The clever hopes expire on a low dishonest football season

For me, the 2010 football season featured less fun and joy than any season since, gosh, maybe ever. The Vikings disappointed grandly. My wife quit watching the games with me when the Vikings cut Randy Moss. My fantasy teams sucked (my Hazelweird team appears to have peaked in Week 17, just in time to avoid last place). The season featured many things against my rooting interests (the Packers are in the playoffs, the Patriots are dominant again), and even the snowy collapse of Thunderdome. The only things to consider now is where to go from here.

Joe Webb. Sure, maybe this game was a buzzkill, but we still know what we knew: Webb has a lot of work to do to be a quality starter, but the potential is there. The Vikings should not, in my opinion, draft a QB in the first round of the draft. This is partly because there are glaring needs elsewhere (the Vikes need 2-4 new starting defensive backs, depending on how things go, and also need offensive line improvement), but mostly that it would be pointless to have two young, inexperienced, talented QBs on the roster competing for the chance to start. Webb certainly deserves a spot on the roster, and far better to bring in a veteran QB for him to play behind or to compete against for the job. A veteran QB (by which I mean an experienced QB around the middle of his career, not a Childress-special end-of-career-stopgap solution, which would be somebody like Donovan McNabb or Matt Hasselbeck) available in an offseason is going to have baggage. It might be somebody in the range of Kevin Kolb-Rex Grossman-Sage Rosenfels-Kyle Orton-Carson Palmer-Matt Leinart-Jason Campbell. If you don't like those names, tell me a better realistic possibility (and some of those guys aren't even going to be available).

Leslie Frazier. I think keeping Frazier is a good thing. As I've said, when you hire a new coach, you try to project based on his resume and personality whether he will be a successful coach in your particular situation. Zygi Wilf had a chance to actually see what Frazier could do in this situation, and I think it would have been difficult for Frazier, in these circumstances, to do a better job than he has done. Now he has a tough job, I think: telling current assistant coaches--a few weeks ago his colleagues--that the team needs to go in a different direction offensively.

New offensive approach. There is a load of skill position talent on the roster, and the Vikings need to utilize it better than they have been. The Vikings have unique talents like Adrian Peterson (still a potential all-timer, whose potential has yet to be fulfilled) and Percy Harvin (a versatile player that can be moved all over the field and asked to do all sorts of things with the ball). Can they find a creative, adaptive offensive coordinator who can find ways to utilize their talents? I hope they don't keep the same offensive coaching staff and scheme.

Aging veterans. The Vikings should keep Antoine Winfield on the roster until it's clear he can't do anything anymore--he's too savvy a player not to be useful. But the Vikes might be cutting ties with some other starters.

The year long weaknesses: secondary and offensive line. Because the Vikings need to add multiple quality starters in these areas, this is no quick fix.

Who can they keep? Chad Greenway? Ray Edwards? Sidney Rice? Will they be Vikings next year? I hope so.

Goodbye, suckers.

But I won't be here to blog about it anymore. No drama: I'm just wore out from five season of writing about this team, and my time and energies are more and more devoted to other important things. I just want to follow and watch the team, not think of what to say about it (frankly, I've scrambled for time this year, and feel my writing has frequently been pretty incomplete and scattered). I leave you as I started with A.E. Housman's poem "Loveliest of trees, the cherry now." With each of my allotted years that goes by, one chance to see the Vikings win the Super Bowl passes by unfulfilled. Maybe next year. Always, eternally, forever, maybe next year.

Thanks for reading.

Brett Favre as King Lear

Numerous pundits have compared Brett Favre to Hamlet, because of Favre's indecision over retirement and Hamlet's apparent indecision over what to do about his father's murder. But I think that comparison is too easy, not quite accurate, and not terribly insightful. But a comparison to another Shakespeare hero, King Lear, actually offers some real insight, or at least a consistent, developed interpretation, of Brett Favre the man and football player.

It's not indecision: it's a full embrace of the current emotion.

In Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human, Harold Bloom argues that Lear the man "is all feeling," suggesting, I think, that whatever emotion Lear currently feels, he embraces with the totality of his person.

Might this explain Favre's frequent candor with the media, his long-time musings on possible retirements, and especially his displays of sincere, authentic tears? When Favre announced his retirement from the Packers and cried, that was real emotion: he seemed to fully feel it. But the emotion changed, and when it did, Favre fully embraced that new emotion.

And after all, King Lear begins with Lear announcing his retirement, a decision he will very quickly regret.

Love me, love me, say that you love me!

Lear is a man who, in old age, gathers all the important people of the country together, tells his daughters that he is handing them the kingdom...and then insists that they make public displays telling him how much they love him.

Does Brett Favre manipulate the media to stay in constant public attention? Maybe, maybe not. But some have suggested that when Brett Favre made his first retirement announcement, he hoped that the Green Bay Packers would express a deep desire for him to come back, and was irked at the way he perceived they pushed him out when he did want to come back (as Lear was irked when Cordelia wouldn't make a showy display like her sisters: is going to play for the Packers' rival the emotional equivalent of banishing Cordelia?). And it does seem in 2010 that he sent text messages to teammates pointing to retirement, perhaps in an effort to get them to express their love and longing for him. And he did only come back for 2010 when teammates showed up at his home to beg him to come back. He felt loved and needed, in the way Lear badly needed to feel loved and needed.

Aye, every inch a king.

Lear has a king's conviction that he can do whatever he wants, his way. That might give us some insight into Brett Favre, whether he is throwing a terrible pass into coverage and forcing an awful turnover, avoiding training camp, or calling Jenn Sterger.

Monumental Greatness, and Monumental Stupidity.

There is no question that King Lear has the capacity for greatness, that he has been a great and respected king. But as Kent warns him and as the Fool never tires of reminding him, Lear also has the capacity for utterly stupid foolishness.

With all the all-time cumulative records, with a plethora of 30+ TD pass seasons, with two and a half MVPs, there's no question Brett Favre is one of the greatest QBs that ever played. But with the all-time interception record, with a plethora of 20+ INT seasons, with a number of playoff games with multiple interceptions or game-altering end-of-the game interceptions, Favre too has the capacity for failure.

Hamlet? Nah.

