Athletes in 21st century sports: MVP LeBron James

This might be the most bias post I have written or will write being that I am from Cleveland and a huge LeBron James fan. In chapter 20 Rader talks about whether athletes today are heroes or just merely celebrities. I think LeBron James is both. I think almost everybody sees LeBron as a celebrity. His face is everywhere. Right now he is probably the face of not only the Cleveland Cavaliers, but the entire NBA. He has more endorsement deals than I have fingers and toes. You almost can't go a day with out seeing or hearing about LeBron James. Not everybody can think of him as a hero though because not everybody likes him. A lot of people dislike him, like sportswriter Skip Bayless. No matter what LeBron accomplishes Skip always find a way to talk it down to less than it is and criticize LeBron. However, many people may see LeBron as a hero. I think this is especially true with people from Cleveland. I definitely think LeBron is a hero.

What LeBron has done for the city of Cleveland is more than any mayor of the city by themself can do. I think LeBron has kept the city from burning to the ground. Figuratively speaking of course. If it wasn't for LeBron, Clevelanders really wouldn't really have much going for themselves at all. The economy is bad around the nation but exceptionally bad in Cleveland. We are one of the poorest cities in American with one of the highest crime rates and people are abandoning the city. After Hurricane Katrina Cleveland had the second highest desertion rate for any city in the U.S. behind New Orleans. LeBron gives people of Cleveland hope. Maybe all we need to lift our spirits is a championship. We have waited long enough, 45 years. LeBron may be just the person to do it for us. With his MVP award being announced today I feel that we get one step closer everyday. To me, LeBron is a hero in a city that needs one more than any city. He has so much power. He alone can bring a whole city together and give the people hope. However, even if he brings Cleveland a championship, if he ever leaves when his contract is up, the city may crumble. This is a fate I hope I never see. 

Jackie Robinson

I found an article by Hank Aaron published in Time Magazine in 1999 that talks about what Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier meant to him and  the impact it would have on professional baseball forever. It was a feature story about the top 100 most influential heroes and icons. The article was called "Jackie Robinson: He thrilled fans, shattered baseball's color barrier and changed the face of the nation". In the article Hank Aaron talks about the first time he saw Jackie Robinson as he was passing through his hometown of Mobile Alabama when he was 14. Robinson talked of segregation to the black crowd that came out to see him. Hank Aaron said a lot of people talk about a person who is bigger than life, but to him the only person he has known who truly was is Jackie Robinson. Aaron talks about how Robinson was bigger than all of the segregation and hate that was directed towards him. His perseverance opened the door for many more black players. If Robinson would have retaliated against a fan or against other players it might have set back African Americans from becoming more of a part of the game. Hank Aaron thinks nobody else could have put up with what he did while playing for the Dodgers. 

Aaron talks about how Robinson was different from some of his other heroes that didn't let the color of their skin stop them. He compared Robinson to Joe Louis. The only difference was that Louis was competing against white men while Robinson competed with them. Aaron goes on to talk about the steps Robinson took after his baseball career was over to get more equality in sports and in America. To Hank Aaron, and probably many other players and people, Jackie Robinson was one of the most inspirational people they could ever know. 

College Sports in the National Arena: NCAA Basketball Tournament

With the NCAA tournament come and gone it once again showed no lack of upsets, excitement and surprise. Every year the NCAA college basketball tournament turns in more viewers and followers than any other sporting event in the country. I think the NCAA basketball tournament is what makes college sports, or any sport for that matter great. Its the unpredictability and not knowing what will happen. No other sport shows this as much as the NCAA tournament. 

With the exception of last year when all four number one seeds from each region made the Final Four, there is an upset sometime in the tournament over a number one seed who is supposed to make the Final Four. Upsets are what make the tournament fun to watch. One of the most exciting tournaments to watch was when George Mason made the Final Four. Everybody jumped on their bandwagon and became fans of this Cinderella team. It is also good for the school. Research shows that when a schools makes the tournament or does well, enrollment goes up. It's like the Flutie effect when Doug Flutie of Boston College completed the Hail Mary pass in the final seconds to beat Miami. The next year enrollment at BC went up. What makes the tournament great though isn't what it does for the school but what it does for the fans. When else can you watch four very important games simultaneously and be as interested in one as you are any other? Even if you know nothing about college basketball you can still fill out a bracket and do as well as a supposed expert. That's what is so intriguing and fun about the tournament. There is no other time of year like March Madness. 

