Linsanity, "Hero Ball," and Why Christians Can't Play it<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Happy March Madness season, everyone.\u00a0 Let there be compulsive score-checking for all.\u00a0 I have Baylor losing to UNC in the final (What can I say?\u00a0 I'm\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/thoughtlife\/2012\/03\/linsanity-hero-ball-and-why-christians-cant-play-it\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Linsanity, "Hero Ball," and Why Christians Can't Play it\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Happy March Madness season, everyone.\u00a0 Let there be compulsive score-checking for all.\u00a0 I have Baylor losing to UNC in the final (What can I say?\u00a0 I'm\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" 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{"id":3362,"date":"2012-03-15T15:05:33","date_gmt":"2012-03-15T15:05:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/owenstrachan.com\/?p=3362"},"modified":"2012-03-15T15:05:33","modified_gmt":"2012-03-15T15:05:33","slug":"linsanity-hero-ball-and-why-christians-cant-play-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/thoughtlife\/2012\/03\/linsanity-hero-ball-and-why-christians-cant-play-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Linsanity, “Hero Ball,” and Why Christians Can’t Play it"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

$\"\"$ <\/a>Happy March Madness season, everyone.\u00a0 Let there be compulsive score-checking for all.\u00a0 I have Baylor losing to UNC in the final (What can I say?\u00a0 I\u2019m partial to Baptists).<\/p>\n

In the recent issue of ESPN the Magazine, Henry Abbott wrote a devastating critique of Kobe Bryant, Carmelo Anthony, and what Abbott called \u201chero ball.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0 Hero ball is essentially the basketball tactic of giving the ball repeatedly to your superstar, having them go one-on-one like a bull after a toreador<\/em>, and hoping that they singlehandedly win the game.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what Abbott said of \u201chero ball\u201d:<\/p>\n

Perhaps you\u2019ve heard of hero ball. Maybe not. That would hardly be a surprise, as its practitioners like to pretend it doesn\u2019t exist. But even though hero ball looks suspiciously like basketball \u2014 it\u2019s played on the same court and uses the same rims, same ball and at least some of the same players \u2014 it differs from basketball in one key respect: The goal of hero ball is not necessarily to outscore your opponent. The goal of hero ball is, instead, appeasing egos, saving coaching jobs, kowtowing to talking heads and mollifying idiot owners sitting on the floor. If hero ball is tangentially about winning basketball games, it\u2019s about winning them only through the least efficient, most predictable means of doing so.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the whole piece.<\/a>\u00a0 It is a stem winder.<\/p>\n

As you might have picked up from last week\u2019s post on the waning of Linsanity, I hate hero ball.\u00a0 I played on teams that practiced this sort of thing, and it stunk.\u00a0 Basketball is best played as a game of moving and interweaving parts, not as an exercise in ego.\u00a0 The coverage of the quitting of Knicks coach Mike D\u2019Antoni makes clear that he was very much butting up against hero ball; Carmelo wanted to be the Kobe-like center of all things and resisted the motion offense that worked so incredibly well when he was sidelined with an injury (see ESPN<\/a> and the NYT<\/a>).\u00a0 This debacle of a season belongs mostly to Carmelo.\u00a0 It stinks.<\/p>\n

You definitely need a major playmaker if you want to win a title.\u00a0 It\u2019s no bad thing to have a leader on a team.\u00a0 But that leader must constantly check his ego to make sure that others are invested in the greater goal and are able to use their own strengths for the team\u2019s betterment.\u00a0 Godly confidence is good and right; a crucial part of it, though, is humility.\u00a0 You\u2019re confident enough in God and his work in you that you are humble.\u00a0 The Christian leader is perhaps most different from the worldly leader in that, as one saved by the God who became man, he is tenaciously humble, always looking to encourage others, always sacrificing so others can shine.\u00a0 To use sports language, he \u201cmakes everyone around him better,\u201d not worse.<\/p>\n

If Christian leadership succumbs to a form of so-called \u201chero ball,\u201d it is no better than the world, and it seems to suggest that the gospel does not transform.\u00a0 It says, in other words, that God lies.<\/p>\n

Sports are not ultimately important, and sometimes we too eagerly act as if they are a perfect template for spiritual matters.\u00a0 That said, while Christian pastors and leaders must very clearly lead, and lead with strength and boldness, they must never play \u201chero ball.\u201d\u00a0 Our hero, Jesus Christ, did not come to be exalted, but to suffer (Matthew 20:28).\u00a0 Because of his humility, he will be exalted.<\/p>\n

So it is with you and me.\u00a0 Seek your own glory\u2013you will be made low.\u00a0 Seek God\u2019s glory in humility\u2013you will be exalted.\u00a0 The irony is thick, and it tastes delicious.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"