wants to know about it as soon as it happens, not on a delay or after it has been compiled in a neat presentation afterward. What could be a neater package than 140 characters?

If you’ve ever watched a sporting event with real significance, though, you don’t need to be told what 140 characters fail to get across. You don’t get the pit in your stomach from the anxiety of seeing your team or favorite athlete put themselves on the line. You don’t feel the rush of joy when that athlete or team pulls away with the win. You don’t feel the confusion of a loss, and the disappointment that ensues. We might want to know what happened, but we live to see how it happened.

With that in mind, we’re pretty much stuck. How do we feel all of the excitement that comes with the Olympics, yet also get all the information as its happening on the other side of the globe?

There isn’t really a good answer. Nobody faults ESPN and the sporting world for getting us the news quickly. Quite the opposite. We would be upset if they didn’t. Yet NBC is also doing the best they can to get us the full package of the Olympic experience, and do it in the context of American life.

The reality is that the way different countries interact with the Olympics will have to change not only based on the location but also in conjunction with the technologies available. The days of watching suspenseful events on an American timeframe are over, leaving a few options.

One is, of course, to stay up late into the night or wake up ridiculously early to catch things as they happen. Nocturnal behavior isn’t usually recommended, but I’m sure your friends and colleagues would understand if you explained that you simply couldn’t miss the curling champions of the world (ok, maybe they’d judge you a little)

Short of that, though, some form of adaptation is going to have to happen, either by the consumer or by the producer. This year is one of the first where technologies are as easily accessible as they ever have been. Twitter and Facebook were hardly around in 2010, let alone as widely used as they are now. Maybe the change will come in the form of a new technology. Maybe we will find new ways of broadcasting to meet the changed expectations. Maybe the notion of “primetime” will change to reflect the new “news cycle.” This is still a young system, and one that has some work to do in working out the kinks. But, when all is said and done, the Olympics will hold our attention, and ESPN and NBC will find ways to keep it that way.