If anyone cared about Jim Gray’s career, it would be hard to tell who came off looking worse from “The Decision” between he and LeBron. Jim Gray has been a joke in media circles for a long time, but cemented his status when he had his infamous confrontation with Pete Rose at an All-Star game appearance. Since the highly-rated debacle on ESPN the excrement has been flung far and wide at all parties involved. Even the highly respected Michael Wilbon ended up coming out of this with a stink on him. It got me thinking though. Jason Whitlock has been one of the most vocal making fun of LeBron’s selection of Jim Gray to do the interview. Buzz Bissinger has piled on as well. Did Jim Gray doing that show actually save some people?
J.R. Moehringer is the latest go-to LeBron expert as he did the GQ story that is on news stands right now. He had this to say about Gray.
“People have just dumped all kinds of abuse on Jim Gray, but I don’t think anybody would have wanted to be in that director’s chair. That was like being the captain on the Titanic. It was doomed from the start.”
True enough. Now that I think about it, I can’t imagine any announcer worth their salt doing that job. It had to be a clown. Bob Costas gets on my nerves with his over-dramatization of everything, but the dude is a pro and very very smart. I can’t imagine him stepping in to do it. Joe Buck is widely respected if really annoying. He showed interesting judgement in letting Artie Lange crash his show, but I still think he was way too smart to get on that ill-fated train.
So on second thought, Jim Gray was the perfect person to host “The Decision.” A show that ill-conceived, that was also his idea, had to be guided down the toilet bowl by him. It couldn’t and shouldn’t have gone any other way. And even if by some outside chance there would have been another media member that would have considered hosting that show (I am looking at you Ahmad Rashad) they are probably ecstatic that they ended up missing out on another nail in the coffin of Jim Gray’s career.
