A Wrinkle in the Debate: Who is the G.O.A.T.? Thank you, John Thompson

In preparation for my travels to Washington DC, I picked up "I Came As a Shadow," the autobiography of John Thompson at my local library. As my mother's daughter, I wanted to read more about a place I'm visiting; sports is always my preferred point of entry.

John Thompson was a native of Washington DC, a Catholic who was devoted to Our Lady, a coach, father, grandfather and champion. He died on August 30, 2020. Thompson is known as Georgetown University's legendary coach. He became the first Black-American head coach to win a major collegiate championship in basketball when he led the Hoyas to the NCAA Division I national championship in 1984. The setting of his story is our nation's capital through and through. However, what I did not expect was the way Thompson's message would resonate and reveal a truth about women's sports—one that I learned en route to Washington. Here it is.

If there's one topic—one question sports fans love to discuss, debate and defend, it's Who is the G.O.A.T? What athletes are on your Mount Rushmore? Who are the Top 10 athletes of all time?  Thompson presented an important point-of-view. His wrinkle, a real quagmire, offers an important truth worth careful consideration.

In Chapter Two: The Rabbit, Thompson tells the story of  his hero, his friend and who he believes to be among the very greatest, DC native Elgin Baylor. Affectionately known as "The Rabbit," Baylor was born seven years before Thompson. While The Rabbit played at Spingarn High School, JT played at Archbishop Carroll High School, on an integrated team (but one that still had quotas). Both men, however, developed were formed and performed on the city's public courts. Thompson writes,

The competition on the playgrounds was a lot tougher than at school no question. So many terrific Black players didn't get an opportunity to play organized ball. Think about the fact that someone as incredible as Elgin Baylor didn't get recruited out of high school, and would end up at some obscure college in Idaho basically by accident before he went to Seattle University. 

Lots of other guys could have been outstanding in college or the pros. One cat named Chicken Breast could really get it done. I have no idea what his given name was, but everybody knew Chicken Breast. Another very tough player was Gary Mays, who had one arm and was known as Bandit. You heard that right: Gary had one arm, but if there were fifty guys at the park and they chose sides, Gary was always on the court. The tiny scoring guard Wil Jones could have been great in the NBA. Little Wil was a shooter's shooter, talked a whole lot of trash, and always backed it up. 

I could go on and on about all the great players you never heard of. That's one reason I laugh at people who argue about this or that player being the "greatest of all time." Some of the best basketball players in history never got the opportunity to put on a uniform. And yes, I saw both Michael Jordan and Bill Russell play, up close and personal. But we'll never know what some of these other guys could have been. 

I read these words and I know they are true. Willie Mays said so much about his own father, who taught him to play baseball, but didn't have the chance to take his talent beyond regional play in Alabama (Say Hey! Willie Mays HBO Series is worth watching). As a sports fan, an American and a human being, I can't help but mourn what we lost....what we never saw....what we all missed out on. Sadly, this truth is not limited just to people of color.

On Saturday, June 3 of reunion weekend at the University of Notre Dame, the alumni group, Notre Dame Women Connect hosted an event "Champions and Champagne." This gathering brought alumnae together to raise a glass and celebrate and learn from the women who work in athletics to help female student athletes become champions. Our panel featured Kayla Miller, NILI Athlete Marketing Manager, Caroline Powers Ellis, Head Coach Women's Golf and Alex Bechard, Director of Sports Nutrition. 

Our moderator, Kristin Sheehan—Director of Play Like a Champion Today and a monogram award winner herself (varsity cheer) asked each respondent to name and tell us about their favorite female athlete. Alex said "beyond the celebrity athletes: Serena and Venus Williams, I would have to say my mom. She didn't really have a chance to compete in the way that women do today, but she was and still is an outstanding athlete." Caroline, who played golf professionally said "My cousin. She is ten years older than me and she had a career in professional athletics before me. I learned so much from her on what it takes to play at the highest level." Kayla added, "I'm someone who grew up watching Mia Hamm. At the age of five, I wanted to be just like her."

In their responses, I was reminded of the importance of role models, who can show us how to work, overcome, stay strong and make an impact. But I was also reminded of the fact that like Alex's mom, too many weren't given that chance. Fortunately, the story for women in sport is much different today. To a large degree, we write our own...but for too long, that story was short. The G.O.A.T. debate rarely includes a woman. Why shouldn't Mt. Rushmore have the face of a female athlete? (or President?!) I hope some women do crack that Top 10, or rather, let's create our own.

I want to very clear, I have no intention of conflating racism and sexism. "I Came as Shadow,"  attests to the nuances, dynamics and the reality of racism—in DC, in basketball and beyond. As Bill McGarvey writes,  "The game was never the objective for Thompson; it was just the instrument. Basketball became a way of kicking down a door that had been closed to Black people." 

