Everyone Hates a Winner

Shiny Thing$ #234: Everyone Hates a Winner

^{Rob Petrozzo, for Rally}

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Let me start with the usual disclaimer: this is not investment advice. This is an opinion piece…

As I write this, LeBron James is doing something we are unlikely to see again in our lifetime. At 41, he’s leading a Los Angeles Lakers team through a tough western conference playoffs - not as a passenger, but as the undisputed most important player on the floor. He’s also doing that with the the Lakers best scorer, Luka Dončić, sidelined.

On top of that, an additional wrinkle that really makes absolutely no sense whatsoever to anyone who has ever played sports - he’s sharing the floor with his son Bronny. He’s lasted long enough to make the playoffs with his son on the same professional team. In game 3 of the series, LeBron and Bronny went on a 10–0 run ON THEIR OWN against the Rockets, capped by a 35-foot alley-oop from father to son.

👇

Just absolutely insane to think we’re witnessing this. 

All of this should feel impossible, because based on the numbers it IS. Only 4.9% of NBA players have a father who ever played in the league, and no father/son duo have ever played together until now. In all major US sports (not including golf), a fair statistical estimate of an athlete playing AT ALL over the age of 40 is roughly 0.7% and the chances of that 40+ year old averaging 21/7/6 over an entire season in the NBA (what LeBron is currently doing) are incalculable - by any normal math, its literally zero, because its never happened. 

And still, that’s not enough.

For as much as LeBron is scrutinized, one thing that rarely gets its due is how clean his career has been. Two decades in the spotlight with no real scandals, on or off the court. No real concrete reason to hate him. Just sustained excellence at a level that continues to stretch what normal fans know to be physically possible.

But that’s not enough either. Because there’s something deeper happening with LeBron James that has happened a million times throughout history (just never with someone who is doing it at this level and never this aggressively)...

We love watching the rise to greatness. That’s kinda what Rally itself was built on - the idea that you can get in early on something you love, and ride it up as the rest of the world figures out what you already knew. But, like in so many cases, once someone or something wins - but I mean REALLY wins, repeatedly and unapologetically - we start to turn. Especially if that person talks like they believe they’re great and then prove it.

LeBron has lived in that tension his entire career, and more often than not it’s framed against Michael Jordan in a debate he rarely ever “wins” in the court of public opinion. In LeBron’s own words last week, “you can look at both of us and say that you love both of us without trying sh*t on the other person. And usually, it’s sh*t on me.” 

Even Jordan himself, in a private moment recalled by Michael Wilbon last week on ESPN, remarked to the press to “take it easy on the kid” when the narrative first began to tilt negative after a playoff series loss in 2010, way back during the lead up to LeBron’s first championship run. Back when they started to call him “The King.”

It only accelerated from there.

In the public’s defense of tearing down “The King,” there were certainly moments that didn’t help. “The Decision,” the overly produced announcement of LeBron free agency destination post-Cleveland was the first one, leading to the weird scripted and kinda unconfident statement “I’m taking my talents to South Beach.” There the occasional flop and complaining to the ref during games. And there are certainly flashes of ego that still pop up from time to time (as is expected from someone who’s been winning their whole life)…

Long story short, Yes, theres enough for people to latch onto. But none of that fully explains the hate. The real issue is extremely simple and rooted in the core of the human condition: we don’t like anything that gets too big.

Dominance makes people uncomfortable, especially when you have been rooting for something/someone since their days as an underdog. In the abnormal cases like that of LeBron James, you’ve seen consistency at a level that feels unnatural for 23 straight years. We all want to witness greatness, but within limits.

And to tie it all back to where this week’s newsletter was headed, you can see it clearly in the LeBron market. For all of his accomplishments, his collectibles, in my opinion, don’t reflect his standing with any accuracy at all. Comparable Michael Jordan game-worn items trade at more than 2.5x LeBron’s. Kobe Bryant pieces nearly 2X. The most expensive LeBron jersey ever sold is $3.68M - $2M than a Steph Curry rookie card with a half-inch logo jersey patch.

Think about that. An entire Game 7 Finals jersey, worn by LeBron, is valued at a fraction of a sliver of fabric from someone else who plays in the same league at the same time and has the same amount of rings. LeBron has double the amount of MVPs as Steph, but thats irrelevant… because it comes down to one thing: right now, in this moment, LeBron just isn’t as “likable” as Jordan, Kobe, and maybe even Steph Curry. 

But, it’s my opinion, from both a fan perspective and a collector/investor perspective, that that disconnect won’t hold forever. Because this is how it always goes. Time edits the story in everyone’s mind, and the critiques begin to soften - usually in the 3rd or 4th year removed from retirement. What remains are the highlights that we want to see, and the impossibility a career like LeBron James’ becomes the focus.

Even Jordan, the GOAT in terms of both nostalgic memory of “Greatest Ever” and also in terms of collectibility (being the only NBA player who has had both a card and a jersey crack the $10M mark) went through it. Early playoff failures having been unable to beat the Pistons for the first half decade of his career, accusations of selfishness that started early and continued through his entire career, some scandalous conspiracies, and constant questions about whether his style could win a title before it even tually happened. It slowly quieted down a bit as he started winning, but none of that is what we remember now.

We remember the aura through documentaries and instagram posts, and we remember the 3-peats. Everything else got swept under the nostalgia rug - because why ruin a good memory with all the facts. It’s clear to me that eventually, we will remember LeBron James the same way.

The numbers will feel absurd and the longevity with this type of production will likely never be repeated in our lifetime. The idea that he made all of this look routine will feel almost unfair. The market, just like the memory, will catch up as well. All I can chalk it up to right now is that we’re witnessing something we don’t know how to process in real time, because its never happened before.

So we resist it, and many continue to hate on it. 

Until one day, they don’t. 

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Until Next Week…