In Hamlet, Hamlet is in an awful situation: his dad has died and his mother quickly marries his uncle who takes the throne, he discovers that his uncle probably murdered his father (he's not quite sure), but he doesn't know the extent of other peoples' (including his own mother's!) involvement in the crime or coverup, he has all sorts of conflicting desires, is surrounded by untrustworthy people that he has every reason to distrust, seems to be getting betrayed by everybody he knows, he's constantly being spied on, and the one thing he wanted to do (leave!) he was explicitly forbidden to do. If Hamlet is indecisive, he can hardly be blamed for that. What is the right decision? What is he supposed to do? And how is he supposed to pull it off when his enemy is the guy in charge of the whole damn country, with all sorts of power, and perhaps all sorts of allies who are aiding him? What advice would you give to Hamlet given his situation?

Hamlet's indecision is overrated, and I don't think it offers us much insight into Brett Favre. King Lear, the emotional king, longing to be loved, with his capacity for both brilliance and foolishness? There, I think, is an insightful comparison.

Remains

part one in a sporadic offseason of blogging.

I spent the evening rubbing raw some wounds that had spent two weeks scabbing over, so if you don't mind, I have a few things to write. I feel like we gave it to the Saints, and the Saints took it from the Colts.

If you're curious
2009 marks the 12th time the Minnesota Vikings lost a playoff game to the eventual Super Bowl champion ('69, '71, '73, '74, '76, '77, '82, '87, '88, '89, '99, '09).

You might be surprised to learn that PV thought about the Minnesota Vikings while reading a poem.
From Milton's Paradise Lost:

I give not heaven for lost: from this descent
Celestial virtues rising, will appear
More glorious and more dread than from no fall,

Satan is trying to talk himself into something here. After being cast out of heaven during a disastrous failure to wage war against the throne of God, Satan suggests that when they finally do defeat God and take back heaven (a total impossibility), it will be much more glorious than if they had won without falling first.

This is what some might say to console Viking fans. Chin up: after all these disappointments, it will just be that much sweeter when the Vikings finally do win the Super Bowl. But there are two problems with this consolation. First, why the certainty that it will eventually happen? Ask Cubs fans how certain you can be that your favorite team will win it all in your lifetime. Second, weren't there already enough disappointments that would have made 2009 epically sweet? What, 48 years of existence with no championship wasn't enough? An 0-4 Super Bowl record wasn't enough? The endings of '75, or '87, (or if you'll only allow me the disappointments I've experienced) of '98 (especially!), of '00, of '03, weren't enough? We needed a more disappointment in 2009 to make it even sweeter in some mythical hopeful future?

I don't ACTUALLY believe this (not really)...
Some spiritual entities watching over sports won't allow a team to go 0-5 in the Super Bowl. There were three 0-4 teams: the Vikings, the Broncos, and the Bills. The Broncos weren't allowed to go back to their fifth Super Bowl until they were ready to win it, and the Vikings and Bills won't be allowed back until they're ready to win it.

If I think I took it bad...
My wife spent the last two weeks telling anybody who brought up football that she didn't want to talk about it. I thought I had used avoidance and distraction as a defense mechanism: she turned it into an art form (when we turned to The Soup to get away from our football thoughts, Joel McHale started with a joke about Brett Favre throwing an interception in the Puppy Bowl, so it hasn't exactly been easy to forget about). She really might have been more disappointed than I was. She barely looked up while I was watching the Super Bowl (we've watched each Super Bowl together since the Buccaneers beat the Raiders, which, considering the current states of those teams, certainly seems a long time ago), but she's already excited to watch the draft, which somewhat flummoxes me (she's hopeful, I guess). And she's currently encouraging me to keep up this blog.

And now the Saints won
I've avoided allowing myself to think about what I'd be feeling tonight if things had gone just a little differently (like, say, no 12 men in the huddle penalty). Luckily, my imagination keeps that thought abstract and distant, not quite so close to reality as it actually was. But usually after the Super Bowl I start thinking "Someday. Someday. Maybe even next year." I have trouble doing that now. I try to tell myself things though (we've got Percy Harvin and Sidney Rice!). And there are a lot of teams that won the Super Bowl the year AFTER their apparent best shot (the '96 Broncos were the AFC #1 seed but won the Super Bowl in '97,the '04 Steelers were a 15-1 #1 seed but won the Super Bowl in '05, the '05 Colts were a 14-2 #1 seed but won the Super Bowl in '06). But it feels as far away as ever.

Winter
It's constantly cold, and it's quickly dark. Another year without a Viking championship. It's Minnesota. But the Timberwolves are kind of coming around? They've won four straight, right? Right?

(public domain image--by William Blake--from Wikipedia).

National Friday League (week 15)

Viking-Panther Preview
2009 Carolina Panthers
The Panthers are 5-8: offensively, they rank 25th in points scored and 21st in yardage; defensively, they rank 19th in points allowed and 15th in yards allowed.

If you look closer at the stats, they're sort of an interesting bad team: they've got good pass defense but terrible run defense (they give up 4.6 yards per attempt), and offensively they've got a good running game but a terrible passing game. Frankly, I don't think a team with a bad passing game can beat the 2009 Minnesota Vikings. Even if the Panthers have success running, they're still going to be required to sustain drives with some passing conversions, and I don't think Matt Moore is going to get it done. I don't think the Panthers will complete many deep passes (the Viking pass rush can make that difficult), and they aren't good enough throwing the ball to consistently complete short and mid-range passes on third down.

But there is one player to fear: Julius Peppers. Peppers can take over and dominate a single game just as Jared Allen can. The Vikings will need to be effective blocking him in pass protection, not just to win the game but to protect Favre from getting roughed up. I mean, I was feeling comfortable about watching the Vikings handle a 5-8 team, until I realized "Crap, we have to face Julius Peppers." He can be a dominant force, who can change everything about the game.

The Vikings and Poetry
I've written about this poem before, and about Housman and the Vikings before. So I repeat myself.

On the last day of my literature class, I close with poetry that is about art. Mostly we discuss Percy Shelley's "Ozymandias" and Rainer Maria Rilke's "The Archaic Torso of Apollo." I'm trying to bring some meaning to the course: each poet explores meaning in a statue, and I wonder how that can help us to understand how we're taking meaning from the literature we read.

