I haven’t watched the whole press conference, just the clip, but when Noah says “you know what bothers me the most….having to watch the NBA finals and they have world champion on their head….” That’s what bothers Noah the most? It’s cringe worthy. Listen, of course the NBA champion is not a world champion, but Noah Lyles is a world wide cultural speck compared to the biggest NBA stars. In fact Bolt is the only T&F athlete to approach the global (not USA but global) relevance of a Michael Jordan or Magic Johnson or Kareem, etc. The NBA does well over a 1/2 billion $ in revenue over seas. Do you know the total revenue of world athletics or the Diamond league? It’s about a tenth of this or less. True or not, this was a silly fight to pick and Lyles looked foolish doing it. Not the way to win friends or influence people. I’m a big Lyles fan, but in the USA this caused his stock to drop, not go up. You want more great athletes to choose T&F and not basketball or more fans to watch? Find a better approach.
For those who dont follow the NBA, the NBA champs are a better team than an all star team. The all star team has no chemistry and essentially a new coach when they go to olympics. It has bitten them before. So the NBA dudes are correct, they are the world champs, because whoever is the best in the NBA is easily the best team in the world. He should have said MLB or NFL. And in the case of an all star team, they win gold against the world, they are world champs! We cant account for talent hiding in the weeds somewhere.
Nobody is arguing that the NBA isn't by far the strongest league in the world, in the same way that nobody thinks that the European Champions League (in football) isn't (by far) the highest standard of football (soccer) in the world. But the European Champions still compete in an additional tournament (against a far lower level of opposition) to earn the title.
Read post #78.
This post was edited 42 seconds after it was posted.
I haven’t watched the whole press conference, just the clip, but when Noah says “you know what bothers me the most….having to watch the NBA finals and they have world champion on their head….” That’s what bothers Noah the most? It’s cringe worthy. Listen, of course the NBA champion is not a world champion, but Noah Lyles is a world wide cultural speck compared to the biggest NBA stars. In fact Bolt is the only T&F athlete to approach the global (not USA but global) relevance of a Michael Jordan or Magic Johnson or Kareem, etc. The NBA does well over a 1/2 billion $ in revenue over seas. Do you know the total revenue of world athletics or the Diamond league? It’s about a tenth of this or less. True or not, this was a silly fight to pick and Lyles looked foolish doing it. Not the way to win friends or influence people. I’m a big Lyles fan, but in the USA this caused his stock to drop, not go up. You want more great athletes to choose T&F and not basketball or more fans to watch? Find a better approach.
It's cringe-worthy because, as again noticed by the rest of the (English) speaking world, Americans seem to struggle with irony; obviously that's not LITERALLY what bothers Lyle the most.
You're also failing to account for the question he was asked, the vibe of the interview, the tone of the conversation etc.
It doesn't matter that he's a 'cultural speck' (few people in the UK, for example, could name an active NBA player), he's a world champion who's won at world level.
Real Madrid's revenue in a month is higher than Auckland FC's revenue in 10 years. They still play them in the Club World Cup to earn the title of world champion.
I’d bet you every penny I have that more than a “few” people in the UK know LeBron James, and far more than know Lyles. It’s a point of pure pedantry to say the NBA champion is not the “world champion.” In basketball do you think there is any other team that has a chance against the best NBA team? There are basketball leagues across the globe as it is a global sport. Of course the NBA champion is the best team in a given year. It’s not even close. In soccer, there are many outstanding leagues and no league champion can lay claim to being world champion without playing one another, but that’s just not true in basketball. Yes, the NBA champion is NOT the “world champion,” but is the NBA champion the best team in the world? Yes, just like Lyles is the best 200 m runner in the world.
This post was edited 5 minutes after it was posted.
Are you referring to Eliud Kipchoge skipping 2023 W.C? Are you referring to limit of three athletes per nation? Seb Coe doesn't have to show up in China with brief cases of gold bars to encourage China to send athletes to Olympics or W.C. There are more good baseball players from Japan and Korea not playing in M.L.B. compared to number of 100m dash athletes from Japan and Korea not participating in international T&F.
There are more good distance runners in Africa than there are MLB-level players in Japan and Korea who aren't already in the majors. The average salary in Japan is $300k. The minimum in MLB is almost $800k. The highest-paid player in Korea makes $2 million; that would be about the 450th-highest salary in MLB. If any of those players were MLB-caliber, someone would easily sign them.
You are filibustering.
Instead of comparing elite sprinters to explosive movement U.S. professional sport athletes as Noah L is and was doing, you are going far out of the scope of debate. You want to compare African distance running to M.L.B. level talent in Japan and Korea.