Thompson adds, "It was a way for me to express that we don't have to act apologetic for obtaining what God intended us to have, and that we should be recognized more for our minds than our bodies." I think women can understand that...whether or not they are in sports.

Photo Credits
Book Cover
JT and player
Baylor

Sports isn't the answer, but it can serve as a way, a means and a platform for how far we come and how far we must go

With the citywide curfew in the back of my mind, I took to my phone and said I'll give myself a few minutes on Instagram. Perhaps you have been setting limits to your social media intake, as well. I pressed play and listened to the SportsCenter clip featuring Hannah Storm and former Irish forward Brianna Turner. Turner's message was one I needed to hear and wanted to hear. Sports is more often than not, my portal for processing our culture, our world, people and even politics. I would like Brianna Turner to know her words also led me to prayer.

Storm said "Among the many voices who have been very strong, Brianna Turner of the Phoenix Mercury joins us now. Brianna, we appreciate you for being here, a young female voice. As a Notre Dame grad and a fellow Houstonian, the hometown of George Floyd, I am grateful for your voice, for speaking out and for taking a leadership role in this regard."  Turner is the daughter of police officers; she is African American. 

Storm said, "So many people have been saying it is up to young people to push for meaningful change after generations of systemic racism. This racism has been called America's original sin. What can you and your contemporaries do so to make sure that this next generation,  that our children in the future aren't facing these same prejudices and dangers?"

Turner replied, "We need to be able to talk about race without making it uncomfortable. Talking about race should not make you feel like 'Oh! I don't know if I should talk about it or it's not my place!' It's everyone place.  It's everyone's place to talk about equality—it shouldn't make you uncomfortable to talk about what is equality." 

I agree. We need to read about race and we need to talk about it. We need to be patient and supportive with one another as we undertake those conversations. We ought to be able to share our feelings and raise our questions. Ultimately we should be ready to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. I write what many people already know because i believe sports is a good place for these necessary conversations to start.

ESPN SportsDaily's podcast reminded me that two easiest topics for small talk are the weather and traffic. I have often thought sports can be included in this category. However,  the beauty of my favorite topic is that should you meet a person who speaks sport, the conversation can go much further and much deeper. With that platform in mind, I would like to offer a few thoughts on what I've learned reading and writing about race. 

I have often wondered what my own students see as my blind spots in terms of race. I want to own that I have them because I see them in two of the people I care about the most: my parents. They have instilled wonderful example and strong principles that I have taken as my own when it comes to this topic. And  yet every so often, I find myself correcting my Dad. You can't say that word, Dad! Or "Mom, that's not a fair assumption." I must be guilty too. 

That being said, I can't forget the time my dad and I talked about who is the G.O.A.T. in Major League Baseball. He said "Anne, people will tell you Babe Ruth or Joe DiMaggio. but I believe the greatest ballplayer was Willie Mays. What he did on offense and on defense is superlative. He doesn't get the credit he deserves because of the color of his skin, especially in that era."  On that day, I listened to my dad with an open heart. I learned a lot about his point of view and how he saw racism at that time and at work in society today. Sports served as the portal for what was and what remains a necessary conversation.  

Not only do sports provide an avenue for talking about race, they can also measure how far we have come and how far we need to go. This may come as a surprise, but I have come to the conclusion that sports are neutral. They CAN be one solution toward racist attitudes and beliefs. They certainly perpetuate them as well. They can build character and reveal it. They can destroy it too. Still, the potential within sport is why I give of my time, energy and attention to it.

In the essay "Success is a Journey" the Hall of Fame basketball player, William F. Russell speaks to this point. He writes

So much for the American Dream. It is, in fact, no more than a sugarcoated fantasy that sport has fundamentally improved or advanced any faster than the other components of society in the last two decades. I suspect because we elevate sport to a position of sanctity (witness the hysterical reaction to Curt Flood's suit against the reserve clause) that the falsehood is piously maintained that sport is out there in the forefront in the march of human rights. Sport brings a city together. You know that; you hear it all the time. A public hanging would achieve the same end. Sport reflects American life. Yes, it does. The fans bring their prejudices right along with them. 

Indeed, the belief that sport is so progressive probably manages to cause a great deal of harm by perpetuating corollary myths. How harsh it must be for some young athlete to trust that he will be judged only on his abilities and then find out that that ideal is administered by a coach who will bench a boy because his hair is too long or because his politics are too dovish or because it is long-standing policy to start two at home, three on the road and five when you get behind. Progress should be viewed from two standards—not just how far we have gone, but how far we still must go.

