David Stern used his big marketing brain to etch a short list of basketball players—initially Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan—into the imaginations of children and casual sports fans all over the world.
The sports’ governing ethos ever since has been about the biggest names, up in lights.
Every time there’s an international tournament, the analysis is essentially: the best of the overseas teams are better coached, the players developed with more care, and the game more beautiful. But here in the USA, we have better stars. America’s trump card, in basketball, is that we have not just LeBron, (in his prime, the biggest, strongest, fastest athlete) but the next ten would-be LeBrons. Most years, it simply doesn’t matter what crazy perfect offense other countries run.
It’s a trickle-down ethos that has made things sticky throughout American youth basketball, where elite players tend barely to get coached at all, as they hopscotch from one showcase event to another. So many weekends are dedicated to getting discovered, so few are dedicated to being a good teammate or learning to unpick the pick and roll.
The problem is: the effect of stars is wearing off.
None of the 20 highest-paid players in the world made this list. Use social media metrics, off-court earnings, market-size, name recognition, or almost any other measure; the biggest names in the NBA didn’t appear in top-rated basketball games this year. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is the MVP of everything, and becoming a household name, but still nowhere near the fame of LeBron James. The Pacers don’t have a single player in the NBA’s top 30 in scoring.
The game, as we’ve been discussing, is changing.
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