KoriEllis
08-27-2004, 04:29 AM
Brown is out of line
U.S. coach does a disservice to hoops team
JOE POSNANSKI
www.kansascity.com/mld/ka...175.htm?1c (http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/sports/9508175.htm?1c)
ATHENS, Greece — Today's question on manners comes from Team USA basketball coach Larry Brown: Can “Do you want some of me?” be a sort of apology?
Answer: From Larry Brown, it's as close as you're going to get.
Here's the sad part: They had almost become likable. Sure, we know all the issues with Team USA men's basketball. The players are young, rich, cocky, can't shoot, don't pass, play rough, have tattoos, whatever. They are all that's wrong with America, the Olympics, the NBA, the world — you've heard it all.
But you know what? On Thursday in Athens, Team USA played its heart out. Really. This team is all alone here. Many Americans won't claim them. Other countries boo and hiss. They have to take the abuse from all corners of the world.
And still, for 39 minutes on Thursday, against a Spanish team that had not lost at the Olympics, they played gallant basketball. Stephon Marbury made big shot after big shot. Allen Iverson hustled up and down the court. Dwayne Wade played big defense. The crowd was down on them, there were people all over praying against them, but they just kept on winning. It was sort of inspiring in a way.
They were actually threatening to become a team you could cheer.
Then our man Larry Brown stepped in. With 23 seconds left and the United States up by an insurmountable 11 points, Brown decided it was a good time to call timeout. Why? Who knows? In America, we don't even blink when a basketball coach calls a pointless and self-serving timeout at the end of a game. Happens all the time. It's almost as if they're saying, “I'm the coach, and I can do whatever I want.”
It seems, though, that Europeans are not as tolerant of dumb and rude timeouts. When the timeout was called, jeers and whistles spilled down. The Spanish fans seemed to believe that Larry Brown was showing them up. Many of the players — particularly Jose Manuel Calderon — agreed; they raised their hands as if to say, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute, why do you beat us and then humiliate us, too?”
No one was angrier than Spanish coach Mario Pesquera. Now, to be honest, Pesquera seems like the kind of guy who yells at the woman behind the counter when his flight is delayed. After this game, he railed on the lack of traveling calls, the physical play, the NBA, the unfairness of the tournament, the quality of hot dogs in Greece and so on. You get the feeling that Mario has sent back a few steaks in his life.
But on this timeout thing, he was dead right: It was a no-class move. Even Brown did not try to defend it. He simply said it was “an honest mistake.” That one baffles me. Forgetting to return a video, that's a mistake. Calling timeout at the Olympics with 23 seconds left, your team up 11 and the other team heartbroken doesn't exactly seem like a “mistake.”
Brown also said he tried to wave off the timeout, but the officials would not let him.
“If it was a mistake,” Pesquera pointed out, “he could have sent his players right back on the court.”
Yeah, OK, that's a pretty good point. When, the game ended, Pesquera went after Brown. This is where we have our apology mystery. The two yelled at each other for a few minutes. Brown would claim later that he apologized (“All I can do is apologize and move on,” he said). But there was no apparent sign of an apology. There was a moment, though, when Brown very clearly yelled at Pesquera, “Do you want some of me?”
Now, that doesn't seem like an apology. But, then, it was hard to tell the context. It's also possible that Brown apologized before that (in which case, I guess, the “Do you want some of me?” line is Brown's idea of “moving on”).
Afterward, in one of the more entertaining news conferences in Olympic history, Brown again did not appear to apologize. He claimed that he had apologized. But that was about it. Brown was asked about the exchange he had with Pesquera. Here's what he said.
“That was like a disagreement I have with my son,” Brown said. “Sometime he doesn't want to hear an explanation.”
Apology? You decide. Pesquera did not understand the quote at all — condescension, apparently, doesn't translate well to Spanish. He wondered why Brown said he was a like a son to him. He also wondered why the man blabbed nonsense about how the timeout was a mistake, and how they wouldn't let him take it back. He wondered why Brown wouldn't just say he was sorry, say he lost track of the time or the points, say something that made even a little bit of sense.
“I had — stress ‘had' — great respect for coach Larry Brown,” Pesquera said.
It really was a shame. In so many ways, Team USA has gotten a bad rap. A bunch of NBA players turned down the chance to play at the Olympics. These players came. They have taken all the abuse, mostly with smiles. Everybody keeps talking about their bad attitudes, but the truth is, they genuinely seem to be playing hard now, they're coming together as a team, they have not created a scene, and they're a real threat to still win the gold medal. They should be winning over America.
And then their coach, who should know better, acts like a jerk.