You failed to address the difficulty M.L.B. teams have with professional leagues in Japan and Korea. M.L.B. teams must pay Japanese leagues and Korean leagues for the right to talk to Japanese and Korean baseball players.
Noah Lyles, compared himself narrowly to U.S. professional sport athletes who play explosive movement sports. Noah Lyles correctly said he is the fastest man in the world. When professional leagues in U.S. win, they sometimes refer to themselves as best teams in the world, not always true. Do you want to talk hockey? U.S. can put together an all-star hockey team from U.S. hockey players in N.H.L. Smart money says bet against U.S. hockey players against best national teams from countries in Arctic Circle.
Bottom line, it is no doubt Noah Lyles is the fastest man alive, 100m to 200m. Are the best basketball players most likely in N.B.A? All we can say is, most likely. Do you remember U.S. national team losing in 1972 Olympics? Okay, college kids but the best college kids. U.S. national basketball team still loses on occasion with U.S. pros.
1: The World Series was named in 1903. The two teams that played were the best teams in the world, and there hasn't been a day since where any reasonable argument could be made that there is any team anywhere else in the world that could compete for it.
2: There is absolutely a guarantee that the winner of the World Series would destroy the winner of Japan in a 7-game series. The best players on Japan's WBC team are playing in the majors. They do not have a domestic team that could win a series against any MLB playoff team. They'd have trouble beating Oakland. The 25th hitter in each Japan league is hitting about .220 with an OPS under 700, against minor-league level pitching.
This argument applies to basketball, hockey and football as well. There aren't any teams in any non-US domestic league that could compete for those titles, and it's ridculous to claim they could.
I see that you struggle with the definition of the word "guarantee."
I remember when the USA started to send NBA players to the Olympics and a guy who really knew everything there was to know about basketball guaranteed to me that as long as we sent NBA players the USA would never lose.
what does one Olympic basketball team where none of the players on the qualifying team bothered to play in the Games, during the off-season, have to do with actual teams playing a 7-game series?
It's cringe-worthy because, as again noticed by the rest of the (English) speaking world, Americans seem to struggle with irony; obviously that's not LITERALLY what bothers Lyle the most.
You're also failing to account for the question he was asked, the vibe of the interview, the tone of the conversation etc.
It doesn't matter that he's a 'cultural speck' (few people in the UK, for example, could name an active NBA player), he's a world champion who's won at world level.
Real Madrid's revenue in a month is higher than Auckland FC's revenue in 10 years. They still play them in the Club World Cup to earn the title of world champion.
I’d bet you every penny I have that more than a “few” people in the UK know LeBron James, and far more than know Lyles. It’s a point of pure pedantry to say the NBA champion is not the “world champion.” In basketball do you think there is any other team that has a chance against the best NBA team? There are basketball leagues across the globe as it is a global sport. Of course the NBA champion is the best team in a given year. It’s not even close. In soccer, there are many outstanding leagues and no league champion can lay claim to being world champion without playing one another, but that’s just not true in basketball. Yes, the NBA champion is NOT the “world champion,” but is the NBA champion the best team in the world? Yes, just like Lyles is the best 200 m runner in the world.
Few meaning 'a small number of', relative to the population. You'd be very surprised. It's just not that popular. Spain, you'd definitely have more luck.
I've explained the football point ad nauseum, see #81 and #78. It's akin to calling the European Champions (where the biggest 5 leagues in world football BY FAR compete) the football world champions.
This is akin to the winner of the European Champion's League declaring themselves 'world champion' before playing the best teams elsewhere in the FIFA Club World Cup.
The best football (soccer) players across the world play in Europe, for European teams.
Every year the best teams from all European Leagues compete in the European Champion's League.
The winner of the Champion's League is the EUROPEAN Champion.
The EUROPEAN champions then go and compete in the FIFA Club WORLD Cup, against the winners of the Oceanic, South American, North America and Asian equivalents to the Champion's League, to become WORLD champions. All of which are VASTLY poorer leagues, with a notably lower quality of player than the top 5 European leagues.
Europe versus America is apples to oranges. In college sports we would vote to determine a championship instead of determining the results on the field. More controversy means more attention, which draws more money. Claiming world championships in NBA or MLB or hockey is not about facts, it is a commercial act to pool in more money. Europe is about humanity and democracy, America is about capitalism and money. They are different principles, different beliefs.
There are more good distance runners in Africa than there are MLB-level players in Japan and Korea who aren't already in the majors. The average salary in Japan is $300k. The minimum in MLB is almost $800k. The highest-paid player in Korea makes $2 million; that would be about the 450th-highest salary in MLB. If any of those players were MLB-caliber, someone would easily sign them.
