Mister Faded Glory | misterfadedglory.com

Actually, I regret to inform you that it’s break time at Mister Faded Glory. I’m sure you care.

In an obvious attempt to prove that I’m not a total pussy, my next few weeks will be spent painting the interior of my house. I know, I know, you can’t believe it. I actually have a house.

In the meantime, don’t forget to read the Insurrection (at right, genius), and follow me on Twitter.

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… About LeBron James? I still believe it, I suppose.

Sports is a business, mostly, and entertainment, and all of that, and I still believe what I said. Even though LeBron James may be a jerk or an uncaring lummox, I don’t think the PR stunt of the last two weeks damages him. In five months we’ll all have forgotten about this, and his coverage will mostly be positive. I believe all of this, and I even believe that he probably energized a core of true fans, and will weather any backlash. After all, we forgive greatness.

But, wow, that did … suck … tonight. Even in a hollow industry with hollow people, I can’t remember feeling so bleak. It was very difficult, very disappointing, and tough to root for anyone involved. If I sat here long enough, I could justify LeBron James sublimating his ego to play a Pippen- or Magic-like role. Maybe that’s him.

I could justify, certainly, ESPN’s special announcement devoted to the announcement. It’s justifiable.

I could even justify the charity – which shouldn’t really need it. Despite several sportswriters claiming the charity was phony, all for show, and a blank facade … Well, I don’t think Boys and Girls Clubs will turn down a $2.5 million check. It’s all justifiable.

And it’s not the end of the world, nor is it life and death, and doesn’t deserve to be romanticized as such.

But that doesn’t make it any easier to stomach. Sports suck sometimes. So does business. So does public relations, and so do decisions, even if they’re justifiable. Onward and upward, then.

Wow, we’re all quick to judge, aren’t we? Tonight, ESPN becomes the mouthpiece – or enabler – for the cap-off to LeBron James’ farewell or recruitment tour or constant fete.

No matter the sentiment, however, James’ weeklong will-he-won’t-he-why-is-he junket is testimony to the power of viral marketing, public relations, and the zeitgeist surrounding sports. For someone cultivating his own brand – even the negative judgments rendered by sports media, bloggers, et. al, is actually a good thing. Believe it or not.

Bad public relations is better than no public relations. Designed solely to self-promote, LeBron’s tour hasn’t seemed to win him any more fans – but maybe that’s the point. He’s earned opinions and judgments and pity and disgust. He’s relevant, no matter what shape he takes in the top of your mind. Today, we all know LeBron James. We don’t know him any better or any worse than we did before, we just know that he immediately spurs a reaction.

Sports media shudders at the notion that a popular player views himself as brand, rather than people’s champ. Where was this outrage, however, when Nike helped Michael Jordan launch the Jumpman?

No matter how self-aggrandizing Lebron’s tour might be, there’s no question he’s commanded the storylines, fueled interest in the NBA, and fueled reaction, evaluation and enthusiasm for the rest of his career. Is he what’s wrong with the NBA? Is he really out of control? Is he just a total douchebag? Well, probably, maybe, and no. Slice it any which way, but he’s on everyone’s mind.

Besides, this isn’t going to ruin LeBron James. If LeBron can count on one thing, he can count on popular opinion swinging behind him eventually. Kobe allegedly committed sexual assault, and sportswriters lauded him for jetting to and from Lakers games to Vail, Colorado. Allen Iverson took furious root in the counterculture, drawing ire for his sarcastic “Practice” speech. Neither Kobe nor Iverson are rubber-stamped Americana like Cal Ripken, yet each enjoyed immense popularity aided by a backlash, not in spite of.

Fast-forward to only three weeks ago – and Tiger Woods, replete with scandalous past, furious media antagonists, and requisite drama, earned thunderous applause during his third round at the US Open. We don’t care. We never did. And if we did, it was only for that one minute. Greatness, apparently, survives.

Division over a public figure is actually healthy – James is no longer just a boring extension of sportswriters’ Michael Jordan fantasies. Instead, he’s LeBron. He’s great, he knows it, and he doesn’t care how he has to prove it. If that irks you because it doesn’t fit in your idealistic box, then great: he’s caused a reaction.