I also assign A.E. Housman's "Terence, this is stupid stuff." In it, one voice addresses the poet, complaining that his poetry is too melancholy, and it should be more fun. The poet responds that if you want to have fun, then you should probably try drinking instead. Poetry, Housman suggests, has a different purpose:

Therefore, since the world has still
Much good, but much less good than ill,
And while the sun and moon endure
Luck's a chance, but trouble's sure,
I'd face it as a wise man would,
And train for ill and not for good.

Poetry, perhaps, is what we can use to prepare for the troubles we're sure to face in this world. Literature, perhaps, teaches us to know that we will suffer, teaches us to cope with our suffering, perhaps even allows us to find meaning in our suffering.

It is at this point I can't help talking about the Minnesota Vikings. We know things usually end badly--they always have before. When the Vikings are successful during the season, many a Viking fan thinks and may say "Alas, they're just going to blow it in the playoffs." We expect failure, and we prepare for failure. I like to think it is the environment that conditions us this way: we suffer the inevitable winter with icy stoicism, and so we are prepared to suffer the inevitable bad end of the Viking season. But we know that a happy ending to this story is chancy business; we're ready for the sure trouble.

Every year I think "This could be the year. This could be the year the Vikings finally win the Super Bowl." So far, I've always been wrong. The odds are against us, of course: 31 of 32 teams won't win the Super Bowl this year. And so I have to remind myself of Housman's lesson: "Luck's a chance, and trouble's sure." If we're wise, we need to prepare for ill. We can't put too much of our emotional well-being into the team, because the odds just aren't good.

Cheering for an 11-2 team that has a great quarterback, great offense, great defense, great special teams, it's hard to bring myself back down. Sometimes I need A.E. Housman to do that for me.

Link
At SI, Joe Posnanski on the Vikes.

Weekend
Meager fare this week, I know, but as Bob Newhart might say, I shouldn't even be doing this!

Have a good weekend, everybody. Except Panther and Packer fans.

The Viking season is over. Long live the Vikings.

(this blog wouldn't be this blog if I didn't mark the end of a Viking season with a pompous, pretentious, needlessly introspective post).

If you're like me, you have recently been investing whopping portions of mental and emotional energy into the Minnesota Vikings. It has all seemed imbued with a grandiose sense of something (tragedy? pathos? absurdity?). I've been prone to unwilled fantasies, dreams of all the bizarre luck and unlikely scenarios and superb play that would spur this team to a championship run. And today I wake up, blinking, looking around at everything else in the world, realizing there is so much else in the world, and realizing it has been there all along. There are other things to look at. Other things to do. Other things to dream about.

That doesn't mean the fantasies are done. No, the irrational hope that the Vikings will win a championship in our lifetime will kindle new forms for our dreams. Those dreams will still rise up during cold winter nights and hot summer days. We're still Viking fans today, and we will be Viking fans tomorrow. But somehow the season ending also removes a burden. Watching a team with a stifling, dominating defense is enjoyable, but the frustration of watching a team without a quarterback capable of winning playoff games (but trying to convince oneself that maybe the team will win some anyway) won't be missed. Yesterday the Metrodome was filled with loud, buoyant energy, but I came home physically exhausted, emptied. That energy doesn't need to be called upon again for a while; we can blink out at the bright world. Reading a book, going for a walk, playing a game, whatever it is you do: these are no longer things to do to pass the time between Viking games. They are now the stuff of life.

But the Vikings will play again in 2009. And one more thing: wait till next year.

"Loveliest of trees, the cherry now"
A.E. Housman

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room,
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.

National Friday League, week 15

Viking-Cardinal Preview

Tarvaris Jackson
First let's note the negatives of Tarvaris Jackson (likely) starting over Gus Frerotte. Jackson is not very accurate on deep passes. While this affects the Vikes for only one to three plays per game (it is Brad Childress' offense, after all), it means defenses may not account for the deep pass at all. It also means the Vikes have less chance of moving the ball into scoring position in one play; for an inconsistent offense, putting points on the board keyed by one big play has been helpful. Furthermore, Jackson may take Bernard Berrian out of the game entirely; Berrian has been a threat going deep with Frerotte playing quarterback, but may get fewer targets from Jackson.

Missing Frerotte also means the two-minute offense will struggle (and perhaps disappear entirely).

But, there are several positives.

--Gus Frerotte is tied for the league lead in interceptions; Jackson turns the ball over far less frequently. Frerotte's interceptions have really hurt the Vikes this season--even in victories, his turnovers have kept games close that didn't need to be close. Even if Jackson doesn't make as many positive plays as Frerotte, he may make fewer negative plays.

--Jackson's mobility opens up other plays in the playbook; rollouts can lead to easy yards on passes to Shiancoe, Wade, Taylor, or Peterson.

--Jackson's running ability provides another way to pick up first downs.

--Jackson may take fewer sacks; last season Jackson was sacked half as frequently as the other Viking QBs, and this season Frerotte is getting sacked on 8.8% of his dropbacks. Frerotte's career sack rate is actually better than Jackson's, but at this point Frerotte hangs onto the ball too long; Jackson may find more ways to avoid sacks.

My irrational confidence level is down with Jackson instead of Frerotte; I'd like the Vikes chance better in this game with Frerotte. But as I've suggested, Frerotte is peaked; Jackson may still actually improve. I'm intrigued to see how the team plays with Jackson.

Phoenix

The 'o8 Cards' are 8-5, but they are 3-5 outside the NFC West.

They rank 32nd in rushing yards and rushing yards per attempt; I wonder if they'll even try to run against the stout Viking defense.

They rank 2nd in passing yards, 3rd in passing touchdowns, and 5th in net passing yards per attempt; Larry Fitzgerald, Anquan Boldin, and Steve Breaston have combined for 3,055 yards receiving in 13 games. Expect to complain about Benny Sapp, Cedric Griffin, and Darren Sharper on Sunday.

The Cardinals clinched a division title last week; is there a possibility of a letdown? Such letdowns may be mythical.

Learn about University of Phoenix Stadium. It's a grass turf (retractable grass turf). This worries me: the Vikes have only lost one game on turf this year, and in particular the pass rush seems better on turf.

Adrian Peterson runs with urgency.
Tonight during the Saints-Bears game, a pass got tipped by a defender, and WR Marques Colston reached back to catch the tipped ball, but came up just short. He slowly started walking back to the huddle, before finally half-heartedly swinging his arm as if to say "Ah, darn." It's a reasonable reaction, and one I like in a player. I like even keel guys--don't get too up or too down, stay calm and get ready to continue playing. But it made me think of Adrian Peterson.

