If you consider yourself a sports fan then you have probably made the joke, heard the joke, shared the joke, or done something else to further badger the point. There is even a commercial out for Foot Locker that stars current Portland Trail Blazers point guard, Damian Lillard and a bunch of other notable retired athletes making the joke. The punch line that continues to be pounded throughout the entire piece is that as an athlete, essentially it’s believed your career doesn’t have the legendary legacy unless you win a championship ring.
Even though we see memes all the time cracking on the likes of Melo, Durant, etc, this isn’t a recent trend: people said it about Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, and countless others until they finally won one (or multiple in the case of these three). Scoring titles, MVPs, All-Star appearances, all-time records are perceived as miniscule achievements in comparison and to a degree they are but I think you can’t base someone’s legacy on their ability to win the big one.
Now I’m a former athlete and in the words of former football coach Herm Edwards, “you play to win the game (hello!)” so by no means am I stating that it is not a big deal if you don’t win at all, all I’m saying is let’s look at it from the following perspectives:
Let’s be completely honest, for the NBA the 80s were Dr. J, Bird and Magic, the 90s were the Bad Boys, Jordan, and Hakeem, the 2000s were Kobe & Shaq, Tim Duncan, and the Celtics and unless you’ve been living under a rock and haven’t noticed, this current decade is the LeBron, Bosh, and Wade era. What goes unnoticed though are the teams that ARE routinely there even if they aren’t winning. The Barkleys, Ewings, Reggie Millers, and plenty others at least got to the game and majority of the ones who are considered great gave themselves a chance to win it all at least once. The problem comes when they are peaking around the same time as the pillars of the era, their work pales in comparison because of the competition they faced night in and night out and because of the next category, they were unable to put it together and stake their own place in postseason immortality.
Every Jordan of their era had a Steve Kerr or a Ron Harper, players who were bought into the system who most likely will never get into the hall of fame but were willing to “play the background” to help the team. The problem that you run into is great players don’t have enough HEALTHY good players around them to make a run, people getting hurt along the way is a part of the game. Even if they do have the supporting cast at full strength, you can’t always rely on your good players to close the deal for you and that is nothing against the star(s), these things just happen. Classic example is Nick Anderson from the Orlando Magic in the mid-90s missing crucial free-throws that eventually led to them not only losing the game but losing momentum in the Finals and eventually the series. Does that one game ruin Penny Hardaway’s legacy because had it not been for injury he was on pace to be a hall-of-famer? With a title in hand a lot of people become serious contention for hall of fame, especially when you have a lot of individual accolades with it but no matter how hard you play there is one factor that is even out of the players’ control.
The coach has to adapt to the players he has, that is what made coaches like Phil Jackson such a great coach. He adjusted his scheme from when he had Jordan and Pippen, to Jordan, Pippen, and Rodman, to Kobe and Shaq to just Kobe. Having a coach that can put his players in the best situations to be great is an underrated factor and I’m realizing it more and more as I watch the game. There are a lot of great players in the league but because the coach doesn’t know how to optimally utilize them to their full potential, teams suffer. Great coaching (and a great pickup in Al Jefferson) is the reason why the Bobcats went from being one of the laughing stocks in the league to being a playoff team (granted they were swept by the presumed eventual champions but it is a step in the right direction). Players are only able to do so much, they don’t control sub rotations so there is a CLEAR catalyst that factors into how great a player can be. Take a player like Ray Allen who was the man in Milwaukee and Seattle and place him around two other guys who are sure hall-of-famers, one of the most underrated PGs in this era and a hall of fame coach and you have a recipe for success that equates to two title appearances with one being victorious.
I only offer these perspectives to consider as this year draws to a close. Daily I hear people say that Durant can’t win the big one and it really baffles me because he’s 25…not only has he been to the finals already but his best basketball hasn’t even surfaced yet, that’s scary to think about. I know that won’t stop many of you from cracking your jokes but just understand the full argument, just because someone doesn’t win a title doesn’t diminish their legacy…
But if they do win, it does put them in a rather exclusive category of which they should take pride in because it’s merely icing on the cake of their individual career legacy. What are your thoughts…does a person need a ring to be considered GREAT? Tweet #KKNoRing to join the conversation.