Tuesday, January 17, 2006
By ADRIAN WOJNAROWSKI
SPORTS COLUMNIST
NEW YORK -- The teenager responsible for changing the NBA, the prodigy who challenged our sensibilities on the right of passage to pro s om, happens to turn 30 this year.
Through it all, Kevin Garnett has kept the unmistakable appearance and disposition of an Ivy League scholar, a renaissance star who never needed March Madness and Vitale to validate his journey.
Inside the visiting locker room Monday, Garnett wore one of those sweater and shirt combos that appealed to him long before the commissioner mandated fashion to his franchises. Once again, Garnett is the Minnesota Timberwolves' upperclassman surrounded by dropouts, castoffs and troubled souls, Peyton Manning's kindred spirit in championship-less pursuits.
Down the corridor from Patrick Ewing's old seat at Madison Square Garden, Garnett found himself closer to being fitted for the most unenviable of pro predicaments: the best player to have never won a championship.
Just a day after Manning tried to be a "good teammate" and called out his offensive line for failing to protect him, Garnett looks like the most unprotected star in sports. No one else so good for so long has ever failed to gain his sport's greatest stage. Truth be told, Garnett wishes he had the talent surrounding him that Manning does, but he's never had a le-worthy team on his side.
So, Manning is the next Dan Marino, the way that Garnett is suddenly cast as the next -- pick your ring-less future Hall of Famer -- Ewing/Charles Barkley/Karl Malone.
Nevertheless, Garnett always has understood the responsibilities of a franchise player. Too many in the sport knew the rights of that stature -- max-out money and max-out adulation when it's going well -- but Garnett stayed professional at a time when Jason Kidd, Vince Carter and Tracy McGrady were demanding to be dealt to championship contenders.
"I'm a loyal person," said Garnett, after his T-Wolves beat the Knicks, 96-90. "There's no guarantee that it's beautiful on the other side anyway. I know what to expect here. I'm invested in it, full mind, body and soul. ... That's not my style to just up and run when stuff gets tough."
It was a lesson that Stephon Marbury never learned as his long-ago teammate in Minnesota. The Knicks' six-game winning streak has been dulled by consecutive losses, including Monday's where a collision with Wally Szczerbiak would send Marbury out of the game with a bruised shoulder.
Marbury was long ago miscast as a franchise player, his salary and stature never fitting his talent or temperament. There are so few leaders through tough times in sports, and if nothing else, Garnett always has been a study in professionalism and character in that way.
Garnett let little Troy Hudson deliver the fourth-quarter daggers Monday, content with one more selfless game on his way to the Hall of Fame. Garnett had 24 points, 16 rebounds and six assists, but he never forced a thing Monday at the Garden. He never does.
For his prodigious physical talent at 7 feet, Garnett takes pride in stealing opposing teams' play calls and feeding them to the T-Wolves' bench. He does the little things that the NBA culture barely acknowledges anymore.
"I'm like a quarterback," he said. "Sometimes, you can call me a stand-in coach."
With Garnett's back-to-back $126 million and $100 million contracts, with a playoff history as full of disheartened concession speeches as the those of the Colts' quarterback and coach, you would've once figured that his thirtysomething years would promise to bring much grief and scorn to his legacy.
In a lot of ways, it will be easier for Garnett and Manning to go without a championship than those players before them. Our sporting culture is changing in that way, with winning less and less of a requirement for the validation of greatness. Privately, yes, Garnett and Manning will ache with emptiness that befalls such fierce compe ors, but let's face it: Sports immortality is no longer so tied to les.
More and more, our next generation of sports consumers and fans measure greatness with "SportsCenter" highlights and clever commercial ads over championship glory. Mostly, this is stuff that sportswriters keep bringing up, but understand: Manning is still going to be a bigger pitchman than the Patriots' Tom Brady. Garnett still will be more popular than Tim Duncan.
Nobody cared about the Detroit Pistons after they won a le and look to be on the way to another, and nobody cares about the Spurs after they've won three of them. That goes for the Patriots' popularity too.
Just last week, what do you think had America's attention: The Spurs and Pistons meeting for the second time this season, or Kobe and LeBron going one-on-one in Los Angeles? Come on, no contest. The way we look at and judge athletes over the next decade will be far different than how we did in the past.
In a lot of ways, winning has been so devalued in sports, replaced with so many superficial measuring devices, the stigma of never winning a le will sting less and less in the public arena.