You are filibustering.
Instead of comparing elite sprinters to explosive movement U.S. professional sport athletes as Noah L is and was doing, you are going far out of the scope of debate. You want to compare African distance running to M.L.B. level talent in Japan and Korea.
You failed to address the difficulty M.L.B. teams have with professional leagues in Japan and Korea. M.L.B. teams must pay Japanese leagues and Korean leagues for the right to talk to Japanese and Korean baseball players.
Noah Lyles, compared himself narrowly to U.S. professional sport athletes who play explosive movement sports. Noah Lyles correctly said he is the fastest man in the world. When professional leagues in U.S. win, they sometimes refer to themselves as best teams in the world, not always true. Do you want to talk hockey? U.S. can put together an all-star hockey team from U.S. hockey players in N.H.L. Smart money says bet against U.S. hockey players against best national teams from countries in Arctic Circle.
Bottom line, it is no doubt Noah Lyles is the fastest man alive, 100m to 200m. Are the best basketball players most likely in N.B.A? All we can say is, most likely. Do you remember U.S. national team losing in 1972 Olympics? Okay, college kids but the best college kids. U.S. national basketball team still loses on occasion with U.S. pros.
You’ve actually point out that in team sports the world champion is probably often NOT the best team in the world because world championship teams are national all star teams assembled in way with limited chemistry, coaching time, buy in from the players that would render them inferior to the best club teams. I’m not enough of an expert in soccer to know for sure, but do you think Argentina would beat Manchester City? Which is the world champion and which is the better team? The best NBA team would almost certainly beat team USA given the way the latter functions in reality. Yet team USA or another national basketball team might be crowned world champion.
Few meaning 'a small number of', relative to the population. You'd be very surprised. It's just not that popular. Spain, you'd definitely have more luck.
I've explained the football point ad nauseum, see #81 and #78. It's akin to calling the European Champions (where the biggest 5 leagues in world football BY FAR compete) the football world champions.
You’ve missed my point completely. Lyles made a dumb straw man argument for no reason and it mostly backfired and he looks foolish. Lyles is the best 100/200 runner in the world. In track that’s fairly synonymous with being the world or Olympic champion. In basketball, the best team in the world is the NBA champion. You can certainly point out that the NBA champ is not technically the world champion, and you would be correct, but if you mean to imply that winning and NBA championship is any less of an accomplishment than Lyles winning worlds, that’s wrong. Best sprinter in the world: Lyles. Best basketball team in the world: Denver Nuggets. We correctly say Lyles is a world champion and Denver is not, but this is a foolish point to make. Both are the best in the world.
I’m standing with Noah on this one !! @LylesNoah the organization have players from different countries but do they compete against different countries. You have to go against the world in order to be a world champion!! https://t.co/UYlEBgKIdg
Ethiopia and Kenya had 74 of the top 100 marathon times in the world in 2022. 6 of those athletes were in the World Championships.
45 of the 85 participants in the WC marathon had PBs slower than the 74th fastest Ethiopian/Kenyan ran in 2022.
There aren't 68 players in Japan or Korea who would eassily slide into the MLB, but there are HUNDREDS of African distance runners who could easily slide into the World Championships.
Ah, Noah Lyles, you are so right. Cry baby NBA'ers. The only real world championship in basketball is at the Olympics, period. The worst thing the US did for Oly BB was to allow the pros to play. Amateurs played for glory, NBA players in Olympics play like its a side-show. Athletically, I'd put Lyles up against any player in the NBA. Did anyone else notice, before every race, he always takes a jump...the dude has to have a 50 inch vertical.
I see that you struggle with the definition of the word "guarantee."
I remember when the USA started to send NBA players to the Olympics and a guy who really knew everything there was to know about basketball guaranteed to me that as long as we sent NBA players the USA would never lose.
what does one Olympic basketball team where none of the players on the qualifying team bothered to play in the Games, during the off-season, have to do with actual teams playing a 7-game series?
It has to do with people thinking that outcomes in sports are guaranteed because they say so, or because they bang away on a keyboard and claim it is stupid.
That guy was wrong that NBA players would never lose in the Olympics. His guarantee wasn't worth spit.
We'll probably never know, but your guarantee that the World Series winners would never lose to the best team from Japan has equal value. None.
Calling something the World Series that only teams from two countries can win is laughably stupid. Claiming it makes sense because you can "guarantee" they would "never" lose is equally stupid.
