LeBron James x Pat McAfee, Shedeur Sanders, Aaron Rodgers with Jesse Miller-Gordon
The sports are SPORTING.
Jesse Miller-Gordon and I were originally going to keep this meeting of the minds about Football, but then LeBron James exploded on Pat McAfee. By now, you will have seen these clips and they’re a warning shot from someone not known for his public comments. It’s LeBron unlike we’ve seen him: unguarded, startlingly petty, gregarious, and interracial. Sport is a gift, it directly penetrates the many different cultures that define American life. Whether that is politics, fashion, movies, sports is something that divides, brings people together, and captures our imaginations are writers and people — as LeBron and McAfee proved. Miller-Gordon and I went back and forth on LeBron, McAfee, Shedeur, and more:
JMG: First thing that jumps out as me is he’s pivoting to a human life and there’s some funny parallels with Bill post Pats, where there’s what their life was for so long and what it could be and all the normal ass shit they’ve engaged with so much less than you me or the guy on the street. (Bill looks STOKED to be with that 27 year old, there’s no reason to think he’s not the one setting up the tripod happily) I guess the throughline is greatness and using McAfee specifically as the humanizing machine, perhaps for similar motives? That thinking relies heavily on the idea that Bill really wants to coach college kids and won’t opt out when his buyout goes from ten million dollars to one million dollars on June first.
The line has been that Lebron wants to get into ownership upon retirement. I’m unsure how this helps, since his wealth so eclipses Tom Brady’s that he wouldn’t have to gain liquidity through a media job, and would likely have his eyes on more than 10% stake. Lebron is very brand conscious, and in the past I would have said he wouldn’t do this unless he wanted something (as if I know him personally). Maybe he just felt like it.
You mention interracial, not really my place, but do you think he wants to do this in relation to Jordan, who readily sold anything to anyone without creating an infrastructure relating to any community? This is maybe the most interested Lebron has appeared in casually chatting directly to a white audience.
JB: For me, what I mean by interracial is that LeBron has always struck me as the Jay-Z of NBA athletes: everything is about appealing to and creating a certain Black power structure that is private, confidential, and imperial. His celebrity is partly an example that he is setting for other people. Rich Paul is his close friend and they started an agency together; when Ty Lue was hired in the 2015-2016 season, LeBron made a point to talk about the background that Lue and him come from, an obvious shot at David Blatt’s identity as a Isreali-American who was coaching these Black men that he might not be able to personally relate to. So, as you said, this seems like the first time LeBron is speaking to white people, particularly the kind of white people who consider Jordan their proxy for the type of Black athlete they feel the most comfortable with. (This is unfair towards Jordan in many ways, but it does exist). It was LeBron as I have never seen him. Instead of being a politician, he was Unc; instead of being diplomatic, he was aggressively opinionated. Instead of sticking with facts, he was conspiratoral. LeBron James, welcome to the frat house. What were your feelings on it?
JMG: I think the funny thing about wanting athletes to be Jordan, which I'm very sympathetic to, he’s my first God I remember from early childhood, is that you just want a sociopath. You want someone to be action figure levels of unreasonable. He’s the only guy you would believe if you found out he did the Saratoga banana peel bullshit. I’ve compared him to the frontman in this video, who I have always described as “punk so you don’t have to be.” like the way that fool acts is the ideal, and nobody does it cause it’s unreasonable. Jordan’s natural state seems to play into a lot of what the little ass boy inside sports fans want, and it’s not a reasonable standard, it’s wish granting to a 7 year old (it felt so good to be 10 in ‘97 with a family from Chicago).
I guess it’s obvious when you say it but it feels like Lebron’s shifting into a new phase. If he was first focused on being the best in the world, check, ok, time to build a business empire that draws from the capital of whiteness but doesn’t overly rely on it whenever possible, fuckin’ check. I would imagine this choice to share this part of himself, or his capability of being this also, figures into a plan or maybe he’s just getting older. My Mom was a total powerhouse matriarch who had exacting plans for everything, and now she’s 77 and she kinda doesn’t, cause she’s a little too tired to be like that. Maybe it’s 80/20?
JB: See, it could just be getting older. LeBron fans, because they’re similar to Jay-Z fans in that they have to believe that everything is an ingenious plan, think that he went with McAfee strictly to stick it to Stephen A. Smith. Hey loser, I just went to the show of your biggest rival at Disney. I don’t disagree with that; LeBron certainly isn’t the biggest fan of Stephen A. But, I also would not be surprised if he got on that show and realized just how much he has missed out on being a soundbite because he was trying so hard to be a role model. There’s times during this interview where he sounds like Charles Barkley, unfiltered and spraying everyone in sight. (Pause). He even comes at Brian Windhorst, who I always assumed had a positive relationship with LeBron’s camp. Poor Windy!
