Author Archives: Kent Sterling

Rocket Mortgage Classic – Phil Mickelson pulls the wrong club as he threatens to never return to Detroit over Detroit News story

51-year-old Phil Mickelson makes a rookie mistake in commenting on a Detroit News story.

Paying too much attention to the media is a silly indulgence for professional athletes.  It reveals the paper-thin skin of the truly insecure.  Phil Mickelson yesterday showed his fear of the media and respect for its ability to change minds as he announced this weekend’s Rocket Mortgage Classic will be his final event in Detroit.

“It was so much effort for me to be here and to have that type of unnecessary attack,” Mickelson said.  “Not like I care, it happened 20-something years ago, it’s just the lack of appreciation. Yeah, I don’t see that happening. I don’t see me coming back. Not that I don’t love the people here, they have been great, but not with that type of thing happening.”

Here’s a golden rule of talking about the media – when Mickelson says “Not like I care,” what he means is – “I care deeply.”

The Detroit News published the story that got Mickelson’s goat.  They dredged up an unpleasant chapter in Mickelson’s life updating the story of a Michigan bookie who cheated Mickelson out of $500K.  The bet was made more than 20 years ago; the bookie was convicted in 2007 and has subsequently died.  But Mickelson still allows himself to boil with anger when the media fishes for clicks by reminding people of it.

Mickelson is 51-years-old, has won six majors including this year’s PGA and 45 PGA Tour events. He was enshrined in the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2012, and has an estimated worth of $400 million.  Yet when The Detroit News’ Robert Snell writes 1,277 words about the long forgotten sordid affair, he decides never to return to the Motor City?

In his promise to never return, not only does Mickelson paint himself as petulant, but he generates heat for the story.  Sounds like the strategic act of a man who would hit driver instead of four-wood with a one-stroke lead on 18 at Winged Foot in the final round of the U.S. Open – which Mickelson did in 2006 – instead of the golfer who became the oldest to win a major at the PGA just six weeks ago.

Nothing against Snell, but when a golfer like Mickelson allows a reporter nest in his noodle, he elevates The Detroit News to a level of importance it doesn’t can’t otherwise reach.  Life is simply too short for Mickelson to be bothered by such an insignificant intrusion, but even if he can’t resist that temptation – publicly calling out the story is exactly what the media wants.

Media dies without word of mouth, and Mickelson breathed life into a fading paper by yielding to his impulse to deride it.  If he really wanted to punish Snell and the News, he should have ignored the story – or feigned ignorance as to its existence.

That’s true not just for Mickelson for anyone who deals with the media.  Complaints supply heat that drives awareness and then consumption.  Silence deprives media of oxygen necessary to burn.

Mickelson should be smart enough to know how to fade a story, and so should anyone who on occasion sits in the media’s crosshairs.

Former Pacers forward Paul George loses again – and then shows us why

Every time Paul George talks to the media, I silently beg him to stop talking. It’s only a matter of moments before he reveals himself again to be a fraud.

Some professional athletes say all the right things after a loss.  They honestly assess their shortcomings, congratulate the winners, and promise to work hard to avenge their defeat.  Los Angeles Clippers forward Paul George is not among them.

George’s Clippers lost to the Phoenix Suns by 21 last night in a game that sent the Suns to the NBA Finals and the Clippers to that long dirt nap of an offseason.  Following the loss, George was asked what might have happened in the series if not for Kawhi Leonard‘s injury.  His response was what people who know him would have guessed, “We’d be going on.  This series would be a lot different. Talk about one of the best players in the league being out, yet we were inches away from getting to the next round.”

Can you imagine Michael Jordan saying something like that when Scottie Pippen played horribly during game seven of the 1990 Eastern Conference Finals because of a migraine?  Or when Pippen caught a Bill Laimbeer elbow in the first minute of the elimination game of the 1989 ECF and sat the rest of the game?  Jordan did not say, “We would be going to the Finals if only Scottie was healthy!”

What Jordan actually said was, “These things happen for some reason, and you have to deal with what you have. You have to take your lumps and move on.″. That’s what a champion says.  Actually, that’s what a six-time champion-to-be says.

