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NBA

What, Exactly, Do We Want From Brandon Jennings?

Posted Jun 29, 2009 3:58PM By Tom Ziller (RSS feed)

Filed Under: Bucks, NBA Media Watch

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The weekend Brandon Jennings saga will only gain steam this week as talking heads give us the holy word on how a 19-year-old professional athlete should act. (Because 40-year-old white men know best, right?) In case you missed it, in a phone conversation with rapper Joe Budden, Jennings disparaged the Knicks, Chris Duhon, Ricky Rubio and (depending how you look at it) Luke Ridnour. Budden streamed the conversation on his Web site (apparently unbeknownst to Jennings). In the aftermath, Jennings erased his entire Twitter account and Budden sought to remove an unauthorized recording of his stream that had popped up on YouTube. (The video has popped back up, by the way.)

Responses from the blogosphere have been nuanced -- the FreeDarko sermon is particularly on target (and interesting, considering FD's Shoals helped break the story for The Baseline). But we have been through enough of these episodes before to know that the prevailing sanity will not last. Before the storm, allow me a question. (I think I've killed whatever suspense that line could illicit by posing the question in this post's headline.)

We rue the cult of anti-personality marketing has created. Michael Jordan's infamous "Republicans buy sneakers, too" line is seen as the work of a soulless corporate devil, not a sober acknowledgement that cash rules the world. LeBron James is constantly bemoaned for his lack of an edge. When a perceived angel like Dwyane Wade or Dwight Howard takes a bad step, the stodgy media pounces like a starved wolf, eager to uncover some "human element" in these otherwise mythical champions. Stars who offer mold-cast answers in the interview setting are boring. Players who refuse to make a flesh-to-flesh, eye-to-eye connection with fans are jerks. The public (pressed by the media) forces these athletes to be real humans, but refuses to accept the human elements that might disappoint us.

Unlike almost every other point guard in the league, Jennings is brash. He has no filter. Popping off about a subject close to your heart in a personal conversation without a filter blocking the real, raw emotion ... that's pretty damn human. After being passed up by New York in the draft, Jennings says "[eff] the Knicks" in a personal conversation with a (supposed) friend. That's very human! If I'm up for a job with a company, and they pick someone else, I'm probably going to react similarly. Why would we hold Jennings to a higher standard of verbal control?

Take highly-paid ESPN columnist Bill Simmons, for example. Simmons has ripped Clippers coach Mike Dunleavy mercilessly for years. He has dubbed the coach "Dumbleavy" in recent work. When asked about the writer during an ESPN radio appearance last week, Dunleavy called Simmons a "joke writer" and said he had "no credibility." How did Simmons, a 39-year-old who won't make that much less than Jennings this year, respond?

A one-hour string of 18 personal Dunleavy insults on Twitter. Simmons didn't invoke the f-word, but I fail to see how "Mike Dunleavy saying someone has no credibility is like Michael Richards calling someone a racist" is much different from "Duhon ain't getting it done." Considering that Jennings made his comments privately while Simmons purposely broadcast his for the world to see adds to the sentiment we have a double standard here: a 39-year-old white dude gets paid handsomely to talk crap about his foils while it's a crime for a 19-year-old black kid to do the same. Further, Simmons' work was created for broadcast, attempting to make a statement to the world. Jennings is just talking smack.

Confidence and candor are not crimes. Leave Brandon Jennings alone.

Tags: Bill+Simmons, BillSimmons, Brandon+Jennings, BrandonJennings

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