chapter four - my 30s
Great story on Azcentral.com about Shaq dedicating a reading centre to a Boys and Girls club.
Shaq has to be one of my favourite athletes! The guy went back to school, got an MBA and is - according to the video - now working on his doctorate. More young men and athletes should take Shaq’s example.
Donnie Walsh is the new president of the New York Knicks. Hallelujah. Finally. For the past two years I’ve had a draft blog post saying that until Isiah Thomas was history I wasn’t going to be able to say “I’m a Knicks fan” with a straight face. We’re half way there.
I like Walsh, think he did good things with Indiana over the past 25 years – till he brought in Larry Legend and then things kind of went downhill. Still, it’s an upgrade over Isiah who basically took a sinking ship and made it sink a heckofalot faster.
It’s turnaround strategy time. How should Walsh turn the ship around?
This is a tough one. If I was Walsh, I would do 4 things, change the leadership, clean the house out, find and promote the talent, and improve relationships.
Changing leadership; I would fire Isiah, take the GM role for a while and bring Herb Williams in an interim head coach role ASAP. Bring in strong leadership at the top, Herb isn’t the long term guy but he shows promise and has the players respect. Let Herb have a go next season if he succeeds it turns out like the Raptors and Mitchell, if he fails he’s likely not to fail as dramatically as Isiah.
Clean the house out; buy out Steph Marbury, trade Eddy curry for a bag of peanuts to whoever will take him, get rid of Zach Randolph, and stop and breathe. Try and clean up some significant cap room so when players like Lebron, CB4, Wade, Melo come on the market in a couple of years the Knicks are an attractive situation.
Find and promote the talent, the Knicks have some good players, some good personnel, Nate Robinson and Crawford are decent, I would package one or both of them if it gets Curry/Randolph out the door, otherwise no need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Renaldo Balkman, David Lee, and their draft pick, plus Nate - if he keeps him – are a decent foundation. Add to it a strong pick in the draft – again if he keeps it – and we have a decent core with the Knicks.
Improving relationships; keep it authentic. Be real, be true, speak to the other GMs in the league and let them know there will be no more sucker trades, but the Knicks have got some assets and some needs.
This is a sweet situation, there’s absolutely no worse it could get. Walsh has a chance to be the King of NY. Or could it get worse? F***, I hope not.
News from the blogosphere hit one of my favourite tv shows today, ESPN’s Pardon The Interruption – I say TV show, but I listen to the podcast here in the UK. The news was that Greg Oden(GO), a basketball center with the Portland Trailblazers, had publicly endorsed Barak Obama on his blog. The post was followed by over 170 comments (mostly positive) and a bunch of other blog posts like this (mixed results).
Both hosts from PTI were giving GO dap – i.e. credit –for taking a political stance and being vocal about his political leaning. I was born during the later stage of a time when many athletes were thought leaders, to a certain extent, in the US. On PTI Michael Wilbon rattled off the names Jim Brown, Muhammad Ali, and basketball players like Bill Russell, Bill Walton and Bill Bradley (who’s now in politics, not just talking politics in the locker room) who were all vocal about their political beliefs. Before these athletes there was Jackie Robinson, the black power salute at the Olympic Games, and other acts of politics and sport mixing. Whether you agreed or disagreed with these athletes you had to respect their strength in character to discuss their views. Some, like Ali, even suffering financially and reputationally (yes I know it’s not a word, don’t care) because of their views.
Today, I can only think of one other athlete, the Canadian 2 - time MVP of the NBA - Steve Nash, who also has made his political views known on occasion and has suffered some backlash for some of his views.
Personally, I think there’s too much money in endorsements for professional athletes today, and an athlete today can suffer significant financial set backs by saying the wrong thing or upsetting the wrong person. Being like Mike meant drinking Gatorade, wearing Air Jordans and buying into Brand Jordan not believing in some of the things that Mike believed in. Being like Tiger means wearing an expensive watch or investing a mutual fund or whatever else Tiger’s associated with. I’d love to see GO’s stance to be seen as a new trendsetter, one of athletes speaking their minds.
Maybe I’m a little partial to this as I’m reading Obama’s Dreams of my Father right now and I like the fact that he comes from a diverse background, something I can really relate to. Not to mention that I think he could do a whole heap of good for America’s reputation across the world and… well this wasn’t meant to be a political post so I’ll stop there. Maybe I’d feel differently if GO had endorsed McCain or Clinton on his blog. Don’t know, can’t say. But I like it in this case.
As someone who studied sport, who works in technology and has a passion for entrepreneurship, I love it when the three meet. So when Don Dodge wrote a post about the Giants, Pats, Mavs, Larry Bird, and other sporting teams and heroes and the lessons for entrepreneurs through sport I enjoyed reading every word.
I’m a huge, huge, huge sports fan and haven’t had an opportunity to write a great deal about sports on this blog… yet. After hearing that Darko had agreed to terms with Memphis I thought it was time to look ahead at the coming NBA season.
Big free agent signings were not really a factor this season, with Billups, Rashard Lewis, Wince Carter, Grant Hill and other big names out off the market and with trade talk dying down a bit, I think it’s a good time to make some predictions.
I’ve got the Suns, Spurs and Mavs having the best three records in the West, think this is the year that the Suns pull past the Spurs. Make that a promise if they get a deal for KG done before the end of the year, Amare, KG, Grant Hill and Nash on the floor at the same time would be a phenomenal combination!
I think Utah and Houston will round out the top five in the west. But after that it gets interesting. Golden State’s Belinelli is getting a lot of good pub, but I can’t see the Warriors making the playoffs again – think they got lucky last year. The LA Lakers soap opera with Kobe seems to be going on forever and I can’t see the Lakers making a repeat appearance in the playoffs either. Think Sacramento has way too many issues that even if they get rid of Ron Artest they’re a couple of seasons away from a playoff spot. And I’m not sure the Clippers have done enough to turn the corner – if they sign Francis I think they’re done, the guy will never, ever, ever be a winner. Whiner maybe, but winner, can’t see it. I like what Seattle’s doing, but think they’re a good two or three years away. And although Darko and a healthy Gasol might work, I can’t see Memphis really doing too much damage. And I’m not even going to touch Minnesota.
So my crystal ball has Denver, New Orleans and … believe it or not … Portland squeezing in. Aldridge, Frye and Oden is a great young but good front court, and with Brandon Roy, Jarrett Jack and Sergio Rodriguez all with another year of experience under their belt I really do believe the Blazers can make the playoffs. And although the losses of Randolph, Magloire, and Dickau might hurt, think the team could really surprise people. Nate McMillan has got to be rubbing his hands with glee and really looking forward to the upcoming season.
There’s still a couple of things that could happen to shift the power balance a bit – with Mo Pete perhaps signing in Utah or New Orleans or the Lakers getting KG or moving Kobe. But my breakdown will stick to:
The East is a lot more unsettled, but I’ll save a separate post for that.