How often do we see Adrian Peterson, after being brought down for a short gain, slap the turn hard with angry frustration? It seems he could see the "almost" in the play: there was a chance for a long run, he almost had it, but was just brought down by something small. And when that happens, he expresses a passionate, natural emotion. It's like Peterson wants every play to be successful. He plays with urgency--each play he's running is the most important play there will ever be.

Last season I thought Peterson too frequently tried to break plays out to the sideline for a long gain, only to be brought down for a loss or no gain. This season, he's doing a much better job of churning out positive yards, taking what he can while still looking for big runs. But even though he runs with more patience, he still runs with that urgency. He's still emotionally invested in each play, running it for all he can.

I'm not necessarily saying that Colston's reaction or Peterson's reaction to an "almost" play is better than the other; they are just different approaches. Their reactions do reveal attitudes: Colston just missing on a play and calmly walking back to the huddle to ready for another play, Peterson just missing on a play and expressing his frustration physically. There is something positive to both approaches.

Week 15 Games

There six matchups between .500+ teams this week.

Saints-Bears (alas, Chicago won in overtime)

Buccaneers-Falcons

Vikings-Cardinals

Steelers-Ravens

Broncos-Panthers

Giants-Cowboys

These are obviously not the only games worth watching; a lot of playoff contenders will lose games to non-playoff contenders in the next three weeks. The Vikings are going to Arizona for a December football game--we should remember that much.

Fantasy Narcissism: Kurt Warner

When a player on your fantasy team go against your favorite team, it's lose-lose. Rooting interests are conflicted at some level, conscious or unconscious, however little (my Viking rooting interests far surpass my fantasy rooting interests, obviously). I've still got an outside shot at the Hazelweird Trophy (it's a longshot), and Kurt Warner has been reliably giving my team solid weeks (how I'm in third place with Bernard Berrian and Anthony Gonzalez at WR is a mystery to me). But I'm seriously debating benching Warner against the Vikings this week (in favor of Eli Manning or Matt Schaub). Even in Warner's bad games his fantasy numbers are outstanding, but I still might bench him. I've usually kept my regular fantasy starters in against the Vikings, but the quarterback position seems different. I might not.

I think I love/I think I hate
I Think I Love My Wife is a funny remake of a terrible French movie Chloe in the Afternoon. For some reason, I think about Chris Rock's line at the end of the movie (the movie title) at various times. For example, when my pure evil cat hisses and lunges her claws at my feet as I walk past her, I say to myself, "I think I hate my cat."* So why not start a new feature here: "I think I love/I think I hate." I realize this bears a resemblance to Peter King's "things I think I think" business, but that's coincidental: it's an OK movie I saw years ago that I think of when my demon cat attacks me, not a football writer I don't like.

I think I hate the Minnesota Timberwolves.

I might be happier if they disbanded, or relocated, or even just changed their name and color scheme. I've stopped enjoying thinking about them. I used to take rooting for a terrible team as a point of pride (Ha, I wear a Christian Laettner shirt to school--I'm the awesomest seventh-grader ever!). Now I wish they didn't exist. I don't trust the owner, I don't trust the management, I don't trust the coaching staff, and even though I like some of the players, I feel doomed anyway (if they couldn't win a title with Garnett, who are they going to win a title with?). If the Wolves didn't exist, I would just devote my basketball passion to the UCLA Bruins and probably the Boston Celtics (who I'd probably be rooting for all along if the Wolves had never existed).

I think I hate the Timberwolves.

*I do love my cat. I have to; there are maybe three people in the entire universe that do. Who else is going to love an evil demon cat?

Links

PW and KW will play for a while (Access Vikings 1 and 2, Pioneer Press, Viking Update, PFT)

Advanced NFL Stats' week 15 win probabilities.

Grant's Tomb is skeptical about Tarvaris Jackson.

Defensive Indifference on Tarvaris Jackson.

Bucky Brooks discusses James Harrison (and now has Adrian Peterson #1 on his MVP list). See my current MVP candidates here. Drew Brees did a lot of stinking Thursday against the Bears, but in the fourth quarter completed a huge pass on 3rd and 15, followed shortly by a go-ahead touchdown on 3rd and 7. Brees made the "clutch" plays, then events outside his control took over. The Saint defense let the Bears drive into field goal range. The Saints lost the coin toss. In overtime, pass interference was called on a deep pass, and the Bears won the game. If events outside Brees' control occurred differently, he'd be praised for his clutch finish and still be an MVP contender; instead, he likely doesn't win MVP because the Saints likely don't make the playoffs. I've been excluding Kurt Warner because he plays in a terrible division (his team is 5-0 in the division, 3-5 outside it) and he's aided by some great teammates (Fitzgerald, Boldin, and Breaston are probably the best WR trio in the league), but if the Cards win out and Warner plays well, I can see him as an MVP.

At Football Outsiders, Mike Tanier overviews "run to win" and looks at the running games of several good teams.

In his Power Rankings, Don Banks refers to Visanthe Shiancoe's "notoriously bad hands." If this statement were made three months ago, it would be true--Shiancoe dropped a lot of passes last season and continued to drop passes early this season. As the season has progressed, however, Shiancoe has been catching the ball fairly consistently. Indeed, according to Football Outsiders, Shiancoe is the third-ranked TE in DYAR, second-ranked TE in DVOA, and has a catch percentage of 67%.

Weekend
When I was growing up, I mocked my parents' penchant for making so much chili in the winter. Now I have chili all the time (vegetarian chili, of course). It's great for Sundays, and then it reheats throughout the week. Cycle of life: as the hooligan voice says in Tony Harrison's poem "v.," "now yer live wi' all yer once detested..." Now I live with chili all winter.

Enjoy your weekend everybody.

Keats and the Vikings

Today I was teaching John Keats' "Ode on a Grecian Urn," and the discussion naturally turned to the Minnesota Vikings.

In the poem, the poet looks upon images on an urn and reflects upon it.  This passage in particular sent me on a tangent:

"Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
Though winning near the goal—yet, do not grieve;
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,
For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!"