That might be the only time I ever compare George to Jordan, and rightly so.  While Jordan has not always bathed himself in glory with his comments to the media – or in The Last Dance – but George has been routinely weak if not downright deceitful with the media dating back to his time with the Indiana Pacers.

Somehow, some way, George has managed to carve out a brand where meaningful productivity and winning have little bearing upon his public persona.  Is George a nice two-way player who can help a team win a championship as it’s third option?  It seems like he could be, but he has never been to the NBA Finals, so we don’t know.  Is George’s presence so weak during moments when championships are won or lost that his teams can’t overcome him?  Maybe.  He’s only 31, so there is hope that the light will eventually go on and real words that represent a winner might finally escape his lips.

To this point, George is nothing more that a fraud who says all the wrong things as he tries to please everyone when answering questions, and does all the wrong things when that moment that separates winners from losers rolls around every season.

There may come a time when George overcomes adversity instead of embracing it.  We found out last night that time is not here yet.

Pacers legend Freddie Lewis celebrating a birthday – which sent me down a worm hole!

Today’s Pro Basketball Stathead email mentioned that today is the 78th birthday of Indiana Pacers legend Freddie Lewis, so I clicked into the basketball-reference website to scan through Lewis’s stats.

My day goes like that once in a while when I have some free time.  The sports reference sites are endlessly entertaining and provide an infinite amount of interesting facts to consume about professional and college sports history.

What caught my eye today was Lewis’s presence on a fascinating ABA team.  It wasn’t the three championship teams of the ABA Pacers for whom he played, but the 1975-1976 Spirits of St. Louis – a group that finished 35-49 and did not qualify for the playoffs.

This was the final season for the Spirits and the ABA, and St. Louis fans cheered for a team that featured a fascinating array of familiar names:

  • Rod Thorn was the Spirits coach for the first 47 games of the season.  You might remember his as the general manager of the Chicago Bulls when they drafted Michael Jordan.  Thorn also served as the NBA’s Executive Vice President of Basketball Operations under David Stern.  He likely had more fun than any basketball executive in history as the chairman of USA Basketball’s Men’s National Team Selection Committee in 1992 – the group that assembled the first and only true Dream Team.
  • Marvin Barnes was a very talented basketball player out of Providence, but more famous as the principle figure in a story Bob Costas has told 47,389 times.  The Spirit were at Standiford Field in Louisville about to board a commercial jet to St. Louis after a game against the Kentucky Colonels.  Barnes told Costas, who was a team broadcaster at the time, “I’m driving back to St. Louis!”  Costas asked why he wouldn’t fly.  Barnes pointed to the sign at the gate that said the flight would land five minutes before it departed.  This was due to St. Louis being in the Central Time Zone while Louisville was in the Eastern Time Zone.  He told Costas, “I ain’t getting in no time machine!”
  • Steve Green was a rookie after graduating from Indiana University where he played for Bob Knight‘s first four teams.  He is Indianapolis’s most famous dentist and an IU Basketball booster.
  • Mike D’Antoni was a Spirit guard who averaged 3.5 points per game in the 1975-1976 season before becoming one of the most respected coaches in basketball and a recent candidate for the Pacers gig after the firing of Nate Bjorkgren.
  • Moses Malone was a second-year player who bounced to the ABA straight out of high school.  Not quite the dominating Hall of Famer who played in 12 straight NBA All-Star Games, Malone averaged 14.3 points and 9.6 points per game as a 20-year-old for the Spirits before blossoming with the Houston Rockets and Philadelphia 76ers.
  • Maurice Lucas became The Enforcer for the Portland Trailblazers after he spent the first 28 games of the 1975-1976 season as a Spirit.  He famously said about Portland teammate Bill Walton, “Bill’s a gorilla until the fight starts. Then he goes in hiding while I straighten things out,”  Lucas’s #20 has long been retired by the Blazers.
  • Caldwell Jones was a stalwart for the Philadelphia 76ers and four other NBA teams until 1990 after the ABA folded.

Nothing like 20 minutes spent clicking through Freddy Lewis’s bio page to kill 20 minutes on a rainy Thursday morning while we wait for Colts Camp, the NBA Finals, and Big 10 Football!

Hard to believe the Spirits lost so many games with this well-known group.  It’s also hard to imagine what I might learn if the rain doesn’t stop as the clicking may never end.