In praise of unprofessional conduct - basketball wise.
Matt Yglesias (whom I normally find is saying it better than I could have) is unfortunately flailing at the value of college basketball again. (Equally talented Jason Zengerle disagrees.) I'm not sure why the Prospect would let Yglesias damage his credibility by putting the meme in a full article, but oh hell, I can't resist. First, I believeYglesias is a New Yorker who went to Harvard. From that perspective, he is performing a feat of incredible physical dexterity to suggest that the current Knicks and Celtics play a better game than do college players. (If in fact a Knicks fan, Matt may not even remember what a pass looks like, but I'm sure Larry Brown will resurrect that as soon as Isaiah ditches Stephon Marbury. Though again, Yglesias would seem to disagree.)
Yglesias claims that the College game suffers from early departures, stating that the most promising talent has bypassed college for the pros or leaves after too short a stay. This is a point that is overblown - while some great talent heads to the pros early, we are talking about 10 or 15 at the most out of 180 or so players spread through division one. But it's not just overblown, it's not backed up by one thing, NBA performance. If the college game were really suffering because of NBA-talent drain, then the best young NBA players would either have never played college ball or played so briefly (I'd say only one year) as to have not been great impacted or had a great impact themselves.
So among this year's rookie class, whose the top scorer with one year or no college experience? Marvin Williams formerly of Carolina. As a Tarheel fan, Marvin, I miss you, but I don't feel like my enjoyment was hurt by your early departure (I've got the Championship DVD to prove it). Marvin's gonna be a star, but right now he's only averaging 7.9 ppg on a very bad team. Sure, it'd be nice to have him in college still (George Mason would have lost to the Heels, in DC for a trip to the Final Four.), but somehow I think the college game has forged ahead (and even I have come to love George Mason).
Who's next among NBA rookies? Monta Ellis and Martell Webster. What, you haven't heard of them. Funny thing about these great talents the college game is missing - THEY often go missing when they get into the NBA (quick quiz, whose Jonathan Bender? Hint, he's retired at 25). Maybe one day they'll be great, but all these guys are clearly behind Chris Paul, Charlie Villanueva, Channing Frye, Raymond Felton, Deron Williams, Salim Stoudamire, Andrew Bogut, Nate Robinson and Luther Head. I guess I got on a roll there, but for Yglesias's sake I didn't want to miss naming a player who played at least two years in college and excelled in the NCAA tournament, as that was what apparently has Yglesias climibing the walls. Maybe the fact that all these rookies excelling this year led their teams in the tournament while in College will awaken Matt to the value of the college game. Perhaps his assertion that the best young players are in the NBA needs a little re-evaluation.
Of course, a rookie season does not make an NBA player. And there some great no-college NBA players. Kobe Bryant, Lebron James and Kevin Garnett are obvious examples. There's also Carmelo Anthony who left after winning a National title at Syracuse after his freshman season. But guess what, they're freaks! Among the Top 40 scorers in the league this season, Zack Randolph and Al Harrington are the only others with similar lack of need for the college game. This has been going on for a while, the anti-college NBA route- did you really think that only 6 of the Top 40 scorers spent little or no time in college?
It's true that the college game would be better if at least the kids who weren't ready to go pro stayed in school, but a consequence of drafting players who aren't ready to play NBA ball is that the quality of the professional game has suffered. The average NBA team from the early 90s team would most likely shred the NBA's best today. Except for the aging Shaq, the Eastern Conference alone probably doesn't have a single player who would crack say the 1991 All-Star team's lineup. Guys can't shoot well, they don't even have a clue what a down screen looks like, they think (and apparently Yglesias does as well) that a 2 or 3rd pass is a sign of weakness. It's no wonder that a relatively unathletic team like the Pistons (featuring an all-college player starting lineup) has played in the last two NBA finals and dominated the league for much of this year.