The poet looks at a picture of a man trying to kiss a woman.  Because it is a picture, it is frozen, and it will always be frozen.  The man's lips will always be moving toward kissing the woman, but will never actually kiss her.  Keats suggests this is a good thing: because the scene will not change, the man's love for the woman will not change, and she will always be beautiful.  This contrasts real life, where emotions do change and all flesh decays.

Keats is praising desire.  Fulfillment of desire can bring disappointment, and even if it brings satisfaction, it is still fleeting; all things change.  By being stuck frozen in the moment of desire, the man will forever be happy.

And I told my class that one of my greatest desires is to see the Vikings win a Super Bowl.  I talked about how I long for it, how I dream for it, how it has never happened and how I think that if it does happen, life will be perfect and I'll never complain about anything again.

I talked about how I don't understand why my Packer fan friends who did see the Packers win the Super Bowl in the '96 season can ever complain about anything.  "You saw your favorite team win a Super Bowl; isn't your life now perfect?"  I assume that if the Vikings win a Super Bowl, I will never complain about them again, and if they ever disappoint me, I'll just smile and say "Oh well--they already won the Super Bowl."

Maybe Keats is telling me to enjoy what I have.  The tantalizing desire may be a greatly enjoyable part of being a fan, and perhaps fulfillment of my desire will be disappointing (and would be fleeting).  Of course, I consider it a "desperate urge" more than a "tantalizing desire."

But the poem still makes me think of being a Viking fan.  We're that "Bold Lover," frozen on an urn, always leaning in for a kiss but never actually getting to do it.

The Next Eleven: LeBron James

Last season was the NBA's 60th season, and we commemorated it by adding ten players to the NBA 50 team. Now in the 61st year, we add one more.

LeBron James' career regular season numbers are 27.1 ppg, 6.8 rpg, and 6.5 apg. He's led the Cleveland Cavaliers to victory in four playoff series already, and his playoff averages are 27.3 ppg, 8.1 rpg, and 7.1 apg. In each of the past three seasons, he's been first or second team All-NBA and he's been in the top four in points per game. He already has at least one legendary playoff game under his belt, his 48 point masterpiece against Detroit in Game 5 of the Easter Conference Finals last season.

This year LeBron James leads the league in scoring, and his season averages are 30.1 ppg, 7.9 rpg, and 7.2 apg. But James is so good, you can almost take for granted that you're watching a 30-7-7 guy. We all need to sit back and appreciate the basketball force that is LeBron James: he's going to give us some incredible basketball memories, and he's already one of the 61 best players ever.

LeBron James is akin to William Shakespeare. If an English teacher tells you that he or she likes Shakespeare, you really know little about that teacher. It's Shakespeare: English teachers are supposed to like Shakespeare. Similarly, if somebody tells you he or she likes LeBron James, you can't know that person's personality or fandom; all you know is that person is able to appreciate the best that basketball has to offer.

Shakespeare also seems to transcend labels like "writer," "playwright," "poet," or "literature." He is his own thing, above every other writer in the canon of English (and perhaps world) literature. So too LeBron James transcends what it means to be a "great basketball player;" there is something special in him that sets him off as his own thing.

Previous Players: Bob McAdoo, Dennis Rodman, Tim Duncan, Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Reggie Miller, Allen Iverson, Jason Kidd, and Dirk Nowitzki.

Another year closer to death

"Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now" by A. E. Housman

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now
Is hung with bloom along the bough,
And stands about the woodland ride
Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,
Twenty will not come again,
And take from seventy springs a score,
It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom
Fifty springs are little room
About the woodlands I will go
To see the cherry hung with snow.

Another year goes by, and there's one fewer chance that I'll see the Vikings win a Super Bowl before I die.

Bill Belichick, Shakespearean Villain

Corruption of power is the most Shakespearean of themes. When we see corrupt leaders, we must again turn to Shakespeare, for he understood them better than anyone else (as he understood just about everything about humanity better than anyone else).

The Bard foresaw Bill Belichick, and named him Claudius.

Let us turn to Hamlet, that great masterwork of the English language, to get beneath all that Bill Belichick's fall from grace is. Belichick is a corrupt, paronoid, powerful man, like the villain of Hamlet, Claudius.

At the beginning of Hamlet, after his father's funeral Hamlet wishes to return to Wittenberg to study. Claudius doesn't let him:

For your intent
In going back to school in Wittenberg,
It is most retrograde to our desire,
And we beseech you bend you to remain
Here in the cheer and comfort of our eye,
Our chiefest courtier, cousin, and our son (I. ii. 112-117)

Think upon Belichick's treatment of Eric Mangini when the assistant coach wished to leave Belichick to become head coach of the Jets. It seems Mangini's move was "retrograde to [Belichick's] desire," and Belichick treated Mangini poorly for his decision. Like Claudius for Hamlet, Belichick doesn't entirely trust Mangini. Hamlet is clever and could bring down Claudius from the throne--he thus must be kept near so Claudius can monitor him. Belichick knew that Mangini could take him down from his throne, King of the AFC East. He didn't want to let him get away from his own watch.

Claudius is also madly paranoid. He sends Rosencratz and Guildenstern, those hapless victims of fate, to spy on Hamlet. He sends Ophelia to spy on Hamlet, perhaps dooming her. He sends Hamlet away to England to be executed. And in the final scene, Claudius wants to be so sure that Hamlet dies, he makes sure that not only are the swords used in the duel poisoned, but the wine that Hamlet might drink from is poisoned too (and while the Hamlet is killed, so are Laertes and Gertrude, ultimately leading to Claudius's own demise).

Consider Belichick's paranoia. His team was massively better than the Jets. the Patriots could easily have stomped all over the Jets. The Patriots will still be massively superior to the Jets the next time the two teams meet. There's no reason to cheat: he should have them beat anyway. Videotaping the Jets' coaching signals is akin to saying "The swords aren't enough: let's poison the wine, too." So paranoid in his attempts to destroy opposition is Belichick that he overdoes it, ultimately bringing himself down.

Claudius feels guilty for murdering Hamlet's father. He cannot, however, sincerely repent, for he knows he is still enjoying the spoils of his crime:

"Forgive me my foul murther?"
That cannot be, since I am still possess'd
Of those effects for which I did the murther:
My crown, mine own ambition, my queen. (III. iii. 52-55)

And now Belichick apologizes for cheating. But can he really repent when he still posesses the effects of his cheating: wins, prestige, success, power, money? Let Shakespeare judge.