The reaction today features sportswriters, casual fans, and Clevelanders lining up to take potshots. Some think the Bulls are a better chance to win now. Some think no one should ever leave their original team. Some are a little uncomfortable with joining a star-laden team, rather than leading one. Some still want LeBron to thrive for a storied franchise, under the brightest lights. To some LeBron will always be a scumbag, his self-aggrandizement totally incoherent to middle-class lifestyle. Yesterday, for example, some argued against college players leaping to the pros. We’d never do that. Today, some imply that in LeBron James’ shoes, they’d gladly accept whatever menial check the Cleveland Cavaliers would provide, simply exuding gratefulness they got to play basketball for ridiculous amounts of money.

The implication is that LeBron’s next move should be totally defensible. But nothing’s ever that simple. No matter what he does, he’s failing someone, if not several. The reaction tonight will castigate him for any of this.

The reaction tomorrow will be a further devoted base, a gnashing backlash, and those in the middle. Some even react to the backlash, and develop a grudging admiration. (Check the archives for Mr. Faded Glory’s own 10 years of Kobe Bryant examination.) But everyone reacts. But that’s the point.

Tomorrow the reaction differs. Most of us will forget. Some of us will start looking forward to his time in New York, just because it’s excitement injected into humdrum NBA basketball. Some of us will gnash our teeth in hate, assuming LeBron a frontrunning punk. But we’ll all forget, and we’ll realize that things are the way they are. In the end, most of us just like to watch great basketball. When someone excels, we all forget.

LeBron James has gone viral. He’s a basketball player, a brand, and a conglomerate, like Jordan before him and Julius Erving before that. His legacy is fifteen years down the road, and his career is in its prime. To act as though anything else is within his control – or within our knowledge, mores, and values is futile. That’s our deal. Not his.

But we talk about it. We judge today, we’ll judge differently tomorrow, but his marketing team reviews hits and scores and clicks, and knows this whole ordeal has been a success. Brand level boosted, no matter the location, no matter the message. And you thought that stuff mattered?

Instead, LeBron’s saga is a case study in public relations. It doesn’t matter what your opinion is.

Only that you have one.

About a year ago, some tortured employees around our nation were forced to work on a dreaded Friday – the 3rd of July. The horror! This year, another sect of poor souls unbelievably trudged to work on Monday, July 5.

This is their story.

If you’re so inclined, I encourage you to read my most recent short story, An Insurrection. I submitted this story in 2009 to Esquire as part of a contest that I didn’t win. Now, however, it’s free for your reading. Your lucky day is finally here.

An Insurrection is the story of a bitter, divorced, down-on-his-luck middle manager, who can’t quite believe he has to work on the third of July. It’s fairly short, and it’s also available as a permanent link at right.

Best of all, it’s got some of your favorite JJH hallmarks – misguided frustration, bizarre admiration of Des Moines, pet rebellion, excessive drinking, delicious irony, bursts of profanity, irreverence, and, believe it or not, Franklin the Cat.

Read the story and let me know what you think.

Believe it or not, I’m not only interested in comments if you like the story. Your feedback is welcome, unless you’re hoping to ascertain which character you think might be you. Get over yourself.

But seriously, I hope you like it. Comment here, email me, tweet me, links are available at right. Sign me to a book deal, if you’d like. Thanks for reading.

It’s Fourth of July weekend, everyone. Enjoy your country. And if you’ve glommed onto some other soccer team in the World Cup just so you can root for a winner, well, you can go straight to hell.

I’ll be outside or something; not admitting that I’m out of ideas. Maybe I’m just bored by my ideas – after all, there’s only so many times an unheralded rookie call-up can nearly no-hit the Cubs before I barely notice.

But I’m about to be busy, cleaning up around here. You guessed it, the ink is finally dry on the contract, and now I’m actually an owner of a piece of property in Lawrence. Nope, it’s not your mom.

Have a good weekend.

I found out last week my wife shares a birthday, June 23, with notable goth-metal-whatever legend Glenn Danzig. I also found out Glenn Danzig released his ninth studio album last week, which is unbelievable, ridiculous, and, well, totally awesome. Not the album, per se, but the sheer devotion of Danzig. He’s still churning out product!

