At age 36, Kevin Garnett has reached the tail end of his career with the Boston Celtics. Retirement is right around the corner for The Big Ticket, and he said when he is done with basketball, he’s done with basketball.
By that, K.G. means that he isn’t planning to get into coaching and is unlikely to become a television analyst. However, he did seize the opportunity to blast the media when Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports recently asked him about life after the NBA.
“Commentary is an opinion,” Garnett explained. “I don’t think people take the initiative to learn the player that they are speaking on. Everybody has something to say. Everybody was ‘great’ when they played. Ha. That’s not the case. Everybody has tough nights. You kind of hold athletes to a perfect standard at times.
“Sometimes when I hear commentating, it’s sickening. People who never played the game, people who never played in the league have an opinion, and that’s all it is. You are here to educate the watcher or the viewer. Sometimes it comes off as personal. I don’t ever want to come off like that. My opinion is my opinion about someone.”
Garnett added that commentating is not his “forte” and that when he has to speak after retirement — at, say, a Hall of Fame induction ceremony — it will be strictly from a personal level.
When we think about “sickening” media coverage, someone like Skip Bayless comes to mind. As comments like the ones Kevin Durant made about Bayless back in April remind us, Skip does not have the respect of many athletes because he is nothing more than an opinion — and usually a terrible one. However, offering an opinion about an athlete makes for good television. Media outlets want ratings, so they probably wouldn’t hire K.G. if he was opposed to sharing his opinion anyway. Although, something tells me Garnett would have plenty of personal opinions to offer.