White Americans have always been adversarial towards LeBron, in a hidden but alarming way. Unlike Jordan, he didn’t play for Dean Smith; unlike Magic and Bird, he didn’t necessarily save the NBA; unlike Kareem, he didn’t go through incredibly racist things. LeBron’s treatment has been more understated; like, how dare you go to Miami instead of staying in Ohio? How dare you not care enough about Phil Jackson’s criticisms of you? LeBron has always marched to the beat of his own drum, stood with his own people. It’s why he is so beloved in the younger Black male community. I wonder if this is a one time thing, or if the true LeBron is really about to show up.
JMG: Lebron publicly valuing things aside from winning really did disturb people, because it “breaks the game” if you do not want to consider the humanity of those playing it, which we’ve found out in the last few decades, a lot of people do not want to do; They want their action figures. Phil Jackson’s fall from grace is a funny one because he could have just shut the fuck up and retired and there’d be murmurings now about how “that book thing was pedantic and weird” but it wouldn’t be the same.
The mechanics of a Pat Mcafee type show really help with producing sound bites cause they’re so damn long that as a guest you forget the context, and say what you really think. It's not dissimilar from what the Rogan model started out as (I hate invoking something I dislike and don’t listen to, but it’s really just about the “tape for 3 hours you’re gonna get 15 minutes of gold for socials” format). I would add to this that I think Lebron is smarter and more aware than most people, and he probably went there with some talking points. He’s not a silly goose.
JB: Do you have any thoughts on LeBron and Bronny vs Stephen A, outside of this McAfee interview? It was handled oafishly by the James family, but there’s complaining about that, and then dissing Bronny with his highlights playing on loop while you are ranting on ESPN. What’s your thoughts there?
JMG: The Bronny situation felt like none of my business. If I were on the bubble of NBA rosters, putting together a career in G-League, a little time in Spain, etc, I might be fucking pissed, but I’m not. Those depth bench spots sometimes belong to one guy forever (Scalabrini, hello) but not always. The handling of the whole Bronny deal sucked, and as loath as I am to feel bad for the rich kid, the level of scrutiny this opened him up to was pretty awful. He didn’t get a job at DOGE, he’s playing 5 minutes of NBA basketball every other day. Whatever. As long as he’s a replacement level bench player, have at it. Nepotism in sports is funny because it's the one place where genetics actually matter. Maybe once you add in all the amazing coaching second generation pro athletes get, the resources, and then sure, maybe you kind find your way back to being pissed that Bronny is the 12th man on the Lakers.
I’ve never been a huge Stephen A guy, he’s fine, I don’t have the stomach for sports yelling as its own thing, the takesmanship. I’ve tried to learn to like it, I’m trying to de-snob, but it’ll take a lifetime. It’s been funny to have him framed in this totally different light since the election. I feel like that first highlighted all the positive things about him I fail to consider, and what people who enjoy his shows enjoy about him. Then he went on television, and the timeline, and expounded about things he doesn’t have depth in, and displayed bombastic, undynamic thinking about government policy, which shut the door on a bizarre part of the punditry looking to make a populist king out of a sports commentator during a societal low point. I think he’s right where he should be, doing what he was put on this earth to do, and getting screamed at by one of the greatest athletes alive is great business.
JB: Speaking of sports and politics, Aaron Rodgers. Now, Rodgers just went to the Steelers facility and spent a few hours communicating with Steelers’s officials, including coach Mike Tomlin, who is pushing for this move. I’m incensed, as a Steeler fan, because Rodgers is completely unlikable, washed, and boring. I rather them go to war with Mason Rudolph. I rather them draft Dart — I am trying to ignore the fact that he went to Ole Miss — and call it an offseason. Being held hostage by a guy who flirts with pseudoscience is a tough pill to swallow. The Steelers have been boring since Antonio Brown became mentally ill, so people claim that they’ll at least be primetime viewing, and Tomlin does like a reclamation project, but Rodgers over Fields doesn’t make much sense to me. They could have kept Fields for what he got with the Jets and still drafted Dart. Jesse, what is Pittsburgh doing?
JMG: With the 21st pick in the draft, the Steelers might be overdrafting a second round QB like they did with Kenny Pickett. Jaxson Dart is a cool vibe, but the Lane Kiffin offense is one of those college offenses that really takes issues off a QB’s hands and can stunt development. I’m not a ball knower, but it’s one of those styles, like what Tennessee currently serves up, that is fun as hell and you simply cannot run it in the NFL.
The Rodgers thing is funny, mainly because it’s not happening to me. The Giants taking both Jameis and Russ off the board kinda fucked Rodge as much as the Steelers. Titans take Cam, Browns, by conjecture seem like they’re going to draft Shedeur at two, or else why are the Giants doing what they’re doing?