Garnett isn't running out of time, but he is running out incarnations. There have been Garnett-Marbury-Tom Gugliotta T-Wolves. That broke up when Marbury didn't want to be a sidekick, when he started a destructive NBA trend of always looking to go somewhere else and be the Jordan instead of staying behind to be Pippen. There were the Joe Smith-Terrell Brandon-Szczerbiak T-Wolves, but they couldn't get out of the first round of the playoffs.
Garnett would come his closest, reaching the Western Conference finals, with Latrell Sprewell and Sam Cassell two years ago. That ran its course, too.
"He lets the [front office] do what it has to do," Hudson said. "He's going to come out and play hard if it's one-on-five."
Sometimes, it's felt like that for Garnett. Now, the T-Wolves are closer to the Barry Sanders' Detroit Lions than the Manning Colts, with Garnett surrounded by lottery-pick busts Eddie Griffin and Michael Olowokandi on the frontline.
And now?
"It is what it is," Garnett said. "I've always tried to be loyal to the cause."
Garnett deserves a bigger stage, a better shot, but so it goes in sports. Into his 10th year in the league now, with Garnett probably crossing his fingers when he tells you that "this team has changed dramatically, but we're making strides," you get the idea that Garnett's greatness is destined for another several seasons of concession speeches.
If Peyton Manning thinks he has protection problems, he ought to come walk a season in his kindred spirit's shoes.
Nice read and I could give two sh!ts what any non-Spurs fans think about Tim Duncan and the Spurs' three les. The Pistons are well on their way to the le this season...but its barely mid-January. Come playoff time I expect this Spurs team to be a wrecking machine, and I expect Duncan to be able to flash 4 rings at his rival, Kevin Garnett.
I concur.
Yes. Kevin is tall.
popularity doesn't win championships
plus Duncan will go down in history as Tim Duncan, 3/4/5/6-time champion.
kevin Garnett will go down as kevin garnett period
Last edited by nkdlunch; 01-19-2006 at 01:58 PM.
What is the source for this article?
How do you quantify popularity? Duncan leads Garnett in jersey sales pretty regularly, and their All Star votes are usually about even.
I keep seeing the le and keep thinking that I'm seeing:
"Kevin Garnett stands trial"
People buy jerseys of championship teams. That is the reason TD might have more jersey sales. If KG wins a championship or two, then his sales would be higher. You can not argue the fact that KG is more marketable, but TD could care less about that.
The point of the article is that winning is not as important as it used to be...these players used to make more money in the playoffs than in the regular season, now they take a pay cut, so it has lost its luster somewhat.
The most popular jerseys have been Lebron's, Carmelo's and AI's, and they have not won jack, but they are all wealthy beyond all comprehension.
When I see Duncan's head bobbling on some four year olds body CGI style, I'll believe he's as popular as KG.
What is the link to this article?
I was in sports section of today's Houston Chronicle. This guy is in New Jersey though.
WAO he turned 30 years!!!!!!!!................OMG i didnt really realize about that, he has not a lot of time to win a championship, after 31 years he wont be the same, SO HURRY UP KEVIN!!!!!
This a neighbour of my would say:
That is one bull article.
Do you want sympathy from me? Look at me. I will never play for NBA. I will never play proffesional basketball and I am short. He's got ego problems that cost him rings. Sorry, no tears shed for KG and his middleyear crisis soon appearing.
And something else: History would hardly remember him. A footnote as a middleschool superstar failure-but-would-be phenomenon.
To finish my rant... I think the same about about me. I could have been the best... and no one writes articles of my potential.
I must share something about my neighbour..He has a point.
Awww is KG finally accepting his status of a 2nd rate superstar?
Boo ing hoo. I'm sick to ing death hearing about the lack of talent around KG. It's a weak excuse, not to mention a lie. He's had more All Stars play with him while they were All Stars than Tim has. Count 'em. Starbury, Googs, Brandon, Szcerbiak. Tim has had David and Manu in 8 years. Kevin Garnett. He's a weak loser.
KG also had Jackson, Billips, Spree and Sam, yet we still only hear the sobs of how he never had any support. All the boo hoo is really a load of BS!
I did qualify it that they were All Stars while playing with him. Point taken, though. As counterpoint, Tim has had Sean (past his prime), GRob(way past his prime), and Finley and NVE (past his prime, way past his prime)KG also had Jackson, Billips, Spree and Sam, yet we still only hear the sobs of how he never had any support. All the boo hoo is really a load of BS!
I thought Sam Cassell had a decent case for 2004 NBA MVP...
KG can go cry me a river with his fans makin lame excuses....
KG indeed is one heck of a player, but he's just a bad playoff time player & not clutch, great for 75% of the ride, but when the tough gets rough, his balls dwindle
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