a Greater Glory

The world we live in is interesting to say the very least.  I remember my father always telling me that a man is only as good as his word.  In other words if you say you are going to do something, make sure you do it.  Jesus believed this same idea as seen in Matthew 5:33-37:

Again, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘Do not break your oath, but keep the oaths you have made to the Lord.’ But I tell you, Do not swear at all: either by heaven, for it is God’s throne; or by the earth, for it is his footstool; or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make even one hair white or black. Simply let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No’; anything beyond this comes from the evil one.

It seems that this idea of letting your “Yes” be “Yes”, and your “No”, “No” has been forgotten in professional sports, specifically the NBA.  Just yesterday there were reports of LeBron James telling free-agent Trevor Ariza  that he would be staying in Cleveland past this year.  Today, there have been reports that this is not necessarily true.  If LeBron said he was going to stay he needs to step up and say, “Yes that is what I said”.  Unfortunately that will never happen.  If LeBron James stepped up right now and said “Listen, I am planning on testing free agency next year, but Cleveland is my first choice” would anyone have a problem with that? It could possibly affect some of the free-agent signings they make this year, but there is always a possibility that something could happen where LeBron never plays again.

There are numerous examples in the NBA where yes no longer means yes. Joe Dumars could not give Avery Johnson a straight yes on whether he would retain him past one year (see “When coaching isn’t enough” for more on Dumars), so Avery pulled his name from consideration for the Detroit Pistons job.  All Dumars needed to do was be straight with Avery and say, “You know I will probably be looking for another coach in a years time, you are more of a stop gap for this year, until 2010.  We are going to try and make a run at LeBron James and I want to bring in a coach that fits LeBron’s style”.  Hedo Turkoglu went back on his acceptance of the Portland Trailblazer’s offer and decided instead to sign with the Toronto Raptors.  Carlos Boozer did a similar thing to Cleveland in 2004.  Clay Bennett the owner of what is now the Oklahoma City Thunder originally had said he wanted to keep the Seattle Sonics in Seattle, when he was really just lying to keep people off of his back.  The examples could go on and on in the NBA.

Obviously not everyone will follow the idea of letting your “Yes” mean “Yes” and your “No” mean “No”, but how different would the NBA, professional sports, and the world look if people followed the simple idea of keeping to your word, even if it means having to do something that is unpopular or not what you personally might want to do. What do you think?

Being an athlete who excels in professional sports is tough, maybe one of the most difficult things in the world.  That is why there are so few of them.  But something that may be even more difficult than being a professional athlete, is being the coach of those professional athletes.  In no other job are you criticized for the failure of your team and then forgotten about when your team does well.  Being the coach of a professional team is a job that requires you to shoulder the blame when things aren’t going well and then step into the background when your team is doing well. Coaches must love to coach and must be willing to do just that, coach.

While coaching is important, it seems that we have now entered a time in professional sports where a coach can no longer coach or attempt to bring about change on a team.  Typically when a coaching change is made it is a chance for players to hear another person’s voice and allow for the new coach to do some things differently, but how often is to often to change? A New York Times article highlighted the short leash that NBA coaches are on, that article can be read here.

Since when did coaching in any major sport become something that changes when the weather patterns do?  An interesting study although extremely time consuming would be to look at the number of coaching changes that have occurred in the major sports (football, baseball, basketball, and hockey) over the past five years. For basketball Jerry Sloan has been coaching since 1988. During that time there have been over 225 coaching changes.  Did you read that number??? That means that there is on average 11 job changes every season.  Remember, there are only 30 teams in the NBA so that is a little over a 1/3 of the teams every season.

By no way am I saying that every coach should be kept, but the firing of Michael Curry that occurred yesterday is a bit frustrating. Curry wasn’t a great coach after only getting the team to a 39-43 record, but look at what he was given.  He had to deal with Allen Iverson in a mid-season trade that was anything but beneficial to the Pistons. Joe Dumars is quickly becoming the Matt Millen of the NBA with 5 coaches now in 9 years.  Dumars needs to make sure he gets it right with this next coach.  Typically, the most successful franchises are the ones who “stay the course”.  In the NFL you have the Pittsburgh Steelers, MLB you have the NY Yankees, in the NBA you have the Utah Jazz.  Does consistency mean you will win and make the playoffs every year?  Of course not, but there is something to be said about consistency.  All I am asking is that given the current state of our country, economy, and speed of life, one would think that consistency and staying the course would be appropriate and important.