Growth Industry No More

“Why can’t they be like

We were,

Perfect in every way?

What’s the matter with

Kids today?”

-- “Kids!” by Charles Adams and Lee Strouse

*

Truer lyrics were never written. The generation gap is part of life and what’s the point of being an adult if you can’t blame everything on your kids?

Of course, I had a different perspective when those words were written -- in 1960 for “Bye Bye Birdie” -- than I do now.

However you see it, it’s undeniable the youth revolution has changed the NBA, not to mention the youths.

The kids get a lot of bad raps but they mess up a lot too. Part of it is just being young. Part is coming up in a corrupt system the adults created and have no idea how to reform.

And a lot is lost, all around.

When Michael Jordan started the commercial boom that changed everything in the 1980s, the NBA overflowed with personality for the best possible reason: everyone was hungry.

I remember the young Charles Barkley, getting ready to go to Chicago to play Jordan’s Bulls, announcing, “I want some of that big-time Nike money!”

Barkley got it the old-fashioned way, he earned it. Back then to get endorsements, players had to prove they were a) good, which meant b) winning something. Beyond that, they also had to show c) some actual personality.

Not that this was a problem for Barkley.

Now, Sports Illustrated and ESPN magazine fight to be the first to put high school juniors on their covers. By the phenoms’ senior years, they’re on national TV and the day they turn pro, they get huge sneaker deals -- capped by LeBron James’ $80 million from Nike -- since the target audience is fellow kids.

By the time they actually play in the NBA, they’re burned out, having long before retreated into the cocoon celebrities must construct, with a trusted inner circle for company.

“They didn’t give us all the money and all the endorsements after one year,” Barkley said recently. “Obviously, I wish it could have stunted my growth.”

Don’t knock growth. Barkley wound up rich and got to grow into his fame. Given all the incidents while he was growing into his fame, everyone should be grateful for those three years at Auburn.

With James’ preternatural poise, he handled all obligations gracefully from the time the media landed on him at St. Vincent-St. Mary High in Akron. He didn’t think of it as pressure and insists to this day he had a great time.

Of course, as far as his actual personality goes, you can’t tell he has one. He’s businesslike but gives up nothing of himself. He’s actually a high-spirited, fun-loving guy, but it may be years before we see it.

Or his personality may never emerge. It’s a leap from embodying local pride in high school to becoming a plaything for talk radio, and some don’t make it.

Kevin Garnett was a nine-year veteran with a live-wire personality in 2004 when he led the Timberwolves into the Western Conference finals against the Lakers but remained press-shy. Despite consistently admiring coverage, it was surprising to hear he still saw the world as expecting him to fail.

Kobe Bryant, who turned pro a year after Garnett, loved attention. Nevertheless, the furor on Philadelphia talk radio after he announced he not only wouldn’t attend a local college, but was skipping college altogether, marked him too.

Bryant arrived as everyone’s darling, beloved by Laker fans, Laker management, the league, the networks, the big-ticket sponsors and the nation’s kids, who made him the youngest All-Star starter at 19, before he was even starting for the Lakers.

Nevertheless, years later after hitting every bump in the road he traveled at such a tender age, Bryant could do his Nike commercial -- “Love me or hate me, it’s always been that way” -- and believe it with all his heart.

Now the magazines are dogging the next phenom -- SI just had North College Hill (Ohio) High junior O.J. Mayo on the cover -- and it’s James’ turn to get whittled down from living legend status.

In the upset of the ages, James lived up to his hype ... which only increased. Now, after LeBron the Golden Child and LeBron the NBA Phenom comes ... LeBron, the Big Choker?

The Cavaliers, 17-65 the season before he arrived, are now No. 4 in the East, but his struggles in recent fourth quarters are monitored nightly as if he were Jordan at 31 instead of James at 21

At the end of last week’s win in Chicago, James drew the defense and passed to an open Ronald Murray, who hit the game-winning shot. That night’s “SportsCenter” ran a graphic, comparing James’ fourth-quarter production to Murray’s.

In a postgame interview, James was asked why he had decided to pass off.

Topping that one, James, who’s from nearby Akron and insists he’ll stay in Cleveland, was recently booed at home when he came up short at the end of a game.

For the sake of what sanity remains, the NBA, which finally got a minimum age rule at 20, could use a better one at 21 so freshmen can’t do that one-and-done number.

The union opposed the issue for years, but it works for its members too.

To answer the legitimate objection about economic rights, they can let younger players start in the developmental league at full rookie scale, $3.6 million a season for the top pick. If players have to spend two years in Bakersfield to get to Los Angeles, Westwood and Chapel Hill might look better.

I was thinking of writing Durham, but I realized most people hope every Dookie leaves as soon as possible.

Faces and Figures

Thanks for coming: The Suns’ family-style front office watched in horror as General Manager Bryan Colangelo, the son of former owner, GM, coach and paterfamilias Jerry, left for Toronto. Jerry cashed out the family’s stake before the 2004-05 season when Robert Sarver paid $401 million for the franchise, but kept operating control for three seasons. However, a year later Sarver denied an extension for Bryan, the reigning executive of the year, suggesting they’d part ways sooner or later, and the Raptors hired him away at $3 million, a $2-million raise. ... Sarver, asked if he’s worried about losing Jerry too, said, “Yeah,” although he may be more worried about taking another PR hit. ... Said Jerry: “All I’m focused on today is Bryan’s decision to move and just dealing with the emotions here from a lot of people. ... I’ll continue to evaluate it. Robert and I will continue to have conversations in the next few days.” ... That sounds like Jerry is open to a buyout. Sarver, already under fire for a similar failure to act that cost the Suns Joe Johnson last summer, contended he doesn’t like to extend contracts (“For me, it was a matter of principle”), while his people were saying privately that he did finally offer Bryan a new deal. In the worst insult one can get in Phoenix, Sarver is now being called “the new Bidwill,” an allusion to Bill Bidwill, owner of the NFL Cardinals.

San Antonio’s Brent Barry, who would have been traded to the Hornets for J.R. Smith if they could have gotten the deal done in time: “It’s been an interesting week. It’s sort of like going to your ex-wife’s wedding. You’re happy for her but not really.” ... The Spurs are back atop the West after winning last week’s showdown with the Mavericks, but this time they’re doing it with mirrors, with Tim Duncan a pale imitation of himself and a battered Manu Ginobili taking a step backward. Tony Parker averaged 19 points in February to Duncan’s 14 and Ginobili’s 15 as they went 9-2, clinging to the tail of the Mavericks, who went 10-1. ... Making it more perplexing, Duncan’s fade is no longer attributed to sore knees. He averaged 12.6 rebounds in February, is No. 5 in the league overall at 11.6 but doesn’t post up much anymore. Said Golden State assistant Mario Elie, a former Spur: “You still worry about Tim but I think the main concern now is No. 9 [Parker] in the open court.” ... Bottom line: The West is w-i-d-e open. ... From Russia with love: Andrei Kirilenko’s wife, Masha Lopatova, a former pop star, told ESPN magazine she allows him one one-night stand with another woman a year. Said Lopatova: “What’s forbidden is always desirable and athletes, particularly men, are susceptible to all the things they are offered. It’s the same way raising children. If I tell my child, ‘No pizza, no pizza, no pizza,’ what does he want more than anything? Pizza.”... The couple have been married six years and have a 4-year-old son, Fedor. Said Andrei: “I’m not planning to do anything. But she said, ‘If you want to do it, you can do it.’ ” ... I guess there’s no point in writing more basketball after that.