And so Shakespeare gave us Belichick before Belichick: a leader paranoid of all who could undo him, a leader poisonously deceptive in achieving his own ends, a leader whose repentence cannot be sincere as he enjoys the spoils of his crime.

(Quotes are taken from The Riverside Anthology of Literature, ed. Douglas Hunt, Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1988. See this post for the inspiration here).

Thurman Thomas as a cartoon? I'll watch

There's something about the Buffalo Bills being a fellow 0-4 Super Bowl team that makes me like them (Denver, what happened to you, man? You used to be cool). I'll support all their wacky endeavors.

According to an AP article in Sports Illustrated, Thurman Thomas's wife Patti has been creating and writing a cartoon, and Thomas would provide one of the voices. Thomas and his wife appear to be amusing, fun people. I'll watch their cartoon. Most kids' shows suck hard and make me think all children are utterly insane. Which I suppose they are, uncorrupted by rational society as they are. As Wordsworth writes in "Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood" (and with a title like that, you know it's good),

Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy,

You stay crazy kids; don't let society steal your glee.

Anyway, I'm ready to be amused by Patti Thomas's creative endeavors and Thurman Thomas's voice. And a blogger less sympathetic to the plight of an 0-4 Super Bowl competitor might make jokes about the cartoons losing their helmets, or the show getting blown out during sweeps week, or some such inanity. But I feel for you, Buffalo Bills fans, even though I hope the Vikings soon leave your team as the last 0-4 Super Bowl team.

"It is either Valjean or Javert"

Let me follow up on some of my thoughts examined below on the Vikings' decision to sign Fred Evans, an athlete that has been arrested a couple of times.

My recent readings (Dostoevsky's Demons and Yoder's The Original Revolution: Essays on Christian Pacifism) and listenings (the soundtrack to the musical Les Miserables) have put the concept of redemption prominently in my head. Les Miserables offers us the contrast of Javert and Jean Valjean. Javert is loyal to the law above all else and believes criminality is in the essence of the person: once a criminal, always a criminal, with no justifiable crimes and no room for personal growth and redemption. Valjean, the one-time prisoner and hardened criminal, offers us a sign of humankind's redemption: when a man he robs forgives him rather than punishes him, he converts to a life devoted to God and to selflessness toward his fellow people.

The contrast of Javert and Valjean offers us much for life, including how we choose to view athletes. Shall we take the perspective of Javert, allowing the taint of a crime to follow an athlete through his career, hounding him, preventing him from moving on? Or do we recognize Valjean, a man who through another man's forgiveness comes to understand redemptive power and changes his life, and allow athletes the same opportunity?

You have a choice. But remember that when Valjean shows mercy to Javert, Javert is unable to accept this mercy, and kills himself. Perhaps Javert's worldview separates us from our fellow people and dooms us to solitude. Perhaps Valjean's worldview shows us a deeper way to connect to our fellow people.

Welcome to Minnesota, Fred Evans.

Tom Powers will be rooting against the Vikings

Antoine Winfield is one of my favorite Vikings: I don’t think he’s doing anything wrong by skipping voluntary workouts, and as of yet his expressions of discontent about the offense haven’t verged toward being a bad teammate.

But when I saw the Pioneer Press headline “Note to Winfield: Right on, Antoine!,” I just knew Tom Powers was going to use it as another opportunity to gleeful rip Brad Childress and the Viking offense.

Hey, any objective observer would conclude that the 2006 Viking offense was poor. I think it was a personnel problem more than a coaching problem (and so it's valid to wonder if the Vikes have done enough to upgrade that personnel), but there’s validity to criticism of Childress. But I’m a little disturbed by the glee and vitriol with which Tom Powers enjoys criticizing Childress and the offense. What gives? Is he that miserable watching the games that he just has to take out his quasi-witty aggression against Childress? An objective observer would note the Viking offense was bad; an openly hostile observer will take mean-spirited pleasure in doing so.

Among the lowlights, Powers writes:

“The Vikings' offense was horrible last season. Other than drafting Adrian Peterson and his clavicle, the team hasn't done much of anything to improve it.”

It’s true that the Vikings’ offense was horrible last season. But Powers can’t even bring up main thing the Vikes have done to improve that offense without bringing negativity, too (“Adrian Peterson and his clavicle”). And the Vikings have brought in a vast quantity of WRs to try improve, but Powers qualifies his statement that the team "hasn't done much of anything" to improve" (emphasis mine). Qualifiers make it less likely you'll be wrong.

“I'm puzzled by some of the reaction to Winfield's comments, however. A good chunk of people appear to be taking the attitude that, hey, if he doesn't like it here, let him go someplace else…. But that's exactly what Vikings fans don't want. The guy is too good. They need him here.”

The sure sign of a lousy columnist is when he talks about what “a good chuck of people appear” to be saying. For all we know, Powers is making up this reaction; more likely this "good chunk of people" does exist, but even a good chunk can still be a small minority of fans. I know I don‘t think Winfield should be let go. There’s no question Winfield is a very good player that can help the team; Powers isn’t being unique, insightful, or contrarian to say so.

(note: in my previous post, I talked vaguely about what I’ve heard Viking fans talking about; I did so out of a desire not to call out particular Viking fans or bloggers).

"he is violating the cardinal rule of the Brad Childress regime: Thou shalt not criticize the organization."

Yes, we know: Childress is an insecure tyrant laying down God-like commandments. Har Har.

“You can argue--and I'm sure the Vikings' brass will--that with a year of experience, a year of familiarization, the offense should be somewhat improved. But somewhat improved won't make much difference with that group. It's like a fellow going around with a feather duster, trying to clean up after a nuclear attack. It's just not going to cut it.”

Look, if you predict bad things for a sports sports team, most of the time you are going to be right. As A. E. Housman writes,

Therefore, since the world has still
Much good, but much less good than ill,
And while the sun and moon endure
Luck’s a chance, but trouble’s sure,
I’d face it as a wise man would,
And train for ill and not for good.