And who would have thought? I mean, what’s the point? It is 2010, we are a long way from the Misfits – and who could possibly still be listening to Danzig? Yet Glenn persists, either committed to his laughably over-the-top devotion to Satanism, or bludgeoning, forgettable heavy metal. He must love doing what he does. He must believe it’s art, or believe it fits somewhere. In that respect, Danzig’s kind of like Mister Faded Glory, actually. No one may be reading, but undaunted, we keep turning out our stuff, even if no one cares at all.

I guess I should have foreseen the eerie parallels between my writing and Danzig back in high school, when I wore a No. 6 jersey for a team named Danzig, emblazoned with logo and font on our uniforms for a three-on-three basketball tournament. (Note: May actually have happened.) And now here we are!

Anyway, in celebration of Danzig, and in celebration of hopelessly tenuous similarities, I’m offering a career retrospective and review of awesome Danzig albums, which sound even better if you haven’t listened to them since junior high. And, not included here is Glenn’s phony duet with Shakira. You are welcome. (H/T AV Club commenters).

• Danzig I. Featuring solid, sneering metal songs Twist of Cain, Am I Demon? and the original incarnation of Mother, the rest of this record is totally unnecessary, but still probably good and at least a little scary.
• Danzig II: Lucifuge. If, by now, you assume that Glenn Danzig is totally focused on topping each preceding album with ridiculous combinations of Pagan words, you’re totally right.
  
• Danzig III: How the Gods Kill. The only song I remember off this is Dirty Black Summer, which lasts an eternity and involves a funeral pyre. And the cover of the record resembles this creepy visage, appearing totally coincidentally on the outer walls of a bank in Mason City, Iowa, where I grew up. That stone wall that looked just like the grim reaper. FREAKY.

• Danzig 4p: At least I think this is called four-p, it’s packaged in a weird casing with supposed runes on it, spelling Danzig in some mystical language. By the way, this is a good time to mention that the song Cantspeak still is on my IPod.
• Thrall-DemonSweatLive. Featuring Mother ’93, (It’s track 93, professor) this disc totally played in 80 percent of all Midwestern high school weight rooms.
• Danzig V: Blackacidevil. I know, right? Is it DEVIL or EVIL? Supposedly Jerry Cantrell plays on a few of these tracks, which is hard to believe, because this CD is awful.
• Danzig 6:66: Satan’s Child. You would expect with the natural progression of album titles and numerical inclusion, that this album would have a better name. You would not expect its cover art to be any different, however.
  
• Danzig 777 I Luciferi. I think this album is either Gregorian chant or classical music. But then again, I didn’t even know this record existed until today.
• Danzig VIII: Circle of Snakes. Obviously a concept album, solely to steal thunder from “Snakes on a Plane’s” popularity. Yes, my imagination is a pleasant place to hide.
• Danzig IX; Deth Red Saboath. And it’s 2010, with Glenn still rocking, even under the umbrella of nonsensical mystical album titles. That’s the Glenn we know and love and sometimes are scared of. According to the reviews, this is a return to his roots. Which is probably true. And just remember, for anyone to become a caricature, they had to be relevant at least once. For Glenn Danzig, that’s more than most of us.

(Bows head, devil salute.)

From The Big Lead, I clipped and pasted evidence of the conventional wisdom surrounding one of Lebron James’ oft-discussed landing possibilities: The Chicago Bulls.

Why would LeBron go to a franchise where he has no chance of being the best ever? Chicago will always be Michael Jordan’s city. The Bulls drafted him, he won six rings, became the best player of all-time, is considered the ultimate competitor, blah, blah, blah. The comparisons to Jordan will haunt LeBron forever. Misses a game-winning shot? Jordan would have made it. Doesn’t win three titles in a row? Jordan did.

I don’t mean to rail on TBL – they’re not alone. After all, the dueling legacies is a popular refrain among sportswriters. The logic appears sound: The only way the King can truly rise to status of icon Michael Jordan is to escape Michael Jordan’s shadow completely. The last thing he’d want to do is ink a deal in the city Jordan owned. Right?

Unless this notion is completely counterintuitive.

