July 7, 2010

For those of you that have been living in a box since last night, basketball superstar Lebron James will be holding a press conference on Thursday at 9pm to discuss his decision regarding his free agency decision.The press event will air on ESPN and is actually entitled “The Decision”.

One of the most anticipated decisions in the sports world – where NBA superstar free agent LeBron James will play next season and beyond – will be officially revealed on “The Decision,” to be presented live on ESPN and ESPN Radio Thursday, July 8, at 9 p.m. ET.

For those of you wondering, ESPN and Lebron have decided to sell sponsorship and ad space during what will presumably be a highly viewed press conference.  The program itself will be presented by the University of Phoenix and Bing, while various other James’ sponsors such as Vitaminwater, McDonalds, Nike, and Sprite will either sponsor or make contributions to/for the program.  A portion of these various proceeds will go to the Boys and Girls Club of America.

So, to recap… ESPN and Lebron James have teamed up to create an hour long press conference about James’ free agency plans to which they’ve sold sponsorship and taken contributions…a portion of which are donated to charity.

There are no winners in this situation.

Could James come off looking more narcissistic?  Who needs to hold an hour long press conference just to inform everyone where you’ll be playing basketball next season?  Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh had a joint 10 minute interview on SportsCenter.  In other sports, even when marquee players sign, its a quick interview, if not just a Q&A with an expert in that particular sport.

But the charity angle…that negates all of the “bad thoughts”, right?

Does Lebron’s checkbook not work?  Could Lebron not hold an event with some corporate sponsorship and probably make even more money than the proposed “Decision” will make for some worthwhile charity?

Most importantly, we have no clue about the percentage going to charity.  Without that number, there will always be people that think you’re donating $1.00…even if you’re not.  So, it would be almost impossible to convince some people that the gesture is as good-natured as it appears on its face.

The sponsors? They almost seem guilty by association.  Donating money to a cause which inevitably may not do much more than boost the ego of the self proclaimed “king of Akron”…Right or wrong, I can honestly say that I don’t feel all “lovey-dovey” towards Sprite and Nike, now that I know their a part of this event.  Again, if the event was anything more than an ego fest (i.e. about donating money to a charity) why not send the charity a check and not have the event?  It’s one of those situations where the event has a completely different connotation, depending on which one of the two facets came first.  Here, the charity is an after-thought, hence the ego fest.

And what of the network carrying the presser, ESPN?  The network that has been enamored with James ever since he was in high school, when they were showing his playoff games?  Well, to start, they’ve basically handcuffed every one of their NBA reporters.  Chris Broussard can’t give the Lebron scoop (assuming he discovers it) because he’d be scooping his own network.  Funny thing though…they hired him to find scoops.

It’s an amazingly counter-productive catch-22 ESPN has given to its NBA employees.  The point was succinctly stated last night:

The problem facing ESPN’s reporters? If they scoop the network, they’re in trouble. If they don’t get the scoop, they fail. — Don Van Natta

Catch-22 aside though, the fact that ESPN would even agree to take things to this level; is this to be the norm?  Press events for something that is a non-event (or a relatively short event)?  This whole situation, ratings bonanza or not, sounds so juvenile.  It’s like a self-esteem boost for the most confident person in the world (unnecessary).  It really is like the kids in high school, putting on the hat of the college they’ll be attending.

High School.  Yeah, that’s about right.

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