I think it’s clear to most that what Noah Lyles is saying is here valid, and while people are free to disagree if they like, I am a little surprised by the extent of the backlash he’s faced. It sort of reaffirms the notion that outside the United States, Americans are often perceived as people who believe the world starts in New York and ends in California. Lyles obviously knows there’s more than that, but whether it’s ignorance, arrogance, misplaced patriotism or even just classic denial, it appears many of his fellow countrymen - Stephen A. Smith included - don’t want to hear it.
what does one Olympic basketball team where none of the players on the qualifying team bothered to play in the Games, during the off-season, have to do with actual teams playing a 7-game series?
It has to do with people thinking that outcomes in sports are guaranteed because they say so, or because they bang away on a keyboard and claim it is stupid.
That guy was wrong that NBA players would never lose in the Olympics. His guarantee wasn't worth spit.
We'll probably never know, but your guarantee that the World Series winners would never lose to the best team from Japan has equal value. None.
Calling something the World Series that only teams from two countries can win is laughably stupid. Claiming it makes sense because you can "guarantee" they would "never" lose is equally stupid.
OK but you're talking about one team, one team, where they literally imploded the team, put a bunch of inexperienced international players in an off-season tournament, and it's the only time in 28 years they didn't win. You're comparing that to the MLB team that is literally the best team in baseball performing at its absolute peak.
I can absolutely guarantee the Japan Series winner would never beat the World Series winner in a 7-game series, juslt like the International League winner would never beat the World Series winner in a 7-game series. If your only claim against that is one basketball team, poorly constructed, that had never played together, 20 years ago, you're just helping me prove my point.
I think it’s clear to most that what Noah Lyles is saying is here valid, and while people are free to disagree if they like, I am a little surprised by the extent of the backlash he’s faced. It sort of reaffirms the notion that outside the United States, Americans are often perceived as people who believe the world starts in New York and ends in California. Lyles obviously knows there’s more than that, but whether it’s ignorance, arrogance, misplaced patriotism or even just classic denial, it appears many of his fellow countrymen - Stephen A. Smith included - don’t want to hear it.
It isn't valid.
Lyles wasn't talking to the world. He was taking shots at his own country for elevating team sports over his accomplishments. He thinks winning the 100/200 should be a bigger deal than winning an NBA championship. It never will be.
The rest of his complaint is gobbledygook - they both have to beat the best in the world to win. He just wants his to mean more.
It has to do with people thinking that outcomes in sports are guaranteed because they say so, or because they bang away on a keyboard and claim it is stupid.
That guy was wrong that NBA players would never lose in the Olympics. His guarantee wasn't worth spit.
We'll probably never know, but your guarantee that the World Series winners would never lose to the best team from Japan has equal value. None.
Calling something the World Series that only teams from two countries can win is laughably stupid. Claiming it makes sense because you can "guarantee" they would "never" lose is equally stupid.
I can absolutely guarantee the Japan Series winner would never beat the World Series winner in a 7-game series,
I can take a dump in a box and stamp "Guaranteed" on it and it would have the same value.
It makes me sad to see that people don't understand what a word means and toss it around anyway, or don't understand how long forever is (you're saying it could never, ever happen).
Of course it could happen, at some point, and you can't guarantee it couldn't. And calling something the "World Series" that doesn't include teams from around the world is as stupid now as it was before you replied.
I think it’s clear to most that what Noah Lyles is saying is here valid, and while people are free to disagree if they like, I am a little surprised by the extent of the backlash he’s faced. It sort of reaffirms the notion that outside the United States, Americans are often perceived as people who believe the world starts in New York and ends in California. Lyles obviously knows there’s more than that, but whether it’s ignorance, arrogance, misplaced patriotism or even just classic denial, it appears many of his fellow countrymen - Stephen A. Smith included - don’t want to hear it.
It isn't valid.
Lyles wasn't talking to the world. He was taking shots at his own country for elevating team sports over his accomplishments. He thinks winning the 100/200 should be a bigger deal than winning an NBA championship. It never will be.
The rest of his complaint is gobbledygook - they both have to beat the best in the world to win. He just wants his to mean more.
winning in a team versus wining as one against the whole world are two different things.
an individual world title is greater than a national team title.
Would the Denver Nuggets even win an Olympic medal? Team USA, an all-star NBA team, only beat France by 5...
This is apples versus oranges. If the Nuggets were to play all the remaining NBA all-stars and the latter was a team that practiced and played together for months during an 81 game season with the NBA title on the line, the all-star team would win. Team USA in basketball barely plays and practices together when they start these world tournaments and the players are in their off season with uneven motivation. That team USA would likely be annihilated by the Nuggets and certainly Team USA would have trouble ever beating truly great NBA teams like the 1996 Bulls or 2017 Warriors. I ask again, who would win, Argentina or Man City? Argentina are world champs, but are they the best team in the world? Not likely.
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