The All-KG Edition
What? My favorite NBA player wins All-Star Game MVP and you think I'm going to write about something else? Relax. We'll take a couple KG angles in this one.
The first, of course, is that KG brought home some BIG hardware. And I mean that literally more than figuratively. The trophy weighs about as much as KG does. I think it was a pretty special honor for Garnett; he said he had never really won anything before. We know he hasn't won anything at the team level before (NOT his fault). But he also hasn't won individual awards, no doubt in part due to his unselfish style. So when a player like that drops 37 and fills the stat sheet in an All-Star game, you pay attention. Not that winning All-Star MVP is any real accomplishment compared to a long playoff run, but it's nice that people around the world got to see KG at his best. I have always maintained that some players are better if they can blend into the talent around them. Some aren't. Take Iverson, or Kobe Bryant. I think their games actually are better served with less talent around them, so they can do their thing. KG's the other way. He's so creative, so versatile, that in order to see him at his best, he needs to be with other great players. That's not to say that he isn't carrying the Wolves by himself, because everybody knows he is. But if he had one other great player, I don't think there would be any question who the best player in the league is.
Speaking of which, David Aldridge wrote a great piece on ESPN on KG, who has long been his favorite player in the NBA. When somebody like Aldridge is giving praise like that, you take notice. The article goes into some real depth about KG's relationship with the Wolves front office. It's not encouraging, to say the least. His whole thing is, why doesn't anybody ever back him up when people start putting the heat on him? He knows the answer, and he all but says it: If the heat ain't on KG, it's on Flip and McHale. So it's no shock that they didn't exactly jump to KG's defense last spring when Magic and Barkley and everybody else was flapping their yaps. Loyalty is everything to Kevin Garnett. I'm now very afraid that once KG saw that his front office didn't have his back when the going got tough, it sealed his fate here.
It was jarring to see KG in that red All-Star uniform, the chromatic opposite of the Wolves' colors. I'm afraid I'm going to have to get used to it, unless something changes. Until KG came along, George Brett was my sports idol. I never had to see him in anything but a Royals uniform, for which I have always been thankful. No matter where KG ends up, he'll have my support. For his game, for the way he carries himself off the court, for the way he puts it on the line when he speaks his mind. He deserves a better fate and better support from the front office than he has received here.
11:58:45 AM 
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