All the other kids at East Junior High School in Wisconsin Rapids laughed at me. They said, “You’re a fool, Lee.” Then the kids would make bets with me that they knew they would win and I knew I would lose. All I could say after the series was over and my tears were shed (sometimes it did come to that) was sometimes you had to bet with your heart. I always bet on him.
Professional basketball has its icons, those players that are almost bigger than the game itself. One could argue that Shaquille O’Neal is one of those, although he is not. A true icon was Wilt Chamberlain, and the icon of all icons was Michael Jordan.
Then there are those players who seem to toil just beneath the greatness of such a player. They battle, struggle and then eventually just fade away when their prime is past. It was one such player that, as a child, I believed was the greatest player in the world.
Every one of my friends was a clone. One and all, they loved Michael Jordan. They told me “His Airness” was the best. In retrospect, he was. The battles played out that way, and who can argue with history? It didn’t mean I had to like him. No, he was my nemesis. He always will be, because Patrick Ewing was my hero.
Tuesday, when Ewing finally gave up basketball by announcing his retirement amongst family, teammates and friends, there was only one word I could say: “Finally.”
Ewing had overstayed his welcome. Fans too young to remember and fans with no appreciation for the game were losing sight of what Ewing had been–one of the best players in a league at a time when the best player in the league was the best player the world had ever seen, still the best the world has seen.
Losing countless dollars when the Bulls beat the Knicks never stopped me from wearing my Ewing jersey to school or making the same foolish wager the next year in hopes that just once I would share in Patrick’s glory as the Knicks beat Jordan and went on to win the championship. I never shared the glory, and Ewing never made good on the promise of a league title that he had made to the media on several occasions throughout his career.
Should I think any less of him for that? No.
After winning an NCAA championship at Georgetown and starting what would become the legend of Georgetown basketball, Ewing was selected with the No. 1 draft choice by the Knicks in 1985. Standing seven feet tall, the city thought it had a player that would deliver countless championships. As time went by, Ewing delivered countless heartbreaks rather than championships.
The closest that Ewing got to the championship he had promised was in 1994, when the Knicks advanced to the finals in a Jordan-less Eastern Conference playoffs. Ewing faced off against Hakeem Olajuwon of the Houston Rockets and lost in seven games. Once again, I was heartbroken. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one.
It was when Jordan made his return to the NBA, and I saw that he was the same old Jordan, that I knew Patrick would not have his ring–at least not as the focal piece of the New York Knicks. It turns out he never got it with Seattle or Orlando, either, as he moved around the league in his final years.
Perhaps that is for the best. What would it have meant for Patrick to have a ring without the Knicks? For that matter, what would it have mattered for the Knicks to have earned a ring against the Spurs while Ewing was injured in 1999? I certainly would not have felt quite right about that.
Of his era, only Michael Jordan and Hakeem Olajuwon surpassed Patrick in greatness. He never did get his championship, but his career should not be undervalued. Ewing scored an amazing 23,665 points, grabbed 10,759 rebounds and is also the Knicks’ all-time leader in eight other statistical categories.
For most of the world, the NBA was a fairy tale for years on end. The good guy (Jordan) repeatedly stole victory from the clutches of the fearsome antagonist (Ewing). Jordan owes Ewing a thank-you. Superman couldn’t save the world without Lex Luthor, Batman couldn’t function without the Joker and Jordan may not have been quite as great without Patrick Ewing taking the heartbreaking fall year after year.
When I think back on my childhood and my favorite sportsperson, I won’t think of Jordan, and I won’t think of the great Brett Favre. Instead, my memory will turn to the big man with the sweet turn-around jumper and the ability to drive the lane with a smoothness that made him seem like he was moving in slow motion. Perhaps he was.
To this day, if there was one player that I could see play in his prime again, it would be Ewing, and that’s the way I like it.
