A Look into the Comments of Noah Lyles
by Steve McGill
Though I am a lifelong fan of American sports, particularly professional basketball and professional football, I yet remain amazed at how ignorant the American sports public can be when it comes to any sport outside of the two I mentioned above, and baseball. For years I have been baffled by how the channel that calls itself the Everything Sports Network (ESPN) hardly ever covers anything related to track and field. And when they do, it seemingly always involves scandal or drama — the BALCO performance-enhancing drug scandal in the early to mid-2000’s, Ben Johnson getting stripped of his Olympic gold medal in 1988 a day after winning it. Or they say disparaging things about track athletes not being strong or tough-minded. I’ll never forget reporter Michael Wilbon of PTI fame referring to sprinter Jon Drummond as being “track bitchy” when providing his take on Drummond lying spread-eagle on the track, refusing to leave the track after being called for a false start in the 2003 World Championships. Nor will I forget Monday Night Football’s Mike Tirico, when talking about sprinter Christian Coleman in 2019, shortly after Coleman had won the world championship in the 100 meter dash, saying, “But can he run that fast with pads on? And a helmet?” What a dumb ass. The ignorance just knows no bounds.
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The latest example to display just how little the American sports media knows and cares about track and field occurred during the World Championships that took place in August in Budapest. There, as I’m sure most of you are well aware, Noah Lyles completed the sprint triple threat of winning gold medals in the 100 meter dash, the 200 meter dash, and the 4×100 meter relay. While Lyle’s times may not be quite on a Usain Bolt level, his accomplishments in terms of victories are on par with Bolt’s at his best. Carl Lewis in 1984 and Jesse Owens in 1936, both of whom added the long jump to their gold medal collection, are the only two sprinters who earned more medals in a major international championship. So, Lyles is a pretty big deal. After what he achieved in Budapest, it would be fair to call him an international athletic superstar. He has reached a level of dominance that the sport has rarely seen.
But for American sports fans who love their American sports, Lyles crossed a line in his post-race interview after the 4×1, where, in answering a question about how to grow the sport, he compared track and field to NBA basketball, making it clear that while he could legitimately call himself a world champion, the winners of the NBA’s Larry O’Brien trophy were by no means world champions. “I have to watch the NBA finals and they have ‘World Champion’ on their head,” Lyles said. World Champion of What? … We have almost every country out here fighting, thriving, putting on their flag to show that they are represented. There ain’t no flags in the NBA.”
Now what did he go and say that for? Every Tom Dick and Hank, every Jane Judy and Jenny came out of the woodwork spouting their opinion on his remarks. Every pundit on ESPN, Sports Illustrated, and every other sports outlet in the media and on social media was ranting and calling Lyles uninformed and accusing him of being unpatriotic. Now keep in mind, none of these people gave a damn about Lyles before he said what he said. None of them had followed his career up to this point, and they probably didn’t know he had won three gold medals. Heck, they probably didn’t even know that the track and field World Championships were even taking place. They probably didn’t even know that Noah Lyles existed until he hurt their feelings by dissing their beloved NBA.
So there’s that. And then there are the NBA players themselves, including superstars like Damian Lillard and Kevin Durant, who were quick to send out tweets belittling Lyles and dismissing him offhand, as if his perspective wasn’t even worth closer examination.
ESPN’s millionaire talking head Stephen A. Smith had a whole lot to say about Lyles on his show First Take, but later retracted his denigrating remarks after being educated by a friend on what Lyles actually meant and having it put into its proper context. Smith wasn’t the only one to give a knee-jerk reaction, but kudos to him, I guess, for being the only one I know of who turned around and said “my bad” after the fact.
At this point, all that needs to be said has already been said, and plenty of people in the media and on social media have defended Lyles remarks (even if they didn’t all defend Lyles himself). Still, let me give my thoughts on the matter, and on the bigger picture of track and field’s place in the American sports landscape.
The fundamental point Lyles was making is that the NBA is a domestic league, not an international league (even if it has international players), and therefore its champion shouldn’t be called a “world” champion. That’s pretty simple, and I would say indisputable. The Olympic sports like track and field, swimming, gymnastics, wrestling, etc. all have world championship competitions. Lyles’ point was that he has to run against sprinters from all over the world. As the latest basketball World Cup showed, international competition is a whole different animal from domestic competition. Keeping the conversation strictly about basketball, there are some differences in the rules, there are differences in the style of play, in the levels of physicality, etc. To simply say that all the best players in the world play in the NBA is to miss the point. Dennis Schroeder, for example, is a role player in the NBA, but he was a superstar in the World Cup. Dillon Brooks is just a goon in the NBA, but in the World Cup he dropped 39 points against the USA while playing for Canada in the bronze medal game.
So I’m sticking with the track fam on this one. World champions of what? Good question.
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