Win Or Lose, LeBron James Is The King Of Hoop

I was mostly being melodramatic when I dared to compare the LeBron James comeback on Golden State as his Muhammad Ali, Rumble in the Jungle mimick- for memory sake.

Is LeBron ready to shock the world? Boomaye!

Those who hate LeBron mostly hate him because he did a quiet version of what Muhammad Ali did when assuming himself the greatest because he had all the assets to think himself so. LeBron is called a linebacker playing basketball by his detractors, as though he should be apologizing for the size and skills he combines.

No, he is not the biggest to ever play or the best ball handler ever either, but he has combined these two gifts in a way that makes you appreciate it or envy it to hatred. LeBron embraced it, did his best to master his basketball duality from the very start of his career, and used it to do unseen things in the game.

He called himself King before most would accept him as a real deal. Now he is such a real deal, when debating who's best, the only names of significance we consider with LeBron anymore are the two guys who we call the best ever to do it in Jordan or Kobe.

Kobe Bryant left the league reminding us of his unique status in the league, because we needed that reminder after so many years of LeBron James playing on the last day of the NBA season. Love or hate him, you can't escape him.

We could speculate on how many times in a row MJ would have been in the finals if not for baseball, but he's still the undisputed GOAT (greatest of all time), so that won't matter until LeBron...or someone passes Jordan by.

In time, even Joe Louis or Marciano were supplanted as the GOAT, but not as quickly as Ali fans would like; nor was the attempt to sell us on Tyson over Ali ever useful for anything except to make us doubt Tyson and use his finish as a blemish against his masterful start to his career.


James won't easily replace MJ, but could solidify his legacy with a win in Oakland, though I doubt history will be as cruel as current critics are. Win or lose, he'll have the benefit of beating Steph or adding a real feather in the cap of Steph's own legacy.

Either way, great players are made from great competition. Steph has time to overcome this moment, but the signs are pointing to Steph simply being a good piece on a great team, a team he'll need desperately if he hopes to return to the finals as often as LeBron has.

In reality, Klay Thompson has out performed Steph as has last year's MVP Andre Iguodala and Draymond Green, the Warriors actual most valuable player.

Steph and the rest of the Warriors are on the verge of losing at home and having to point to fatigue from the OKC series to avoid blaming the 73 game regular season record chase.  LeBron's win will make his haters blame the NBA for Draymond's nut fetish, Iggy's back, Bogut's exit, or 80's style non-whistle's instead of giving credit to the rope-a-dope LeBron is doing to GS.

In these finals, he is leading every important stat among every player on both teams, and deserves to be the series MVP win or lose, just like last year when they didn't have the courage to go there, so gave it to Iggy as the only option that wouldn't embarrass LeBron or the Warriors.

Twice in two years, the player on the losing side could deserve the MVP. This is assuming that the Warriors don't have the worst meltdown in NBA Finals history of course.

If LeBron can do this impossible feat, he must be the King, just like said.  If it takes us years to acknowledge that fact, that too will be par for the course for skeptical critics. Once we crown a GOAT, we don't often acknowledge the new GOAT until long after they're not playing anymore.

I'm rooting for LeBron to bring glory to Cleveland and shake the haters off while doing it. What I'm not rooting for is LeBron to prove, once and for all, that he is the best player in the league because there is no need for all that.

That is a question that has been unequivocally answered, until Steph steps up or LeBron steps down from his throne.

He Who Lives By The AR-15, Dies By It

I'm not trying to intentionally be numb to
all the death and mayhem in Orlando, I'm just at a loss from a world that keeps rushing out to buy AR-15's whenever another lunatic uses one to terrorize US again. It's hard for me to imagine how the murderers and the potential victims will all sneak weapons into church or the club for impending gun battles.

Depending on where you stand on this issue, Dylann Roof is not a terrorist, and Omar Mateen was more than just an American tormented by issues of religion and sexuality. He was an ISIS operative.

I don't really believe either ideas to be accurate, but it is the best way to explain the unexplained mystery of domestic terrorism and the NRA.

As it stands, the NRA has millions of people running to seek a solution that has yet to solve anything. While the original purchase is well tracked, those panicked gun purchases can eventually  be legally transferred to anyone, sight unseen, through online transactions or gun show sales that are not tracked or regulated.

I don't want to be numb to death, but what hope is there when the same people who totally get the importance of tracking car exchanges, or regulations around flying so we don't have terrorism in flight, consider better gun registration and a terror watch list ban as an assault on the right to bear arms.

The notion of rights being more important than responsible ownership only applies to guns in America. Flying in an essentially non lethal airplane demands way more invasion of our privacy. Nude xrays in fact. Guns remain a real addiction that only God knows when or if we'll ever be cured from them.

Gun advocates insist that we must return to the days of the wild west, when villains had to worry about vigilantism. To the best of my knowledge, villains were not dissuaded by all the legalized carrying that we used to allow, nor do they avoid robbing banks now just because of known armed resistance.

As things stand, our greatest obstacle remains the fact that any sensible legislation goes on the Obama legacy and represents the first loss the NRA has seen in years. Which means, this is not about sensibility and reasonable laws that will help US try something more than making gun sellers filthy rich, it is about politics, power and leverage that gun nuts are not going to relinquish willingly.