Most of Yglesias's column seems driven by the same unrealistic yearning that a New Yorker faced with bagels in North Carolina might have. For him, "the college game bears only a faint resemblance to the real thing." He's so convinced he's had the best, that he doesn't even want to consider anything less. Of course the college game is played by athletes "younger, inexperienced, and physically under-developed" compared to the pros. That's why you have a professional league, but it doesn't mean that the step below is suddenly barely better than Church League.
Indeed, I wonder if even most NBA players might think Yglesias's laudits of their relative prowess as a little spooky.
What I do enjoy watching is effort. And that, to me, is where the college game has the NBA out-classed hands-down. I'm not saying there isn't ever effort in the NBA, I love the NBA playoffs (more on that below). But the NBA season is so long that it punishes the kind of all-out intensity that the College game thrives off of. Let's face it, the only other group detained longer than NBA players without a trial are living on Guantanamo Bay. 82 games, and (not for the Knicks) a post season that runs two months - guys will take a night off. As for the fans, most are too busy talking to their agent to really cheer. Though I hear some of them, with enough beer in them, can toss a good drink now and then.
College is about bringing it every game, every minute - for fans and players alike. Does Yglesias seriously not find enjoyment and the endeavor of sport from watching a college game in January or February, in some loud gym like Cameron Indoor, University Hall, or games at places like Butler, Wichita St., Davidson or Montana; watching players tear along the baseline, the offensive player seeking out screens and defensive player bouncing around to avoid them only to have both meet at the end of a pass to the 3-point line; watching big men fight to step out and meet the ball handler, then slip back in, make three pump fakes all the while navigating flying bodies coming at them? As Zengerle points out
Yglesias also takes issue with the NCAA holding a single-game elimination tournament. Perhaps he likes hearing an underdog say before an NBA series, "if we can just get out of town with a split, and get back home, I think we'll win." And, yes, best-of does provide for a more pure champion. But here's a thought: take away single-game elimination, and maybe you don't have Texas Western, NC State (twice), Villanova or George Mason. Like much of American life, the NCAA is a dance with fate's twists. That's what makes it great. And it helps to make NCAA basketball champions legendary (Yglesias's criticism is odd in many ways, but not the least because his article implies that College Football is more tolerable. And that's a sport where the college folks can't figure out a way to remove the word "mythical" from its championship.)
Basketball is the most democratic sport. It demands full and varied participation, not delimited by inherent physical traits (big men shoot threes, six-foot guards post up and rebound, and every body in between does it all) , it seeks a simple utilitarian goal, the means of achieving which is in constant debate, always in motion, with the relevant factors ever-changing. It does not require one to read sub-paragraphs of rule books to know the rules. And occasionally, some little school from a small town, or small university, without the right pedigree will take out the clearly better team on a glorious spring afternoon. Thus, the "Rule of the people" is best demonstrated by March Madness.
I'm sorry that such a state of affairs appears to discomfort Yglesias's moral compass. Of course, I have my own qualms about the NBA. It does have too many teams (namely the Clippers and the Grizzlies), as Yglesias says, and its got GMs who draft every European and high school player more out of fear than out of knowledge. And this season alone the Knicks have worn their road blue on the sacred Madison Square Garden floor, which is only slightly mitigated by the fact that at least the Knicks were wearing their actual uniforms. I occasionally turn on TNT or ESPN and think I'm watching Real Madrid take on the Washington Generals, only to realize that it's another example of how the NBA is so overly marketing conscious that they are just trotting out a team's "full-moon-in-a-February-leap-year" jerseys. And, really is Mighty Mouse finished trying to make his shot in the slam dunk contest? I mean, I know the NBA's all about the Best-of, but letting a guy take 14 tries to get a dunk? Heck that wouldn't play at United Methodist.
Yglesias claims that the College game suffers from early departures, stating that the most promising talent has bypassed college for the pros or leaves after too short a stay. This is a point that is overblown - while some great talent heads to the pros early, we are talking about 10 or 15 at the most out of 180 or so players spread through division one. But it's not just overblown, it's not backed up by one thing, NBA performance. If the college game were really suffering because of NBA-talent drain, then the best young NBA players would either have never played college ball or played so briefly (I'd say only one year) as to have not been great impacted or had a great impact themselves.
