Guru of Nothing
06-08-2005, 01:45 PM
Wall Street Journal (http://online.wsj.com/public/article/0,,SB111824088796754176,00.html?mod=todays_free_fe ature)
Basketball's Invisible Superstar
Prepares to Chase Another Title
June 8, 2005 11:54 a.m.
Is Tim Duncan ready for his close-up?
From everything we know about the San Antonio Spurs superstar (which isn't a lot), the answer is no: Mr. Duncan goes about his business so quietly that he's all but invisible. Well, except when you look at the track record he's amassing.
In the Washington Post, Mike Wise notes that Mr. Duncan won his first title at 23 and is preparing for his third trip to the NBA Finals in six years. He's just 29, with a supporting cast that's young and talented. (Manu Ginobili is 27, while Tony Parker is just 23.)
"The Spurs and their star could finish with seven or more championships before Duncan retires," muses Mr. Wise. "It might seem sacrilege to the MJ faithful, seeing as how Duncan and his perceived vanilla game are to marketing what Kenneth Lay is to profit sharing. But unexciting Timmy D. is closer to winning more titles than Jordan's Bulls than any player prematurely hyped as the Air Apparent. … In-game flair or off-court earning power, Duncan is anathema to what Jordan represented and who he was as a player and pitchman. And yet, he is everything Jordan was as a resilient competitor, a guy who did nothing more than channel his failures into championships. It's too bad that cannot sell a league anymore."
On SI.com, Chris Ballard offers an appreciation of Mr. Duncan as the anti-Vince Carter. Mr. Carter, he writes, "is a player whose attributes are so wildly obvious, and acrobatic, that his myriad deficiencies are harder to spot to the novice fan. More than that, a player such as Vince -- a perennial vote-leader in the All-Star balloting -- is good at the things that are easiest for a casual fan to spot: dunking, making crazy shots and, well, jumping really high. If Carter is the wine cooler of the league, all sweetness and bubbles, palatable to even a 16-year-old, then Duncan is the aged Cabernet. You may not appreciate him at first, but, once your taste is refined, you understand what you were missing."
But there's another reason Mr. Duncan isn't popular, as Mr. Ballard notes: "He doesn't want to be. … What is another $10 million in endorsements going to do for his life? How are more screaming fans going to make him happier? Why in the world would he want to be a superstar, if what we really mean by that -- and by 'we' I mean the media and the fans -- is a marketable superstar? It may seem unlikely in celebrity-saturated America, but Duncan is opting out of the culture of idolatry. And, in spite of his superior skills, that may be the most remarkable thing about him."
Of course, another championship for Mr. Duncan isn't a guarantee -- not if the Detroit Pistons have anything to say about it. The Fix will have much more about the Pistons in the days to come, of course; for now, take the Detroit Free-Press up on its invitation to design custom shoes for the team. (Or, as the paper puts it: "Pimp These Kicks.")
Basketball's Invisible Superstar
Prepares to Chase Another Title
June 8, 2005 11:54 a.m.
Is Tim Duncan ready for his close-up?
From everything we know about the San Antonio Spurs superstar (which isn't a lot), the answer is no: Mr. Duncan goes about his business so quietly that he's all but invisible. Well, except when you look at the track record he's amassing.
In the Washington Post, Mike Wise notes that Mr. Duncan won his first title at 23 and is preparing for his third trip to the NBA Finals in six years. He's just 29, with a supporting cast that's young and talented. (Manu Ginobili is 27, while Tony Parker is just 23.)
"The Spurs and their star could finish with seven or more championships before Duncan retires," muses Mr. Wise. "It might seem sacrilege to the MJ faithful, seeing as how Duncan and his perceived vanilla game are to marketing what Kenneth Lay is to profit sharing. But unexciting Timmy D. is closer to winning more titles than Jordan's Bulls than any player prematurely hyped as the Air Apparent. … In-game flair or off-court earning power, Duncan is anathema to what Jordan represented and who he was as a player and pitchman. And yet, he is everything Jordan was as a resilient competitor, a guy who did nothing more than channel his failures into championships. It's too bad that cannot sell a league anymore."
On SI.com, Chris Ballard offers an appreciation of Mr. Duncan as the anti-Vince Carter. Mr. Carter, he writes, "is a player whose attributes are so wildly obvious, and acrobatic, that his myriad deficiencies are harder to spot to the novice fan. More than that, a player such as Vince -- a perennial vote-leader in the All-Star balloting -- is good at the things that are easiest for a casual fan to spot: dunking, making crazy shots and, well, jumping really high. If Carter is the wine cooler of the league, all sweetness and bubbles, palatable to even a 16-year-old, then Duncan is the aged Cabernet. You may not appreciate him at first, but, once your taste is refined, you understand what you were missing."
But there's another reason Mr. Duncan isn't popular, as Mr. Ballard notes: "He doesn't want to be. … What is another $10 million in endorsements going to do for his life? How are more screaming fans going to make him happier? Why in the world would he want to be a superstar, if what we really mean by that -- and by 'we' I mean the media and the fans -- is a marketable superstar? It may seem unlikely in celebrity-saturated America, but Duncan is opting out of the culture of idolatry. And, in spite of his superior skills, that may be the most remarkable thing about him."
Of course, another championship for Mr. Duncan isn't a guarantee -- not if the Detroit Pistons have anything to say about it. The Fix will have much more about the Pistons in the days to come, of course; for now, take the Detroit Free-Press up on its invitation to design custom shoes for the team. (Or, as the paper puts it: "Pimp These Kicks.")