Cavalier Film Room: Dehydrating Defense
June 11, 2015Back Where We Started—Cavs vs. Warriors: Game 4
June 12, 2015Prior to Game 3 of the NBA Finals on Tuesday night at Quicken Loans Arena, LeBron James, number 23, walked over and stood in front of Jim Brown, number 32, who was seated at court-side. James clasped his hands together and bowed in acknowledgement of Brown’s transcendent career and, undoubtedly, in recognition of his place as the greatest figure in Cleveland sports history. Jim Brown returned the gesture and later said, “It was an honor for this young man to pay tribute to an old soldier.”
The simple and dignified pregame encounter was aptly described by Mary Kay Cabot of the Plain Dealer, as “… one of the most poignant scenes in Cleveland sports history: arguably the greatest basketball player of all time acknowledging arguably the greatest football player of all time.”
Some of us can still hear the voice of Gib Shanley calling a running play, “Handoff to Jim Brown, up the middle, breaks a tackle, cuts right, he’s to the thirty-five, forty, he’s across mid-field …”
That Jim Brown and LeBron James are both in the discussion as the greatest players in the history of their respective sports is no surprise. Their career statistics speak for themselves. In Brown’s case, he played only nine years, 1957-65. For the first four years of his career, the NFL was playing only 12 regular season games and in his final five years, it was a 14-game schedule. So even without the benefit of today’s 16-game seasons, his statistics still look other-worldly. In nine seasons he rushed for 12,312 yards for a career average of over one-hundred yards per game … a career average of over five yards per carry. He was also a superb receiver out of the backfield, catching 262 passes for 2,499 yards and 20 touchdowns.
You get the feeling, as an NBA analyst recently said, that maybe people just get tired of voting for the same guy for the MVP award, year after year, even though everyone knows James is the best player on the planet, MVP or not.
From 1958-1961, Brown’s running mate in the Browns’ backfield was Bobby Mitchell. Mitchell was the smaller, lighter (6-foot, 192) speedster who kept defenses against Jim Brown a little more honest. In college at the University of Illinois, Mitchell was not only a star halfback, he was also a track star who hoped to compete in the 1960 Olympics as a hurdler. During the Browns’ training camps, however, Jim Brown is said to have actually out-raced Bobby Mitchell in the team’s annual sprint competitions.
In 2002, Jim Brown was named by Sporting News as the greatest professional football player ever and, in any discussion about the greatest professional athletes in the history of the world, Jim Brown’s name is always in the conversation.
No matter what statistics he amassed, however, no matter what he accomplished on the field, none of it would have been possible without his remarkable durability. And it is that durability which seems most under-appreciated. In his nine-year career he never missed a game. He played 118 regular season games and four post-season games. He averaged twenty carries a game and, almost from the beginning, he was the primary target of every defense that faced the Browns. Opposing defenses tried everything, including every imaginable dirty trick to try to stop him, including going for his eyes at the bottom of the pile of bodies. Brown also played through severe concussions, long before there was any understanding of the seriousness of the problem, long before there were any protocols to protect players. Brown played a long stretch of one season with a severely sprained left wrist and during another with a broken toe.
By his very presence, however, his teammates knew that, with the greatest player in the game on their side, they always had a chance. On countless occasions, when everyone on the planet knew Jim Brown was going to get the ball on the next play, he still, somehow, succeeded. Browns fans who recall that era will remember one game, for example, against the Dallas Cowboys when the Browns had the ball inside the Cowboys’ five yard line. Brown got the handoff everyone expected, took it around left end and, surrounded by what seemed like half the Dallas defense, defied gravity, kept his balance and scored the touchdown. You can watch that replay over and over and, after fifty years, it’s still hard to understand how he did it.
Such descriptions of the type of athletic brilliance that seems to eclipse mere mortality, are, today, offered by eye-witnesses of another Cleveland athlete, LeBron James. James, at 6-foot-8, 250 pounds, is hardly a giant in the game of giants. But when you add to that size the astonishing foot-speed and lightning-quick reflexes that go with his game, when you add to that physical combination his ability to see the court as if in slow motion from on high, then you can understand why James’ name comes up more and more often as among the greatest ever in basketball and in sports history.
You get the feeling, as an NBA analyst recently said, that maybe people just get tired of voting for the same guy (LeBron James) for the MVP award, year after year, even though everyone knows James is the best player on the planet, MVP or not.
When LeBron James has even a narrow opening through the lane to the basket, trying to stop him is, as it’s been so often described, like trying to stop a locomotive. And if he is surrounded by defenders in the paint, trying to follow his outlet passes is like trying to follow a speeding bullet. You watch the replay, knowing what will occur, and it’s still difficult to see.
Like it was with Jim Brown, the opposition knows James is coming and, still, they can’t stop him. They’ve tried everything, including a wide array of illegal hacks and grabs and muggings, and still he drives at you. Even when the most obvious and egregious of fouls are ignored by the referees, giving the defenders the hope that they can get away with almost anything, still, James doesn’t go to the bench to recover, he comes right back at you. And the next game he shows up again and comes at you again and puts another triple-double hurt on you.
In a game against the New York Giants, linebacker Sam Huff was in on a rough gang-tackle of Jim Brown and getting up from the pile, Huff said to Brown, “You stink.” On the very next play, number 32 exploded through the Giants’ line and ran 65 yards for a touchdown. Walking back, Brown hollered out to Huff, “How do I smell from here?”
