From 100,000 Feet: Basketball's Place on the Bigger Stage?

This is becoming old-hat fast, but Barack Obama likes basketball. He played at a high level in high school. He now plays everyday. Holds his own. He's also a lefty (add him to the Manu Ginobili, Derek Fisher list).

Does it have far-reaching consequences? Is it relevant?

It's relevant because Obama is relevant. It's also relevant because basketball is.

Basketball is integral to pop culture. Air Jordan's. Air Force 1's. Hip-hop. Jay-Z-owning-the-Nets. Stephen Curry. Yao Ming. 300 million Chinese watching Yao v. Yi. Steve Nash and his eco-friendly shoes. The Final Four.

In the last few years, the NBA has become increasingly political. NBA Cares is a now a major part of the organization. Its international reach is well-known and documented. Most recently, the NBA has partnered with the Red Cross to aid Chinese victims of the recent earthquake.

Henry Abbott of True Hoop, an excellent blogger, recently wrote a post about Infantry Hoops in Iraq. As for many people, basketball is a release for them. It's fun. It's competitive. It's healthy. "It's the number one attraction."

It's then very similar to the role basketball played in Tim O'Brien's fictional accounts of Vietnam. The masterful American narrator O'Brien discussed hoops' place in his 1978 novel Going After Cacciato. In the fictional account of Paul Berlin and his experience in Vietnam, basketball was an escape. Berlin and his fellow soldiers “dreamed of bad angles and crazy bounces, suspense, victory and loss, blocked shots at the buzzer” (103). Basketball occupied their imagination and dreams. As opposed to war, there were also comforting, clear-cut rules in basketball: out-of-bounds, through-the-hoops, fouls, traveling, etc. Similarly, basketball was a sort of attraction.

Not that Presidential Campaigns are like war--they are not--but is it any surprise then that Obama plays basketball daily?

The NYTimes today featured an super overview of basketball in the Obama Campaign. It highlights Obama's "body-man:" former Duke basketball and football player Reggie Love. Never a headliner for Coach K, Love did get minutes on the 2001 National Championship team alongside Shane Battier and Carlos Boozer. More than anything, Love is an important aide to Obama and an even better basketball companion.

But the sport culture goes beyond the daily and high publicized pick-up games. As Obama points out, "One cardinal rule of the road is, we don’t watch CNN, the news or MSNBC. We don’t watch any talking heads or any politics. We watch ‘SportsCenter’ and argue about that." So instead of over-discussing their every-day battles, Obama and Love escape to SportsCenter and basketball, not exactly like the fictional Paul Berlin and Abbott's subject, but not altogether differently. It's a healthy, refreshing activity.

Basketball and sports-in-general are popular. Not only in America, but all over the world. Perhaps in China more so than anyplace else. As the country westernizes, they want it all: banks, houses, and hip-hop. Basketball is no exception. Thanks to Yao Ming, Nike, and the 2008 Olympics, basketball is at the root of Chinese pop-culture.

Like few other sports, basketball has caught fire all over the world. Since the 1992 Dream Team's run through the Olympics, countries and young players everywhere have wanted to emulate it. Frenchman Tony Parker often talks about Michael Jordan and that team. Ever since, the NBA has become more and more international. Against newly inspired competition, the United States team has not won anything of significance since the 2000 Olympic Games in Sidney, Australia. Globally, basketball is relevant.

What's more, there is an egalitarian dynamic to basketball that makes it so beautiful and safe. It's a team-game. It has a sweet flow. It's a superior rubric for education: basketball teaches teamwork, commitment, and communication--essential aspects of human daily life.

That's not to say that football, soccer, or baseball do not, but again sports dialogue often mishandles these components.

So to a certain degree, a presidential candidate playing basketball is nothing spectacular. It is just like him going to the movies or listening to an ipod--or any other popular, weekly activities. But it is significant because anything that someone does on a regular basis becomes part of their persona: i.e., "we are what we do." Furthermore, basketball is significant to the millions of people who play it and watch it. And obviously, any presidential candidate is significant because of the opportunities afforded by the potential office.

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Either way you cut it, Reggie Love may have single-handedly dispelled the "Duke Basketball Players Struggle in the Pros" myth.