{"id":3380,"date":"2014-06-22T09:09:12","date_gmt":"2014-06-22T13:09:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/intramuralist.com\/?p=3380"},"modified":"2014-06-22T09:23:38","modified_gmt":"2014-06-22T13:23:38","slug":"team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/?p=3380","title":{"rendered":"“team”?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"4.<\/a>An amazing thing happened last week… and it happened on the NBA hardwood.\u00a0 Truth be told, the Intramuralist isn\u2019t really a big fan of the National Basketball Association.\u00a0 With all references to Donald Sterling aside — and save for my beloved, once hometown Pacers — I am by all accounts and purposes, pretty much a fair-weather fan.\u00a0 It\u2019s not that I don\u2019t appreciate good basketball.\u00a0 It\u2019s more that when I compare the professional league to the college game, there seems something lacking… a tenacity… a zeal… a focus on the fundamentals.\u00a0 Whether it\u2019s the fact that there\u2019s far less effort on defense or the rarity of a traveling call, it seems the purity of the game has been sacrificed for the profession.<\/p>\n

Except for last week.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll quote one of the announcer\u2019s comments in the climactic moment:\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019ll never see this again.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

Last week the San Antonio Spurs beat the Miami Heat, 4 games to 1, to win the NBA Finals.\u00a0 As previously prefaced here, the Spurs are the epitome of the word \u201cteam.\u201d\u00a0 The Heat, on the other hand, are most commonly identified as the \u201cBig Three,\u201d as three players command most of the playing time, attention, and yes, money.\u00a0 That\u2019s what makes the Spurs victory so amazing, as once again the learning extends far beyond any sporting arena.\u00a0 (Hence, non-sports fans, please keep reading…)<\/i><\/p>\n

The Spurs had 15 players on their 2013-14 roster.\u00a0 Let me briefly share with you the annual salaries of their four highest paid players:<\/p>\n

Tony Parker:\u00a0 $12.5 million<\/p>\n

Tim Duncan:\u00a0 $10 million<\/p>\n

Tiago Splitter:\u00a0 $9.25 million<\/p>\n

Manu Ginobili:\u00a0 $7 million<\/p>\n

While each seems like a significant salary (and it is!),<\/i> those numbers are revealing.\u00a0 Each player could have chosen to play elsewhere.\u00a0 Had they signed with another franchise — becoming a \u201cbig something\u201d — they would have commanded a far greater salary.\u00a0 For example, future Hall of Famer Duncan could earn well over $20 million per year.\u00a0 20 million.<\/i>\u00a0 More than twice<\/i> what he was actually paid last year.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s so amazing?\u00a0 Duncan, Parker, Ginobili and their athletic cohorts chose<\/i> to accept\u00a0 less money.\u00a0 A lot less.<\/p>\n

Each team has a loose salary cap; there\u2019s only so much money a team can distribute before incurring ample penalty.\u00a0 Hence, the Spurs signing for less individual money allowed the whole to be far greater than the sum of their parts.\u00a0 Compared to a team like the Heat, which was bound by the money they committed to a grand total of three.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s so amazing?\u00a0 The characteristics that have to exist within a Duncan, Parker, and Ginobili to accept less than they so-called \u201cearned.\u201d\u00a0 They were not coerced into accepting less money.\u00a0 With no disrespect to those who choose to accept more, the Intramuralist admires the selflessness, humility, and valuing of \u201cteam\u201d that is apparent in the San Antonio Spurs.\u00a0 That\u2019s what\u2019s so amazing.\u00a0 That\u2019s what\u2019s amazing outside any sporting arena.<\/p>\n

\u201cWill it ever happen again?\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n

Maybe.\u00a0 But only if those admirable virtues of selflessness, humility and team trump the pursuit of the individual… \u00a0inside or out of the sporting arena.<\/p>\n

Respectfully…<\/p>\n

AR<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An amazing thing happened last week… and it happened on the NBA hardwood.\u00a0 Truth be told, the Intramuralist isn\u2019t really a big fan of the National Basketball Association.\u00a0 With all references to Donald Sterling aside — and save for my beloved, once hometown Pacers — I am by all accounts and purposes, pretty much a … <\/p>\n

Continue reading ““team”?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,7],"tags":[451],"class_list":["post-3380","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-event","category-issue","tag-san-antonio-spurs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3380"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3386,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3380\/revisions\/3386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3380"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3380"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/intramuralist.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}