The Myth of Old School Competitiveness = Not Befriending Your Rival

[blablabla]

Who the hell is left4dead?

a poster

[DatAsh]

Don't worry. Although every single part of his post was completey wrong, he'll comeback with an emoticon ellipses filled post telling you how he "owned" you and how he's right.

I'm 100% convinced he's mentally ill.

That accurately describes 90%+ of LakersReign posts.

[KG215]

a poster

And did he post in this thread and I missed it? Because LakersReign said "left4dead" is making stuff up and I don't see a post by left4dead.

[KG215]

Keep backpeddling

If this is how you are in real life, every day must be an adventure and, every day you don't end up either dead or in jail has to be counted as a good day. That's how stupid you are.

[LakersReign]

Look who's(kg215) MAKING SH*T UP now?


Good luck with all that

[KG215]

MORE backpeddling cuz he(kg215) just realized how ret**ded he just made himself look

Oh, the irony.

How did I make myself look retarded?

[lilbeastnani]

Nobody said that people on rivaling teams weren't ever friends and didn't hang out or talk off the court. But if you need understanding of what is meant, go watch that Dream Team documentary that NBATV put out. A lot of those guys were friends. Magic, Larry, Michael, Barkley, Ewing, etc etc... they were friends off the court. But as competitors, they wanted to one up each other, not train together. You wouldn't hear a story of Magic and Larry up in the gym together after one of them lost to the other in the finals despite the fact that what they had was a "friendly" rivalry. They wanted to one up each other so they would be focused on themselves and their teammates not on being buddy buddy and working out together. Now, my post here isn't to criticize Lebron or Durant and what they are doing but merely to say that there's clear differences between this era and the last. I prefer the previous era personally but that's just my preference. I don't consider one to be right and one to be wrong.

[LakersReign]

Learn how to read...kg215....learn how to read

[WillyJakk]

OP, you do realize that the guys who were involved have one thing beyond friendship in common, right?

The prominent guy WON.

Bill beat Wilt and Elgin, Magic split w/ Zeke, Jordan beat Charles, LeBron beat KD.

Guys get cool w/ other guys they compete w/ and get to know them, they see things off court that lends insight to the others personality and personal traits and they think they "know" them, in other words, they likely feel like "I can try this guy this way or that way cause he won't get mad, but I can't try him this way cause he will get mad. I can't try this guy period so I know how to do certain things w/ him."

I see it alot cause it's also like that in regular noncompetitive relationships, you feel your friends have certain qualities about them and you pretty much know what lines you can cross and w/ who and you know what lines not to cross w/ certain friends as well.

Same in sports and once you feel like you "know" a guy a certain way, you may feel you can dominate him and I'm quite sure each one of those guys felt the same exact way.

Zeke is the exception cause he was too strong willed to fall for Magic's "spell" considering he was the true definition of an alpha male growing up.

[Owl]

OP, you do realize that the guys who were involved have one thing beyond friendship in common, right?

The prominent guy WON.

Bill beat Wilt and Elgin, Magic split w/ Zeke, Jordan beat Charles, LeBron beat KD.

Guys get cool w/ other guys they compete w/ and get to know them, they see things off court that lends insight to the others personality and personal traits and they think they "know" them, in other words, they likely feel like "I can try this guy this way or that way cause he won't get mad, but I can't try him this way cause he will get mad. I can't try this guy period so I know how to do certain things w/ him."

I see it alot cause it's also like that in regular noncompetitive relationships, you feel your friends have certain qualities about them and you pretty much know what lines you can cross and w/ who and you know what lines not to cross w/ certain friends as well.

Same in sports and once you feel like you "know" a guy a certain way, you may feel you can dominate him and I'm quite sure each one of those guys felt the same exact way.

Zeke is the exception cause he was too strong willed to fall for Magic's "spell" considering he was the true definition of an alpha male growing up.

Not sure what you're getting at here. I would think both parties would benefit equally from inside knowledge. Unless you're suggesting the dominant personality instigated the friendship for purely self-interested, utilitarian purposes (Russell denied that this was the case with Wilt). I'm not sure that you couldn't just point to the one that won after the fact and say that person was "the prominent guy", which I'm not sure what is meant by in this context.

This isn't meant to mock, I'm just not sure that I get your point, so clarification would be appreciated.

[Crown&Coke]

it has been rumored that Russell would be nice to Wilt and do the pre-game meal stuff just to rattle his head before games.

But I have no issue with players being cool with one another. They do have lives outside of the arena btw. And its likely they like hanging with people similar to themselves, i.e. rich and athletic. Not too many of those types running around.

what will irk me is if they start being all buddy-buddy on the court.