I don't want to lose sight of that point. The frustration and disappointment, the anger and outrage that millions of Americans hold today is understood. I believe it is justifiable. As Brianna Turner said "I'm 23 and this is normal?! it's another hashtag, another instance. It's just so frustrating. " AND and I don't want to forget that we have come a long way. We have so far to go, but to say we have NOT made some improvements to systems and structures to hearts and minds is errant. 

Bill Russell is an Oakland native, played at the University of San Francisco and was an 11 time champion with the Boston Celtics. What struck me most about his essay, which appeared in Sports Illustrated on June 8, 1970 was how it serves as bellwether for the times we live in. He had a lot to say. Much of it was not easy to hear. He is direct, he gives poignant examples that speak to the injustice of racism. I believe it is important to be open to the truth to which he has spoken. I want to discuss with others how far we have come from the examples he provides. And how far must we go?

I encourage you to read the entire essay for yourself. I will require my own students to read it this fall in Sports and Spirituality. Russell names names. He speaks about the privilege of white folks in a way that is provocative, disarming and on point. Furthermore, he doesn't speak about women whatsoever in sport which to me is a tremendously important example of how far things have come and again.....how far they have to go. He notes,

Basketball is clearly the most progressive sport now. Blacks have even reached a point in basketball where we have achieved the right to failure. That's very important, you know. It is just as important as the right to succeed. When John McLendon was fired as the coach of the Denver Rockets this winter, there was no fuss made about anybody picking on a black man, or anybody saying a black man couldn't coach. He got the ax, just like any coach, because the team was going bad. Now that is progress.

It is also isolated. Baseball front offices are whiter than anything but press boxes, and football has really looked out for itself. It has never needed a quota system. Football has a much better gimmick. It is called a quarterback. As long as quarterback can be a segregated position, football is protected. It can be assured of having one white star every game, who can get all the endorsements and win all the sports cars. At the same time, the all-white quarterbacks perpetuate the racist theme that no black man is smart enough to call signals. 

I can remember watching a game on TV a couple years ago, and I was moved to say something like: "Man, that Unitas is great." One of the black guys I was watching the game with, said: "Who knows?" A little bit stunned by that, I asked him what he meant, and he replied that he really could not evaluate Unitas or any other quarterback fairly since they had never faced a full range of competition. A Paul Hornung, Mickey Mantle, Jerry West—you cannot deny their greatness, because they have stood the test of time in a free market, so to speak. But no one can pretend to know how good our best white quarterbacks would be if the NFL permitted the development of black quarterbacks to compete with them. 

What makes a quarterback so very important is that he is consistently visible. Everyone else only comes and goes in the crunch. I don't think, for example, that the appeal of its violence has helped make football so popular. I think where it has the edge on basketball and where it has captured more public imagination is in the dead period between plays. At this point, the plays can be run over again and everybody can point out how smart the football players are. In basketball, you don't have time to talk about how smart the players are. 

I do think that basketball is the most graceful of all our major sports. It is not nearly so rough as it was when I came into the pros. The jump shot opened it up, made it more fluid. Today, I think it is close to an art form, with greater potential for growth than any other of the more popular games, because it is more appealing to women.

I referenced this piece of the essay in my blog reflection on Michael Vick. Vick was the first black quarterback chosen as the number one pick in the NFL draft. Since that time, athletes like Patrick Mahomes, Lamar Jackson, Teddy Bridgewater and one Colin Kapernick have come forward and succeeded in this position. Second, basketball is indeed appealing to women but one reason might be because they play it professionally. The WNBA wasn't created until 26 years after this essay was written but one of its stars, Brianna Turner is using her voice and her platform to call us to talk about race. Progress noted.

Mahatma Gandhi said “The true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members.”  Well another measure might be how we talk about race, especially with people who don't look like us. Can we do that? Can we ask questions? Are we ok with saying "I don't know?" Do we have to stand or can we live in the complexity, listen, love and serve one another.

In the meantime, let us pray

God of Justice, God of Mercy, you created all people equally in your image and you call each of us to recognize your presence in every person we meet. Racism, inequality, and oppression are the fruits of our human sinfulness when we fail to uphold the dignity of our brothers and sisters, as you command. In every age, prophets cry out against these injustices and, in our own time, we hear the pain of your people who suffer. Heal the wounds of our division not only with the balm of your love but also with the strength of your Spirit to move us to action. Teach us to oppose racism in our culture, in our institutions, in our families, and even in our own thoughts. Give us the courage to examine our hearts, where every true transformation begins. Even if we should find our sinfulness, we shall also find your mercy. 

In the words of your prophet, Amos, we pray: "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream." Amen.

Photo Credits
Willie Mays
Celtics Russell
Russell Success is a Journey
Floyd George Memorial
Turner and Storm