So among this year's rookie class, whose the top scorer with one year or no college experience? Marvin Williams formerly of Carolina. As a Tarheel fan, Marvin, I miss you, but I don't feel like my enjoyment was hurt by your early departure (I've got the Championship DVD to prove it). Marvin's gonna be a star, but right now he's only averaging 7.9 ppg on a very bad team. Sure, it'd be nice to have him in college still (George Mason would have lost to the Heels, in DC for a trip to the Final Four.), but somehow I think the college game has forged ahead (and even I have come to love George Mason).
Who's next among NBA rookies? Monta Ellis and Martell Webster. What, you haven't heard of them. Funny thing about these great talents the college game is missing - THEY often go missing when they get into the NBA (quick quiz, whose Jonathan Bender? Hint, he's retired at 25). Maybe one day they'll be great, but all these guys are clearly behind Chris Paul, Charlie Villanueva, Channing Frye, Raymond Felton, Deron Williams, Salim Stoudamire, Andrew Bogut, Nate Robinson and Luther Head. I guess I got on a roll there, but for Yglesias's sake I didn't want to miss naming a player who played at least two years in college and excelled in the NCAA tournament, as that was what apparently has Yglesias climibing the walls. Maybe the fact that all these rookies excelling this year led their teams in the tournament while in College will awaken Matt to the value of the college game. Perhaps his assertion that the best young players are in the NBA needs a little re-evaluation.
Of course, a rookie season does not make an NBA player. And there some great no-college NBA players. Kobe Bryant, Lebron James and Kevin Garnett are obvious examples. There's also Carmelo Anthony who left after winning a National title at Syracuse after his freshman season. But guess what, they're freaks! Among the Top 40 scorers in the league this season, Zack Randolph and Al Harrington are the only others with similar lack of need for the college game. This has been going on for a while, the anti-college NBA route- did you really think that only 6 of the Top 40 scorers spent little or no time in college?
It's true that the college game would be better if at least the kids who weren't ready to go pro stayed in school, but a consequence of drafting players who aren't ready to play NBA ball is that the quality of the professional game has suffered. The average NBA team from the early 90s team would most likely shred the NBA's best today. Except for the aging Shaq, the Eastern Conference alone probably doesn't have a single player who would crack say the 1991 All-Star team's lineup. Guys can't shoot well, they don't even have a clue what a down screen looks like, they think (and apparently Yglesias does as well) that a 2 or 3rd pass is a sign of weakness. It's no wonder that a relatively unathletic team like the Pistons (featuring an all-college player starting lineup) has played in the last two NBA finals and dominated the league for much of this year.
Most of Yglesias's column seems driven by the same unrealistic yearning that a New Yorker faced with bagels in North Carolina might have. For him, "the college game bears only a faint resemblance to the real thing." He's so convinced he's had the best, that he doesn't even want to consider anything less. Of course the college game is played by athletes "younger, inexperienced, and physically under-developed" compared to the pros. That's why you have a professional league, but it doesn't mean that the step below is suddenly barely better than Church League.
Indeed, I wonder if even most NBA players might think Yglesias's laudits of their relative prowess as a little spooky.
To watch the world's best basketball teams -- the Miami Heat, the Phoenix Suns, the San Antonio Spurs, the Detroit Pistons, the Dallas Mavericks -- is to distinctly put oneself in the presence of greatness. The feats on display are not quite super-human -- Shaquille O'Neal and Shawn Marion and Tim Duncan are still members of our species at the end of the day -- but they certainly appear to be.I don't know about Marion and O'Neal. But it's hard to imagine the mild-mannered Duncan confusing himself with Aqua Man. Even O'Neal only does that as part of his schtick. Personally, I'm fear what things Yglesias has to be ingesting to think the average March NBA contest could deserve this description:
The sheer speed and ferocity of the games is astounding -- even mentally you'd be overwhelmed, lost, driven to tears or insanity amidst the flying bodies, flailing limbs, and zipping ball.Does he take esctasy during TNT's pre-game analysis? I mean, after a while, you get used to the rythm of ohh, about 65 pick'n'rolls spiced with the scattered isolation play. I realize NBA players are doing something I could never accomplish, but so are figure skaters, professional bowlers and bass fisherman. My own athletic limitations do not shape the paradigm in which I choose the worthiness of a spectator sport. Indeed, seeing as I couldn't make the Student-faculty basketball team in High School, I'm not really sure of the level of basketball to which I'd have to stoop to find athletes not doing something I can't imagine doing.