[Rake2204]

Nobody said that people on rivaling teams weren't ever friends and didn't hang out or talk off the court. But if you need understanding of what is meant, go watch that Dream Team documentary that NBATV put out. A lot of those guys were friends. Magic, Larry, Michael, Barkley, Ewing, etc etc... they were friends off the court. But as competitors, they wanted to one up each other, not train together. You wouldn't hear a story of Magic and Larry up in the gym together after one of them lost to the other in the finals despite the fact that what they had was a "friendly" rivalry. They wanted to one up each other so they would be focused on themselves and their teammates not on being buddy buddy and working out together. Now, my post here isn't to criticize Lebron or Durant and what they are doing but merely to say that there's clear differences between this era and the last. I prefer the previous era personally but that's just my preference. I don't consider one to be right and one to be wrong.

I partly agree with you, but I partly don't. The portion I do agree with is the notion that those guys in the 90's wanted to one up each other. However, the portion I disagree with regards the older guys not wanting to train together.

Many players, if I recall correctly, thought the Dream Team practices were some of the best basketball moments they've ever experienced. They loved playing on the same team as one another and facing off in practice against one another. Further, many players would often put together open runs in the off season as a means of training, maintaining, and improving. Even on the set of Space Jam, Jordan was rounding up a lot of his opponents for runs (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rD424rjpyQ).

And surely, perhaps the argument could be made that there's a difference between playing against rivals in the off-season versus doing exercises with them, but I don't find the situations to be terribly different. Both the LeBron and Durant workout and the runs with the Dream Team and Space Jam (and others) seemed to have the same desired goal for everyone participating: to face the best and to work with the best so as to become the best (or maintain being the best).

Larry Bird and Magic Johnson didn't work out together from what we've heard, but I wouldn't doubt Johnson worked out with Isiah Thomas at some point. I'd bet stars likely trained with many other stars back then, but maybe just not the connections we wanted. So while Magic may have worked with Isiah (just as a hypothetical), we say, "Yeah but he didn't work out with Larry." To me that'd be similar to saying sure, LeBron works out with Kevin Durant, but he's not working out with Dirk Nowitzki so. . .

Even from a personal standpoint, on a much much smaller scale, training with my area's best players in the offseason on an AAU team was great for me. By and large it provided an opportunity for me to push myself day in and day out in hopes of developing my game well enough to take down those same teammates once the season hit. We were tight over the summer but once we met on the court, there was nothing to set aside, we knew it was war time.

[Owl]

Nobody said that people on rivaling teams weren't ever friends and didn't hang out or talk off the court. But if you need understanding of what is meant, go watch that Dream Team documentary that NBATV put out. A lot of those guys were friends. Magic, Larry, Michael, Barkley, Ewing, etc etc... they were friends off the court. But as competitors, they wanted to one up each other, not train together. You wouldn't hear a story of Magic and Larry up in the gym together after one of them lost to the other in the finals despite the fact that what they had was a "friendly" rivalry. They wanted to one up each other so they would be focused on themselves and their teammates not on being buddy buddy and working out together. Now, my post here isn't to criticize Lebron or Durant and what they are doing but merely to say that there's clear differences between this era and the last. I prefer the previous era personally but that's just my preference. I don't consider one to be right and one to be wrong.

A bunch of elite players including Chuck and Ewing (iirc) helped MJ get back into game shape by joining scrimmages on the set of Space Jam. Magic even played once the summer before his comeback.

This a small section on it here.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vau...24/3/index.htm
So maybe it hasn't been done one on one before but stars have worked out together, they play in each others charity games, Magic and Bird shared commercials etc


Stars fierce burning and personal hatred is usually a media construct (with occasional exceptions e.g. Jordan vs Isiah) and (most) players are entirely capable of separating rivalries on court with relationships on it. Isiah picked Bird's brain to try and get insights into winning, they wouldn't have talked if they really disliked each other.

[Indian guy]

MJ and Barkley were having dinner together pretty much every night during the '93 Finals. Picture that for a second - here's Barkley, getting his ass kicked by MJ every night, yet still going out to eat with him after the game.

This is why the whole notion of stars from the past not being buddy-buddy or being these uber-competitive guys who didn't socialize off the court is so moronic. Stop being an idiot. Being friends with a peer doesn't make you any less competitive.

[PJR]

Unfortunately players today are victims of the information age. The facebooks, and twitters, discussion forums and such. Information widespread in a matter of minutes. Shit like workouts between two great players would be a non-story 20 years ago. Today? Something so trivial is broken down and analyzed lol...