How can a man 6-7 seem so small? Paul Pierce takes low road (again) in NBA beef with LeBron | Opinion
Paul Pierce stands 6-7. By most any measure he is a big man. So why does he seem so small? He opens his mouth and shrinks to the size of an insect. A mere irritant.
He has done it again.
Even in retirement, the former Boston Celtics great leads the NBA in annoying.
Miami Heat fans remember that during Dwyane Wade’s farewell season Pierce went on social media to note he had a better career. And there was no doubt ... that Pierce was delusional. That nobody outside of Bahston actually believed that, and that basketball history surely wouldn’t.
(To underline that ESPN recently named the all-time greatest 74 players for the league’s 74 years, and Pierce was ranked 54th to Wade’s 26th. Not close).
Pierce was at it again this week. This time the target of his pettiness was even bigger than Wade, as was how dumb he sounded.
On ESPN’s “NBA Countdown,” Pierce, an analyst on the show, said LeBron James was not an all-time top-five player.
(That same ESPN ranking has LeBron No. 2 all time, behind only Michael Jordan).
Pierce rationalized that LeBron never built a champion or sustained one in saying his top five consisted of Jordan, Kareem-Abdul Jabbar, Bill Russell, Magic Johnson and Kobe Bryant.
He said it on a four-way Zoom video and as he spoke, fellow analyst Jay Williams had his head in his hands as Paul pierced the ear with indefensible nonsense.
I remember that as a kid, my older brother and I would get in sports arguments all the time and I would drive him crazy by saying, “An opinion is never wrong.”
Except sometimes it is. It was Shaquille O’Neal who gave Pierce his nickname, The Truth. But there is no truth behind Pierce’s slight of James. It is calculated and comes from a bitter place.
I believe James vs. Jordan for greatest ever is a far closer argument than most do. I can concede that James might not be No. 1. But not top five? Get out of here with that.
Look, Pierce is entitled to his opinion and to defend it.
The trouble here is Pierce’s obvious motivation and dislike of James. Can we call it what it seems to be?
Envy. Jealousy. Pierce taking it very personally that James quickly and forever became the superstar Pierce never quite was. Sure seems that way to me.
It is 17 years in the making, this latest slight, the continuation of a long-running beef.
Pierce, now 42, was in his sixth season and a rising star in his early prime when ballyhooed LeBron entered the league in 2003 as the Next Big Thing, “King James.” And the intensity of the rivalry was immediate, the bitterness of it one-sided.
In a game in early ‘04 the two were jawing and started screaming at each other. Pierce sat toward the Cleveland bench and had to be restrained from charging James.
Kendrick Perkins, Pierce’s Celtics teammate that season, on ESPN this week: “Paul is talking big noise to the Cavs bench. Paul actually spits over there at the bench, right? The ultimate disrespect.”
A career-long (and for Pierce, beyond) feud ensues.
Pierce and James on the same court is a lot of what made Heat-Celtics such a bitter and great rivalry the first three seasons of LeBron’s time in Miami.
Now James is still going strong (well, when the coronavirus shutdown ends and lets him) with the Lakers, while Pierce is still taking shots in retirement, making himself seem smaller and smaller.
The latest edition of the beef is well-timed, of course, because in the COVID-19 absence of NBA games and other events, sports fans (and media) need ancillary other stuff to chew on.
And we will take anything. Sex dolls posed as fans at a South Korean soccer game. Chad (Ocho Cinco) Johnson leaving a $1,000 tip. Heck, an analyst with an ax to grind insulting LeBron James almost seems like real sports by comparison.
Look, Pierce had a great career. Averaged 19.7 points. Ten all-star teams. Finals MVP in winning the 2008 championship. There is little doubt he will be a first-ballot Hall of Famer next year.
Pierce deserves respect as a player, even if he isn’t very good at giving the respect deserved by others.
One wonders and hopes that, in his Hall of Fame acceptance speech, he will manage to muster the class and grace that at times seem so elusive to him.
This story was originally published May 21, 2020 at 1:03 PM.