What I do enjoy watching is effort. And that, to me, is where the college game has the NBA out-classed hands-down. I'm not saying there isn't ever effort in the NBA, I love the NBA playoffs (more on that below). But the NBA season is so long that it punishes the kind of all-out intensity that the College game thrives off of. Let's face it, the only other group detained longer than NBA players without a trial are living on Guantanamo Bay. 82 games, and (not for the Knicks) a post season that runs two months - guys will take a night off. As for the fans, most are too busy talking to their agent to really cheer. Though I hear some of them, with enough beer in them, can toss a good drink now and then.
College is about bringing it every game, every minute - for fans and players alike. Does Yglesias seriously not find enjoyment and the endeavor of sport from watching a college game in January or February, in some loud gym like Cameron Indoor, University Hall, or games at places like Butler, Wichita St., Davidson or Montana; watching players tear along the baseline, the offensive player seeking out screens and defensive player bouncing around to avoid them only to have both meet at the end of a pass to the 3-point line; watching big men fight to step out and meet the ball handler, then slip back in, make three pump fakes all the while navigating flying bodies coming at them? As Zengerle points out
Maybe Yglesias played for a kick-ass JV team; otherwise, I don't know what he's talking about. While the talent level in college is obviously below the talent level in the pros, I don't think fans are so delusional as to think that college ball bears any resemblance, even a superficial one, to any games they themselves played in.
Yglesias also takes issue with the NCAA holding a single-game elimination tournament. Perhaps he likes hearing an underdog say before an NBA series, "if we can just get out of town with a split, and get back home, I think we'll win." And, yes, best-of does provide for a more pure champion. But here's a thought: take away single-game elimination, and maybe you don't have Texas Western, NC State (twice), Villanova or George Mason. Like much of American life, the NCAA is a dance with fate's twists. That's what makes it great. And it helps to make NCAA basketball champions legendary (Yglesias's criticism is odd in many ways, but not the least because his article implies that College Football is more tolerable. And that's a sport where the college folks can't figure out a way to remove the word "mythical" from its championship.)
Basketball is the most democratic sport. It demands full and varied participation, not delimited by inherent physical traits (big men shoot threes, six-foot guards post up and rebound, and every body in between does it all) , it seeks a simple utilitarian goal, the means of achieving which is in constant debate, always in motion, with the relevant factors ever-changing. It does not require one to read sub-paragraphs of rule books to know the rules. And occasionally, some little school from a small town, or small university, without the right pedigree will take out the clearly better team on a glorious spring afternoon. Thus, the "Rule of the people" is best demonstrated by March Madness.
I'm sorry that such a state of affairs appears to discomfort Yglesias's moral compass. Of course, I have my own qualms about the NBA. It does have too many teams (namely the Clippers and the Grizzlies), as Yglesias says, and its got GMs who draft every European and high school player more out of fear than out of knowledge. And this season alone the Knicks have worn their road blue on the sacred Madison Square Garden floor, which is only slightly mitigated by the fact that at least the Knicks were wearing their actual uniforms. I occasionally turn on TNT or ESPN and think I'm watching Real Madrid take on the Washington Generals, only to realize that it's another example of how the NBA is so overly marketing conscious that they are just trotting out a team's "full-moon-in-a-February-leap-year" jerseys. And, really is Mighty Mouse finished trying to make his shot in the slam dunk contest? I mean, I know the NBA's all about the Best-of, but letting a guy take 14 tries to get a dunk? Heck that wouldn't play at United Methodist.
posted by SebbyMan at 6:14 PM
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