Lebron James is a unique basketball player: freakishly athletic, amazingly skilled, possessing a sublime mental, genius gift for the game. He has repeated successes and failures, and he is 25. these things are all true.James already is regarded as peerless – the best player in the game. He already is regarded higher than Kobe Bryant, a Jordan imitator to the point of surpass. He is perhaps otherworldly, unlike any other player except, perhaps ,Jordan.

James, more than most, is fully aware of his legacy. He is fully aware of his potential to rank in the game’s Pantheon. He is fully aware, also, of his legacy’s keepers.

Who are these guardians?

Who do you think?

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On hot days, the sun peeks through the basement window, shining a crack of light on the far wall, right above the TV.

Maybe it’s a somber reminder the heat isn’t going away, that it’s oppressive outside, and you can’t avoid it, no matter how deep into a dark, cool cave you burrow.

The crack of light disappeared, fading away and back, hazy clouds apparently rolling in. I trudged up the stairs, joints weary from a workout. I opened the patio door, stepping into the thick, grayish air, heavy humidity hanging over the yards.

About 20 yards away, at the bottom of the wood fence, Franklin’s back was to me, his tiger stripes stretched intently. The cat crouched slightly, dirt matting his bright orange fur. He hunted, and when he slouched down to pounce he might remain in crouch for twenty minutes, an hour, two. I wasn’t close enough to see – but he often meowed softly to himself, quiet reminders of his quarry and the importance of patience.

I stepped off the concrete and into the yard, my sandal barely scraping the grass. Franklin didn’t move, he remained in crouch, staring into the flower bed. He lowered his shoulders, tense, his tail wagging slowly.

He didn’t hear me as I walked over, and I realized the remote control was still in my hand. I didn’t shout for the cat, didn’t want to interrupt.

Standing right over him, I saw where he stared – into a gap at the bottom of the fence’s wood planks. Something had forced or chewed its way in, or out, and back into the overgrown woods. No mouse, rat, nor chipmunk peered through. Franklin stared, then he sensed me, and looked up.

His eyes apologized, for something. I greeted the cat, and he meowed. He looked back at the mousehole, back into the flowerbed, then stretched up and looked up at me again. Franklin walked over to my shin, brushing against one, then the other. He slightly purred but sort of growled.

“Come on, let’s go in,” I said. It was hot and the sun yearned to break through the clouds and turn the humidity into a slight roast. Franklin brushed against my shin, then swiped his head into my big toe, and again, furiously rubbing his face against my foot.

I stepped through the grass, clutching the remote, and the cat, ran ahead of me. His eyes apologized again, deep pools of black and green, and he thrust himself into dirt, rolling around and desperately trying to dull his orange sheen – Next time, his color wouldn’t betray his stealth. Next time he’d catch that mouse.

He leaped ahead of me again and ran inside, tail frantically wagging as he waited for me to open the patio door. Inside, he nuzzled my foot again, meowing softly, sorry that he didn’t bring home a chipmunk or baby rabbit – or even a pigeon. He sadly purred that he’d lay a dead rodent at my feet another time.

I smiled at the cat, and a few minutes later I was back in my easy chair, feet on footstool. Franklin walked up to the chair, and offered a clear, easy meow, a loud declaration of something. He jumped upon my lap, looking me right in the face, paws trampling my legs as he searched for a resting spot.

The deep green eyes looked at me again, they were sorry, though they had no reason to be. He curled into my lap, and one paw encircled my leg. His face rested on the back of my  hand, and his purring got louder.

I looked down at my cat, clutching me, purring, and Franklin sighed. The house was cool and the cat was on my lap, securely home.

And I watched the cat breathe. And I thought, ever so briefly, “This is it.

“This is happiness.”

I swear Tony Kornheiser reads this blog. OK, he doesn’t. But he would appreciate our stance on soccer fans. He would – it mirrors his; not by imitation, just by coincidence.

If he read, he’d likely chortle, yet wonder how this place can be so freaking funny, even though each dispatch comes from (sigh) my mother’s basement. (Ha! My mom doesn’t even have a basement.)

Anyway, Tony’s been frustrated with soccer during the World Cup just like us, with aggravations strikingly similar, increasing his radio show from must-listen to practically appointment tuning.

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