“Do you want some of me?” he asked. The truth is, we could use a lot less of him.
U.S. coach does a disservice to hoops team
JOE POSNANSKI
www.kansascity.com/mld/ka...175.htm?1c (http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/sports/9508175.htm?1c)
ATHENS, Greece — Today's question on manners comes from Team USA basketball coach Larry Brown: Can “Do you want some of me?” be a sort of apology?
Answer: From Larry Brown, it's as close as you're going to get.
Here's the sad part: They had almost become likable. Sure, we know all the issues with Team USA men's basketball. The players are young, rich, cocky, can't shoot, don't pass, play rough, have tattoos, whatever. They are all that's wrong with America, the Olympics, the NBA, the world — you've heard it all.
But you know what? On Thursday in Athens, Team USA played its heart out. Really. This team is all alone here. Many Americans won't claim them. Other countries boo and hiss. They have to take the abuse from all corners of the world.
And still, for 39 minutes on Thursday, against a Spanish team that had not lost at the Olympics, they played gallant basketball. Stephon Marbury made big shot after big shot. Allen Iverson hustled up and down the court. Dwayne Wade played big defense. The crowd was down on them, there were people all over praying against them, but they just kept on winning. It was sort of inspiring in a way.
They were actually threatening to become a team you could cheer.
Then our man Larry Brown stepped in. With 23 seconds left and the United States up by an insurmountable 11 points, Brown decided it was a good time to call timeout. Why? Who knows? In America, we don't even blink when a basketball coach calls a pointless and self-serving timeout at the end of a game. Happens all the time. It's almost as if they're saying, “I'm the coach, and I can do whatever I want.”
It seems, though, that Europeans are not as tolerant of dumb and rude timeouts. When the timeout was called, jeers and whistles spilled down. The Spanish fans seemed to believe that Larry Brown was showing them up. Many of the players — particularly Jose Manuel Calderon — agreed; they raised their hands as if to say, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute, why do you beat us and then humiliate us, too?”
No one was angrier than Spanish coach Mario Pesquera. Now, to be honest, Pesquera seems like the kind of guy who yells at the woman behind the counter when his flight is delayed. After this game, he railed on the lack of traveling calls, the physical play, the NBA, the unfairness of the tournament, the quality of hot dogs in Greece and so on. You get the feeling that Mario has sent back a few steaks in his life.
But on this timeout thing, he was dead right: It was a no-class move. Even Brown did not try to defend it. He simply said it was “an honest mistake.” That one baffles me. Forgetting to return a video, that's a mistake. Calling timeout at the Olympics with 23 seconds left, your team up 11 and the other team heartbroken doesn't exactly seem like a “mistake.”
Brown also said he tried to wave off the timeout, but the officials would not let him.
“If it was a mistake,” Pesquera pointed out, “he could have sent his players right back on the court.”
Yeah, OK, that's a pretty good point. When, the game ended, Pesquera went after Brown. This is where we have our apology mystery. The two yelled at each other for a few minutes. Brown would claim later that he apologized (“All I can do is apologize and move on,” he said). But there was no apparent sign of an apology. There was a moment, though, when Brown very clearly yelled at Pesquera, “Do you want some of me?”
Now, that doesn't seem like an apology. But, then, it was hard to tell the context. It's also possible that Brown apologized before that (in which case, I guess, the “Do you want some of me?” line is Brown's idea of “moving on”).
Afterward, in one of the more entertaining news conferences in Olympic history, Brown again did not appear to apologize. He claimed that he had apologized. But that was about it. Brown was asked about the exchange he had with Pesquera. Here's what he said.
“That was like a disagreement I have with my son,” Brown said. “Sometime he doesn't want to hear an explanation.”
Apology? You decide. Pesquera did not understand the quote at all — condescension, apparently, doesn't translate well to Spanish. He wondered why Brown said he was a like a son to him. He also wondered why the man blabbed nonsense about how the timeout was a mistake, and how they wouldn't let him take it back. He wondered why Brown wouldn't just say he was sorry, say he lost track of the time or the points, say something that made even a little bit of sense.
“I had — stress ‘had' — great respect for coach Larry Brown,” Pesquera said.
It really was a shame. In so many ways, Team USA has gotten a bad rap. A bunch of NBA players turned down the chance to play at the Olympics. These players came. They have taken all the abuse, mostly with smiles. Everybody keeps talking about their bad attitudes, but the truth is, they genuinely seem to be playing hard now, they're coming together as a team, they have not created a scene, and they're a real threat to still win the gold medal. They should be winning over America.
And then their coach, who should know better, acts like a jerk.
“Do you want some of me?” he asked. The truth is, we could use a lot less of him.