One of my Facebook friends posted this morning that he was rooting against the U.S. in the gold medal men's basketball game, because of Kobe and LeBron.
I don't understand that mindset. I root against Kobe and LeBron as hard as anyone during the NBA season, but it seems to me that some things should transcend one's usual rooting interests. Love them or hate them, they are the greatest players of this generation, and hardly a reason to root against your own country.
I wasn't a huge fan of the Dream Team concept when it was introduced back in 1992, but I've come full circle - not only do I think it is great, I think it may have been the best thing that ever happened to international basketball, in the sense that it gave the rest of the world something to strive for. And in those rough years when the U.S. was getting their arses handed to themselves by teams like Puerto Rico (still amazing to imagine today, even though it was just 8 years ago), it taught our greatest American NBA players a lesson in humility that they'd probably never been exposed to during the course of their careers.
This year, you saw a great team - a real team - out there on the court, smart enough to play like a team and to defer to the greatest player in the game when the occasion demanded it. I'm not sure what else one could ask for.
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