Our current conditions would almost encourage the NRA to back ISIS, since their mayhem is so damn profitable to the cause of gun sales overall.

If they have lassoed the Socialist, Bernie Sanders, solidly into their corner, who is not an NRA sycophant? Whenever war breaks out, they funnel firearms to both sides. Apparently, they are now doing the same for both sides of domestic terrorism, yet WE are still waiting for just one of these gun toting good guys to bring their fear inspired, self defense assault weapons to the club or church like these killers do.

No. I'm not just numb, I'm defeated because the 2nd Amendment benefits the gun dealers and the gun addicts way too much. Neither is ready or willing to see the wide reaching impact of their gun lust, and congress has just enough addicts or friends of the dealers to insure status quo.

Until further notice, every attempt to turn away from this endless cycle of self destruction will look like that intervention when the addict just isn't ready to change.

For now, I'm leaving this intervention for the rest of you to deal with. I'll return when the patient stops shaking and finally sits still long enough to listen to reason.

How Can America Be Great Without The Greatest?

I wont attempt to share some personal claim of inspiration from the great Muhammad Ali. We were all inspired in one way or another. In fact, his life and death inspire me even now as I reflect on why did he die now and not sooner-or later, and what can we learn from his passing?

The unexplained success of Donald Trump with his odd way with women proves that misogyny has not yet grown as detestable as it should have been way back when Ali was courting multiple women and having children by a few. Our slow evolving morays gave Ali societal support as he became our honest gigolo hero with the temerity to share his entire life with us. As a result, we know of his various women and offspring, and can fill in the blanks on the lifestyle that might have produced many more if our minds need to imagine all of that.

The fact that a balanced biography inspires us so much upon the death of our stars is probably because hidden, sordid details of our own lives are the primary benefit of being unknown.  It's like a soul bearing measure of self defense that allows most of us to forgive ourselves of hidden hell as we chew and digest the sordid side of stars.

With Ali, he knew what we all came to understand;that his life was not some hidden treasure, but an American treasure to be admired throughout the world-good, bad or ugly- and to be used  accordingly until he died.

If you are 50 and under, it's important to remember what we did and didn't get to see from Ali.  The best of his skill was seen by those older than 50, while the just under 50 folks got the return to the ring version that was more about the cause than the craft.

Until he could no longer speak, he reminded us how strong and quick footed and fast and pretty he was, but when he first said it, he also added the words"I must be the greatest", as if he was deducing something that he would entertain the counter arguments if you had one.

Before long, no one ever argued anymore.

Ali didn't ask to be the greatest.  he assumed a face and personality and a skill set so perfect for the times that he must have been meant to sacrifice himself- and his brain eventually- to inspire change.

Was Ali the greatest boxer ever?  Every great champion who isn't named Joe Frazier seems to think so. After three epic bouts with Frazier, Ali lived and died okay with Joe having the voice to say he was better while he had the rest of us to say maybe not.

People over 50 started the debate over his greatness. Just under 50's were the small children like me that cried when Joe won that first fight and when Foreman crushed his ribs before the rope-a-dope brought us to tears of jubilant joy. Many people over 50 cried too, but some digested Clay like chalk dust, unwilling to even acknowledge his religious conversion or name change for years after he no longer answered to Cassius.

They also argued Joe Louis and Rocky Marciano as true GOATS until one day the arguing just stopped happening so much. Eventually, we all had to analyze him on a weighted scale after he told us who he was before being stripped down to ground zero, only to rise up again and again. Good, Bad or Ugly, he told no lies.

I didn't cry for my hero until I reminded myself of that Joe Frazier fight, and even then, only in memory of the tears I shed as a very young kid watching an aging hero do exactly what heroes do.

Get back up and press on.

I had no sorrow because Ali died as Ali lived. The man that inspired us in the ring passed on moons ago from brain trauma and the debilitating impact of his Parkinson encased shell.  Yet even then, he understood the power of his persona and milked it towards every moment of worldwide influence that he could muster showing us all how to give everything you have until you have no more to give, and then give that too.

He fought Parkinson's and stayed in our midst because we needed him, but also because he needed to hear from the legions of influences that his life created.  The death of his physical prowess and speech gave us a fortunate and unique opportunity to talk to a man the way we usually only do when they are dead and gone. His mass appeal is much greater, but similar to that of Prince when you think about it. Both remained intensely true to themselves until the time that we came around to understand and love them for the genuine genius they offered without wavering.

These death's and this odd year had me thinking.

Is it just a coincidence that we lose Prince and Ali in the year of Trump?  Given the fact that there is only one native, might this wall really uncover our stifled greatness- and that American judge from Indiana whose family came from Mexico really is mad about the wall- or might there be a chance that America's greatness does not come from our ill begotten soil or current territory lines, but from the unbelievable people WE the people produce of every national origin?  Isn't our greatness the triumph of the immigrant and the unified demand that all nations tear down walls instead of build them up?

If there is a need for a return to greatness, it would be great if we fully appreciate those who pursue and achieve greatness, by modeling their sacrifice to society before their lives become nothing but a memory.

 Where have all the heroes gone?