When Tom Powers predicts bad things for the Vikings, he is most likely going to be right. He’s simply making the best wager. And Tom Powers, if nothing else, wants to be right. And so, since he’s predicted bad things for the Vikings, he’s rooting for those bad things to happen. He wants the Vikings to do poorly because he has predicted the Vikings will be bad. He doesn’t want to be proven wrong; he doesn’t want the organization to be right that “with a year of experience, a year of familiarization, the offense should be somewhat improved.” That would mean he’d be wrong, and he doesn’t want that (besides, it's easy to create a hypothetical argument and argue against it. In Powers' hypothetical argument, the Vikings will only be "somewhat improved," and he says that won't be enough. The hypothetical argument could claim the offense will be more than merely "somewhat improved," but since Powers is making up the hypothetical argument, he can make it say whatever it is he'd most like to argue against). He wants the Viking offense to be bad so that the predictions he's been making (since at least last preseason) can be right, and he can look smart.

Just know that, Viking fans. If you want to read Tom Powers, you may as well go read Packer blogs, too. If you want to read the commentary of somebody that is openly rooting against your team, that’s fine. Doing so might give help balance your perspective. But don’t be mistaken: Tom Powers doesn’t want the Vikings to win.

Poetry and Sport: David Bottoms' "Sign for My Father, Who Stressed the Bunt"

You can hear Bottoms reading his poem here, and can read the poem here.

David Bottoms' poem "Sign for My Father, Who Stressed the Bunt" is very good, and very simple: the father tries to teach his kid to sacrifice bunt, but the child just wants to hit dingers, and it is only later in life he learns the meaning of the bunt (and you can take the symbolic meaning from there).

Interesting, though, is that many stat people now say that bunts are bad for business. From Tango, Lichtman, and Dolphin, "conventional sabermetric wisdom says that the sacrifice bunt is generally an ineffective and archaic strategy. (...) The sacrifice bunt appears to be a strategy eschewed by sabermetric teams." From Levitt, "Baseball analysts have been near universal in their condemnation of the overuse of the sacrifice bunt. While acknowledging it as the correct strategy in a small number of cases, most feel that any gain in moving players around the bases is more than offset by giving up an out, the 'clock' in baseball. Much of this disparagement of the sacrifice bunt derives from analysis based on expected runs tables (ERT)."

I don't follow baseball or sabermetrics enough to argue about whether bunting is good or bad; the point is that many statisticians now believe that bunting is not beneficial to a team.

With this knowledge, do we have to re-read Bottoms' poem? Was the kid right to want to try and get hits rather than work on his bunting technique? Did the father have flawed values, a distorted worldview, a faulty ethos? Was the child right to resist, and is it somehow tragic that the child eventually caved to and inherited his father's self-sacrificing, hard-working worldview?

Clearly Bottoms means it to be a good thing that the child grew to be a man and recognized the role of self-sacrifice in life; it is a good sign that he gives to his father, letting him know that he is no longer so selfish. However, armed with our new information--or our new ideas--about bunting, might we challenge the point? Or should we bother (the point, after all, isn't really about baseball, but about life)?

It's a question I've asked about literature before: do new scientific ideas or mathematical discoveries require a re-reading of classic works of literature? But the point is, new knowledge and new ideas always demand re-interpretations of old ideas and old works. So too in sports, and so too in poetry about sports.

Worlds Collide: Brad Childress reads poetry

The Friends of the Minneapolis Public Library put on their 6th Annual Favorite Poem Celebrity Reading. As noted by the Fanhouse and by Randball, Minnesota Vikings Head Coach Brad Childress would be one of the readers.
The crowd featured the usual suspects you'd expect at a cultural event in the Twin Cities (we all looked like the kind of people that support public television). Perhaps not the crowd Childress is used to addressing, though he fit right in.

It's wasn't exactly a highbrow poetry event. The first reader (Andrew Zimmern) read a poem by Roald Dahl, and one speaker read a poem by her junior high student. That was nice and all--the student was there, it was quite an honor for her, I'm sure. But at no point did I expect anybody at the podium to wax eloquent on T. S. Eliot or read a poem by Keats or anything.

Childress read Will Allen Dromgoole's "The Bridge Builder." After being introduced, he quipped that after today, he didn't think he'd quit his day job (har har). He talked about how the poem meant a lot to him because life isn't always easy. Sometimes it's hard and there's somebody there to help you through it.It was a low-key event on a Thursday afternoon--a surprising spot to find one of the NFL's 32 head coaches. But poetry readings are always fun, and other celebrities included WCCO's Amelia Santaniello and MPR's Kerri Miller (I recognized the voice as soon as she spoke).

Thank you, Friends of the Minneapolis Public Library for a fun little afternoon event.

Sport in Poetry: Tony Harrison's "v."

"v." is one of the more complex and nuanced poems I've ever read. A full interpretation would require a great deal of time and energy. I'll focus on the soccer hooligans and the poet's attempt to make meaning, in a way that (I hope) illustrates what this blog is sometimes all about.

In "v.", the poet is visiting his family's plot in a graveyard. This graveyard is located near a soccer stadium "where Leeds United play," and so a lot of soccer hooligans cut through the graveyard after the matches. But Leeds United

"disappoint their fans week after week,

which makes them lose their sense of self-esteem
and taking a short cut home thorugh these graves here
they reassert the glory of their team
by spraying words on tombstones, pissed on beer."

The poet finds that one soccer fan,

"dodging between tall family vaults and trees
like his team's best ever winger, dribbler, swerver,
fills every space he finds with versus Vs."

These "versus Vs" lead the poet to muse on all sorts of external and internal oppositions and conflicts (indeed, later the poem shifts into an internal dialogue between two aspects of the poet's self).

But he finds something else when he goes "to clear the weeds and rubbish thrown/on the family plot by football fans." He finds "UNITED graffitied on my parents' stone."

Again, this UNITED leads him to think of bigger issues. He finds in the word

"an accident of meaning to redeem
an act intended as mere desecration
and make the thoughtless spraying of his team
apply to higher things, and to the nation."

And yet, the poet previously admitted that while he might want to believe there is higher meaning in the soccer fan's graffiti, he really might be reaching:

"the feelings that I had as I stood gazing
and the significance I saw could be a sham,
mere excuses for not patiently erasing
the word sprayed on the grave of dad and mam.)"

The poem goes on in increasingly complex ways. The poet continues to try make meaning, and an internal voice mocks him for it. The meaning of work, class, death, human connection, and poetry itself is explored in ways that it would be cheap to try and transcribe into prose.