When the Browns won the NFL Championship in 1964, they had a great team, lots of talented, intelligent, dedicated players. And, of course, in the quintessential team game that is football, it takes quite a few good players to win anything. But if you’ve read or heard the comments of those involved with Cleveland’s last championship team, you know how often they punctuated their reminiscences with the fact that they all knew they had the best player in the world on their team.
Cleveland doesn’t have a great many championship banners hanging from the rafters of its various sports venues, but Cleveland does have an association with two of the greatest players in the history of sports. And we’re watching one now.
In the long term, LeBron James’ extraordinary durability, like Jim Brown’s, is the most devastating of his weapons: strength, consistency, stamina, reliability, grit … a seeming indestructibility. Far be it from me, however, to suggest these qualities reflect something unique to Cleveland. They are not exclusive to any one community or culture. They are, however, universally inspirational. Sure, it’s only spectator sports, but those in the generation of Clevelanders who got to watch Jim Brown play for the Browns for nine years and who are now watching LeBron James play for the Cleveland Cavaliers can certainly appreciate the significance of Tuesday’s brief meeting between these two greats.
20 Comments
LBJ gets it. I thought it was a little over the top but I understand it.
dude, I nearly cried. Like passing the torch, from 1964 to 2015…. one of those moment that made me fathom the idea that maybe… just maybe………
I’ll leave it there.
Needs a drawing! 😉
it’s simple and Easy with waitingfornextyear … kEEP READING
Wow Nick is kinda cute…
Nice article, Richard. (It’s a shame that Paul Brown traded Mitchell to get Ernie Davis. Inside of having two different kinds of runner, Brown wanted two versions of the same kind of runner. Jim Brown thought that thinking was a mistake. But, alas, we would never find out.)
That was a sweet gesture by LeBron. Very touching. Makes you glad to be a Clevelander.
Nick’s a dude.
He’s always had a flair for the dramatic (understatement), but I thought this was pretty damn cool.
I wish there was a better picture of it. Such a great moment.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_kQvP_4N8rbw/TSFGW7GZZWI/AAAAAAAAA6U/R4XvPIKiSkM/s1600/thats-a-man-baby-austin-powers.jpg
I was speaking of Brown deserving a bow not LBJ.
Don’t feel bad s(he)’s confused me too!!!
good lord y’all keeping me BUSY. I have a roster of garbage pail cavs-kids to draw! (assuming we win)
How ’bout a movin’ picture? If you got to 2:12 you can see the run against Dallas around left end.
http://www.nfl.com/videos/cleveland-browns/09000d5d81bdf98e/Top-100-Jim-Brown
Otto Graham was just as good as JB. He was one of the QBs on the all-75 year team, people forget. 10 title games in an 11-year career, no?
You’ve probably seen this but it’s the vid showing the little ‘event’ from a few different angles.
http://www.slamonline.com/media/slam-tv/jim-brown-honored-by-lebron-james-bowing-to-him-in-game-3-video/#f610iaSgJT3KKf3e.97
Hi Scripty. Ah, the great Otto Graham. Interesting question. I would love to see some game film of his playing days in real time and not just the slo-mo stuff in highlight reels. I would say, though, that it’s hard for me to equate his 4-year AAFC success with his 6-yr NFL success. What I know of the two gives me the sense that it was not on an equal footing, talent-wise, with the NFL. Graham’s QB rating in the AAFC was around 100 and in the NFL it was around 80. And in general his stats were not through-the-roof, obvious HoF numbers. In fact they look more like Brian Hoyer’s last year. (Well, I was a Hoyer fan, come to think of it.)
Another interesting element to all this: when the Browns left the AAFC, they managed to snatch up several excellent players from the AAFC teams that were not entering the NFL. That gave Paul Brown something of an all-star team as he entered the NFL. And, generally, I’m not a fan of judging athletes by the number of championships. (as I’ve written several times in these parts, it takes a team) HOWEVER, given the intangibles re Otto Graham that I know of, I would take that guy on my team without hesitation. Great athlete! Exceptional character! In rare and transcendent athletic talent, however, not the equal of Jim Brown, imo.
In the moment, I agree, it’s a little over the top, but in the frame of sports history, it’s a surreal moment. It would be like Van Morrison offering a bow of reverence to John Lee Hooker and someone capturing it on film.
Great writing. I too saw all of Jim Brown’s career and your observations are spot on. I was touched by LeBron’s tribute to JB prior to the game. It shows that LBJ has a good sense of history and also perspective. I get tired of all the “modern” bloggers and writers who think sports were invented in the last 25 years or that the players from the past were not exceptional athletes.
The best example of this is the belief that Jordan is simply the greatest of all time, and there is simply no room for discussion. I would submit that Bill Russell and the big O were every bit as great as Jordan, just without the media hype. The year before Russell joined the Celtics they were under .500 and missed the playoffs, the year after he retired they missed the playoffs. We all know what the Cavs did the year before LBJ was drafted as well as how we did the year after he left. When MJ retired the first time to play baseball, the Bulls made the ECF. A little perspective and respect for the greats of the past is in order.
He’s a gunner. Basketball is team play not one person shooting 40 times in a game. Like jordan,