The start of the merger: Joe Namath

When I think of the first really flashy professional football player it came way before 'Neon' Deion or Michael Irvin or Terrell Owens. The player who set the bar for all players following him was Joe Namath. What may have started him on this path was when he was selected by the New York Jets of the AFL for an incredible $420,000. It could have been the Lincoln Continental he received with his contract also. Namath's nickname was "Broadway Joe" and it made sense. He was very flashy with his fur coats and many women. His fame became more after he guaranteed and delivered a victory over the heavily favored Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl III. But it wasn't any of this that Namath should be most famous for. It should be that he may be responsible for the Super Bowl all together.

When Namath signed his huge contract in 1965 with the New York Jets of the AFL it may have sparked the beginning of the merger of the AFL and NFL. That year Namath was drafted by the older and more powerful NFL team the St. Louis Cardinals. Namath refused to join the older and bigger league and signed with the New York Jets in the AFL. Three years later the NFL started to notice the large rookie contracts players were signing in both leagues. They were afraid to get in a cost and bidding war so they invited the AFL to merge with them. Joe Namath may be bigger than his stats, his guarantee, and his Super Bowl win. His biggest accomplishment, and possibly biggest sports feat ever, is being the catalyst for the AFL/NFL merger and eventually the Super Bowl.

Women's sports being overshadowed

It seems that women's sports are overlooked ad accomplishments by women's teams sometimes go unrecognized whereas there male counterparts are much more glorified in their success than they are. The example I want to look at is this year's Connecticut Lady Huskies and their more than impressive 39-0 championship season. However, the women's national championship game that pitted the Huskies against the Louisville Cardinal couldn't even be seen on national television. They put it on ESPN, which is actually a step up when most of the tournament coverage was seen only on ESPN2. 

I would find this as an insult as anybody who follows UConn or women's college basketball. For a team to go 39-o, which is the best record any collegiate team has ever accomplished, and get very little recognition for it is absurd. Say the same school, UConn, and their men's basketball team went 39-0, you wouldn't stop hearing about it and they would be mentioned as one of the greatest teams of all time. By the way, the Lady Huskies beat every opponent they faced by 10 or more points all season. These accomplishments should not go overlooked. 

The college football coach

Being a former college football player, be it at a small school, I think there has been a shift in coaching styles throughout the years. In the beginning there was Knute Rockne. Rockne was the first coach to instill the idea in his players as a coach and a mentor as well as a friend. The coaches job was not only to teach them and coach them to win games but to guide them into becoming a man. However, as college football got to be more of a spectacle and such a great importance was put on winning there seemed to be a shift. Coaches were more focused on pushing their players to their limits and doing whatever it took to win. Great examples of coaches like this were the famed "Bear" Bryant and Woody Hayes. Though these coaches have gone down in history as some of the greatest of all time, they weren't really know for their charismatic and lovable personalities. These coaches were known to really push their players and a lot of time be hated by their players because of the extent to which they were being exerted. 

Nowadays it feels as if there has been a shift back to a more traditional and charismatic coach like that of Rockne. From personal experience I have seen this. When I played in college the main goal of our coach before even winning games was to shape his players into men. He put a high importance on faith and character. During the recruiting process he made it known that these were his goals and that he looked forward to his recruit being a part of something great  during his weekly phone calls. I also see this same style in coaches like Jim Tressel from Ohio State and Pete Carroll from USC. They seem to really care about their players not only based on their ability but their characters. These coaches develop close personal relationships with their players and have a very clean and fun-loving image to the media. While you can say their styles may seem different, they both seem to evolve around personal relationships and building character. In these ways I think the college football coach has transformed back into the ideals of Knute Rockne and the "unique formula".

Sports Heroes

I know this post is kind of late but I need to catch up.
When I think of sports heroes the first name that comes to my mind is Babe Ruth. I think there are many reasons we can consider him a hero in sports. First of all is his upbringing and youth. Being an orphan and not having a very good childhood Ruth epitomized what it meant to live the American Dream. That is success without being born into it and it not just being given to you. I think a lot of people can relate to this as being the American Dream. Maybe not having as much success or fame or riches as Ruth but living a very comfortable life relative to where they started. Also I think people liked the fact that he was an out of shape man and didn't seem very athletic. These factors gave everyday ordinary people hope for more in their lives.
It is kind of strange and difficult to imagine the sports stars of today being heralded as heroes by later generations. It seems that no athlete today or even in the last 25 years has accomplished or will accomplish the kinds of things the Babe did. He shattered records and rewrote the books. Today there is just too much competition out there. I think the only players that may be close to being considered sports heroes one day are Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods. They have already established themselves as dominating their respective game as Ruth did. I just wonder how a player like Babe Ruth will be looked upon after many more generations of players come and go in each sport. Hopefully he will always get the same respect and be regarded as the same hero he always has been.