loyalty

Chris Bosh, in a Sports Illustrated article, talking about loyalty:

SI.com: What place should loyalty have in free agency, from the perspective of the team and the player?

Bosh: It should have none. Loyalty is an added bonus. It's great that some guys want to be loyal, but you can be unhappy trying to be loyal, and there's no reason to bring loyalty into the business room. It's like if you try to buy something from your friend for five bucks and then find another guy is selling the same thing for four, and your friend wants to know, "What about the loyalty?" And you're thinking, "I don't want to spend five dollars."

People have to look at it as a business. Fans get very wrapped around it because it's a sport. And sports are a little different but they're businesses first and that's how we have to choose sometimes. Sometimes people understand, sometimes people don't.

I can see both sides of it.  As a pro athlete, you have to look out for #1.  But on the other hand, it's the fans who are a coughing up big bucks to go watch these guys play, and sports fans are loyal to a fault.

Like me, I'm a Raiders fan even though I can't stand Al Davis and I can't stand the losing over the past several years.  But it doesn't matter because I'm still gonna always be a Raiders fan.  Well, maybe not if they move back to L.A., but you get my drift.

So, why shouldn't the fans expect loyalty out of the players?  Brett Favre going to the Vikings and playing against Green Bay?  I just can't stomach it.  

Shaq with the Celtics?  Any team but the Celtics!  Well, almost any team, because Shaq playing for the Suns (and any true Suns fan can never really love the Lakers!) was almost as bad.  Almost, but not quite.

Yeah, I understand it's all business.  I understand that the owners aren't gonna show any loyalty to any player.  So, like I said, I see both sides of it.

But as a sports fan, I like it when a professional athlete sticks with one team throughout his career, or at least for as long as he realistically can.  Character has to mean something.  When a guy does like Johnny Damon or Shaq or Favre and goes and plays for an arch-rival like that, I mean it's like if Archie Griffin would have transferred to UofM, or Dennis Franklin suiting up for the Buckeyes.  Like Magic with the Celtics, or Bird with the Lakers.  I just can't see it.