But the initial point is this: the poet sees something random and rather meaningless, but he attempts to give it meaning. He uses the inspiration of graffiti "v." and "UNITED" to muse on much bigger issues than soccer hooligans.

And in some ways, that is what we try to do at this blog. My favorite posts occur when something in the sporting world inspires a philosophical reflection (for example, this and this). You've heard that sports is a microcosm of society, and I don't disagree. But just as graffiti on a headstone isn't an inherent inspiration to muse on conflict and union, the sporting world doesn't always offer us clear, obvious parellels to our world. We interpret them. We make meaning of them. Even when we admit that the significance we see "may be a sham."

Games have always been a significant part of culture; think of how many little contests, games, and puzzles you encounter in your everyday lives. But if the world of professional sports is to have meaning beyond our mere entertainment, perhaps we should use it to inspire us to deeper reflection on our lives. Even if it the catalyst to this reflection is forced or artificial, it is the reflection itself which ultimately matters.

This colossal wreck

One year ago today, I looked about the internet and thought perhaps I had something original to contribute to the sports blog community, and so this humble blog was born. One year...perhaps on the way home, I'll pick up a vegan cake. Um...perhaps not.

The Minnesota Vikings may never win a Super Bowl in my lifetime, and this depresses me in unimaginable ways. I sometimes wonder if my entire philosophical worldview would be different had the Vikings won the Super Bowl in 1998. Perhaps existential ideas like futility, absurdity, and hazard would make less sense to me. As it is, my outlook is dour. How we follow sports can tell us something about how we live our lives, or at least I like to think so. So I hope that this blogging matters. It's mostly been good fun expressing ideas between classes. But thanks to those who take the time to read this blog, and thanks to those bloggers out there who give us something to read and think about. Blogs have made following sports much more fun. If I'm going to trudge through this weary existence without seeing the Vikings win the Super Bowl, at least I'll have this.

Bleh.

To celebrate this anniversary, let's let Percy Shelley remind us of the significance of all our earthly endeavors.

"Ozymandias" by Percy Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said--Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

The Next Ten: Dirk Nowitzki

For the 96-97 season, the NBA named its list of the 50 Greatest Basketball Players. For 06-07, we at Pacifist Viking will be adding 10 players to the list. We are not the first to re-examine the list of the greatest players. But you know what? We're the best.

Dirk Nowitzki is a rare talent, and he's only recently come into his own. In 2006 he averaged 26.6 ppg and 9.0 rpg and led the Mavericks to the NBA Finals ('06 playoffs: 27.0 ppg and 11.7 rpg). Playing the league's most talent-rich position, he's been All-NBA 6 times, including All-NBA first-team the last two seasons (this season he will undoubtably be All-NBA first-team again).

This season he's averaging 25.5 ppg and 9.5 rpg with some AMAZING shooting numbers (50.4% FG, 42.7% 3pt., 90.6% FT) in leading the Mavericks to the best record in the league. He'll turn 29 this summer. No doubt he's going to go down as one of the most versatile basketball players of all-time. He will also go down as one of the greatest.

Dirk Nowitzki is akin to Goethe, because I am lazy.

Previous Players: Bob McAdoo, Dennis Rodman, Tim Duncan, Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Reggie Miller, Allen Iverson, and Jason Kidd.

The Next Ten: Jason Kidd

For the 96-97 season, the NBA named its list of the 50 Greatest Basketball Players. For 06-07, we at Pacifist Viking will be adding 10 players to the list. We are not the first to re-examine the list of the greatest players. But you know what? We're the best.

In this decade, Steve Nash is starting to overshadow Jason Kidd as the best point guard in the league. While Nash may be brilliant, this is completely unfair. In Jason Kidd's career, he has led the league in assists per game 5 times, been second in the league in assists per game 3 times, and been in the top-5 in assists per game another 3 times. Compare that to Nash, who so far has led the league twice and been in the top-5 a total of 3 times. Kidd has the numbers to claim the title of greatest passer of this era.

Jason Kidd has been All-NBA first team 5 times. He's been NBA All-Defense first or second team 8 times. And he carried a less than inspiring Nets team to the NBA Finals two years in a row. He's done so by being in the top-5 in assists per game a whopping 11 seasons. He's one of the top point guards ever to play the game, and easily one of the 60 greatest players ever.

Jason Kidd is akin to Christopher Marlowe. Here is Marlowe, stepping up as the great poet and playwright of his era--and then gets completely overtaken by William Shakespeare. The difference is that we are right to consider Shakespeare the master over Marlowe; I find it hard to argue that Steve Nash is better than Jason Kidd. You could even argue that Nash is Marlowe to Kidd's Shakespeare: Kidd, like Shakespeare, has the much larger and more impressive ouevre. But we'll deal in perception and call Kidd the Marlowe to Nash's Shakespeare.

Previous Players: Bob McAdoo, Dennis Rodman, Tim Duncan, Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Reggie Miller, Allen Iverson

The Next Ten: Allen Iverson

For the 96-97 season, the NBA named its list of the 50 Greatest Basketball Players. For 06-07, we at Pacifist Viking will be adding 10 players to the list. We are not the first to re-examine the list of the greatest players. But you know what? We're the best.

Allen Iverson has won an MVP and four scoring titles. He's led the league in steals per game three times. He's got a career regular season scoring average of 28 ppg (3rd all-time, behind only MJ and Wilt) and a postseason scoring average of 30.6 ppg. Without much talent around him at all, Iverson took the 76ers to the 2001 NBA Finals. He's a unique player and historically accomplished (only three other players--Jordan, Wilt, and Gervin--have four or more scoring titles). He is easily one of the 60 greatest basketball players of all-time.

Iverson is akin to Langston Hughes. Iverson is often credited with bringing the hip hop attitude to the NBA; he refused to compromise his life, attitude, or image for anyone. Hughes is credited with bringing the rhythms of black music (jazz and the blues) into poetry. Hughes also refused to compromise his artistic vision: he famously said that a black poet that wants to be known as a "poet" and not a "black poet" is trying to write like a white poet, and he expressed unconcern over whether white people liked his poetry or not.

Previous Players: Bob McAdoo, Dennis Rodman, Tim Duncan, Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Reggie Miller

(photo by Carl Van Vechten, in public domain)