Yes, I’m doing the classic trick of waiting for an event that’s narratively convenient to my claim. The Philadelphia 76ers were 9-2 heading into their hyped first tilt against Jaylen Brown’s former Boston Celtics and his mortal enemy Jayson Tatum. ESPN reporter Kris Rhim, during a pregame television report, stated:
Jaylen Brown is approaching this with the intensity of somebody going to war.
Brown submitted a meager 13 points in a 22-point loss to the Celtics, proving once again that war is hell (Happy Veterans Day?). It’s not that Brown has been disappointing for the 76ers, or that Philadelphia has been bad. Still, the team’s saga suggests something: Jaylen Brown makes too much money in the modern NBA for what he provides. LeBron has, ahem, helped the Sixers out by playing on the cheap, but this issue remains. The topic rhymes with this week’s contention that we overrate the importance of certain quarterbacks. A superstar NBA player is quite valuable just like Josh Allen is important in the NFL. A team probably requires a baseline level of NBA star power, similar to how a football team can’t have a wholly incompetent QB. But an All-Star lead scorer who scores at average efficiency, making max money? Well…