Temper your Taurean Green expectations, Portland, Ore., columnist Dwight Jaynes recently cautioned fans of the NBA's Trail Blazers. Green, he says, suffers from "Scrappy Syndrome." Or rather, his coach does.
From the Portland Tribune:
"Coaches who were once point guards – and Nate McMillan spent a few minutes playing the position in Seattle – worry me a little, too. They always seem particularly hard on their point guards and find fault so easily. It’s become an NBA truism that it’s tough to play the point for a coach who once did the same thing."
"These same coaches also seem particularly vulnerable to Scrappy Syndrome. And you know what I’m talking about – they fall in love with players who seem not as physically gifted, not as smooth, but who are hard-nosed, who play with grit and determination."
Jaynes goes on to highlight St. Louis Cardinals shortstop David Eckstein as the preeminent carrier of "Scrappy Syndrome."
"Eckstein is the everlasting all-sports symbol of a player who seems to play so hard that you don’t notice how singularly untalented and overmatched he is. You root for him so passionately that your heart drowns out the constant screaming from your brain that on any Triple-A roster, you could find someone more talented to fill his position."
One astute Tribune reader summarily discredits the above in the comment section.
"Great comparison to David Eckstein. I know you were trying to illustrate Green's shortcomings, but comparing him to a player who has made 2 All-Star teams, won 2 World Series, and collected a World Series MVP isn't the best way to illustrate your argument that talent trumps effort. If Taurean Green has a comparable career in the NBA, the Blazers and the fans will be very happy."
Jaynes wraps up his column thusly:
"Don’t get me wrong. I love scrappy. There’s a place for it. But I’ll go with talent over scrappiness every time."
Now that's a bold stance. You want players who are better than the other players you could have. Point conceded.
Here's the thing that this column misses, and many others have missed before it and invariably will miss after it. It's a simple, yet widely-ignored concept.
Playing hard is a skill.
Playing smart is a skill.
Playing with composure is a skill.
Same as shooting, rebounding, and playing perimeter defense. Same as throwing a curveball and sacking a quarterback. They're skills that must be learned and developed.
It's not "heart," "motor," or "scrappiness" that allow players like Eckstein and Green, and other noted "scrappers" like Bo Outlaw, Dennis Rodman and even Joakim Noah, to play at the highest level of their chosen sport. It's talent and skill. Playing hard and/or smart are viable commodities for a basketball team, and they have measurable results.
Take Green for example. First, he had to be a supremely gifted player to be recruited by Florida out of high school. Once there, he had to beat out another supremely gifted player to get playing time. Once he did that, he had to play well enough to even be considered as a possible NBA player. He did that by keeping four fellow NBA prospects happy and guiding them to a pair of national titles. Once in the conversation for the NBA, he had to play well outside of the context of his epic college team. He did that by being among the best players on the court at the Orlando summer league. Now confirmed as a draftable point guard, he had to convince a team to use a valuable pick on him. Portland picked him in the second round. He then had to play his way into a roster spot, which he's all but locked up with a solid preseason.
Did Green accomplish all of this simply by playing hard or not bursting into tears in pressure situations?
That was a rhetorical question, and the answer is no. He did it with an overall collection of skills that proved to be worthy of making an NBA roster. Among those skills is his ability to play hard and maintain his composure. His aptitude at those basketball tasks enters into the complex equation of skills and abilities that he presents to a basketball team, right alongside his ball-handling ability and shooting stroke.
When Rodman snatched a rebound over an opponent four inches taller than him, it wasn't simply because he wanted it more. It was because he wanted it more and had trained his body and mind to react to that desire. His body initiated action first, and more decisively, and he accomplished what he set out to accomplish. We look at that and say he's playing harder, but that's an oversimplification.
A point guard like Green wants to be reliable in pivotal situations, and so he trains his body and mind to accomplish it. That's a skill, like painting, carpentry or writing a novel. Peyton Manning wanted to be a quarterback when he was young, and he acquired the necessary skills to do it. Paired with his natural talent, the formula clearly worked.
The same thought process assumes that marvelously-gifted athletes don't have to work hard. That's an outrage. There are millions of tall guys with natural athletic ability who aren't NBA basketball players. Look at any small-college basketball roster and you'll find a handful of guys who are talented athletes and pass the airport test of looking like a higher-level basketball player. Almost all of them never will. The ones that make it take their natural gifts and add as many complementary skills as they can.
I'm rambling now, but the point should be clear. Playing hard is a skill. Playing smart is a skill. Playing with composure is a skill. Basketball is a game of skill, and if you don't have skill, you can't play.
And Taurean Green can play.