Every season we emotionally edge towards the end of the Tomlin era, but I think the most damning thing was the mood in the Ravens locker room after the playoff game, where their offensive guys said they knew everything that was coming from that D. The Tomlin D is what makes that winning record, and I think that’s on the decline. I’m not surprised a defensive minded head coach wants a vet, especially Tomlin, who favors vets. Fields has issues hanging on to the ball too long and taking sacks, and generally seems to drive defensive coaches crazy, but seems preferable to trying to get Aaron Rodgers and Arthur Smith to work together. Folks keep talking about how DK and Pickens are going to drive him nuts, but just wait until the billionaire's son who coaches the offense doesn’t care what he has to say about anything.
JB: Fields make me crazy watching him, because I see the potential, and I also see why there is literally only potential and no results. I don’t trust quarterbacks easily; prospects aren’t what they used to be. It used to be that you knew these guys would be stars, like Cam Newton or Lamar Jackson, but Dart, Trevor Lawrence, and these other prospects, strike me as overrated. Dart can throw a ball well, but it is never a good sign when college football novices like myself don’t remember signature games that you had. Shedeur intrigues me: For the first time since Russell Wilson, a Black quarterback is being judged by his “intangibles” — things usually reserved for white prospects that don’t fit the physical descriptions that NFL teams blandly like. Shedeur is a tough son of a gun who stayed in the pocket throughout an awful offensive line and a target on his back as Deion’s son. He’s accurate and can lead an efficient offense. Still, that arm isn’t the strongest I have ever seen. Mayfield has been able to be successful in Tampa without a cannon, though, and perhaps the Browns can figure out a way to play to Shedeur’s strengths. But, after all, they are the Browns! I am frightened for the Sanders family. What do you think?
JMG: My general thought on the state of quarterback gets at two things; various levels of football trying to make development the job of someone else, and positional racism creating this generational chasm in between the Brady/Manning/Rodgers/Rivers era, and Mahomes/Jackson/Allen era. I leave Burrough off the list because he looks and plays like a 65 year old’s conception of the position. Football in general, and the NFL in particular, are inefficient, and continually bias driven, just look at the league discovering white cornerbacks in the year 2024. I think Shedeur has a healthy floor, and that’s an underrated feature. I truly think the Browns are a great fit for him. Kevin Stefansky likes a timing oriented guy like Sanders anyhow. The Shanahan disciples dig Darnold, Cousin, et al, and really seem most comfortable when the QB is incredibly coachable (uncharitably, you could say they prefer a joystick). Unlike most other franchises, the Browns would benefit from the Sanders show coming to town to distract from every gross/bad decision they’ve made in the past few years. If I were Kevin Stefanski, I'd be cool with this while also knowing that if they start out rough Deion might begin rattling his saber to coach the team.
JB: OH MY GOD, DEION IN CLEVELAND! He definitely wanted Shedeur to get picked by the G-Men, which is what I wanted to do, but it is clear that they either don’t value Shedeur or think the Browns are picking him. So, alas, Deion will be forced to settle for the Browns when Stefansky is eventually fired. You have said that Daboll likes a gunslinger at quarterback. Jameis does fit that.
JMG: There’s definitely a world where the Browns were praying for Deion to try and force a trade, considering what the Chargers got for Eli Manning when his Dad stepped in (a first, a third, a fifth, and Phillip Rivers). I wonder if a part of Deion wanted Shedeur to the Giants because Daboll is a bit goofier than Stefanki, someone he could realistically replace. Giants ownership doesn’t strike me as much smarter than the Browns in a lot of ways. The Maras must be psyched to share a building with the Johnsons so they only have to hear about their massive running back fuckup.
I am sad Jameis won’t be the starter off the bat. I get why you’d start Russ; It’s the owners job to make sure the team is fun, it’s the coach and front office’s job to win games and not get fired. Jameis can get you right up against fired while putting up one of the weirdest most electric stat lines the league has ever seen.
Is there a world you’re happy with the Steelers trading for Cousins? I am guessing Rodgers is just holding out until after the draft to see who doesn’t draft a ready replacement, but who knows. There’s a world where Tomlin agrees to a college vet and they get this guy Tyler Shough from Louisville day two.
(Sidebar, I hope this theoretical Sanders to Browns thing works out, because I'm totally curious to watch Deion coach Colorado without his son. I think he’s just a decent coach, and without the family angle it’ll be more boring and apparent what his philosophy is).
JB: The answer is a resounding no. Kirk Cousins is an avatar for how Football has been diluted, specifically the quarterback position: Only good with weapons beside him, empty statistics, and overpaid and bland. Schefter is reporting that Rodgers is thinking about retiring, and I honestly am fine with that. It forces us to go to war with Rudolph, something that I am fine with them doing. They can draft Dart, or whomever, and although I have my trust issues on Dart, they can figure this thing out. Cousins is a golf player from here on out, and the quickest way for the Steelers to lose a fan in me if they sign him. Although, I do respect his hustle, I want him nowhere near my Football team. Money Mason Rudolph is QB1.