As LeBron James laid in a huddled mass along the baseline, screaming in pain and writhing back and forth, we waited, nervously, to see if the best player in the game was going to be able to get back up. Adam Silver waited, more nervously, to see if the best player on the planet was going to stay in the game, and keep his team—and the millions of fans watching—involved in this series.
Others were less nervous, and more something else. Angry, perhaps. And yet that anger wasn’t directed at Andrew Bogut for playing Aussie-henchman-du-jour in the playoffs, doing what he could to throw LeBron to the ground—no easy baskets in the playoffs. It was directed at the camera guy whose lens protector left a significant gash in LeBron’s scalp.
https://youtu.be/166F41oAd3Y
The man screaming in this video below (NSFW unless you’re a sailor or work in a soap factory) is reportedly Nike executive Lynn Merritt, the man who manages James’ brand. I don’t any swooshes that have a giant camera-shaped gash, so Merritt went looking for someone to blame.
https://vine.co/v/eOxwVBPYwB0/embed
Now, the angle of that tirade isn’t great, so there’s a chance maybe this rant was directed at Bogut? It would have to be, because nobody in their right mind would suggest a camera man looking through a lens at the court and having a chiseled mass of humanity fall on him could be to blame for what happened. Right?
The camera guy couldn't move his camera? The on-field and on-court cameras are unnecessary IMO. #getoffthecourt/field
— Aaron Rodgers (@AaronRodgers12) June 12, 2015
Wrong…? Let’s please remember this tweet next time Rodgers, or any quarterback, throws an interception across the middle. “How did you not see that coming and react with super human speed, Aaron? Get off the field!”
Rodgers is right about one thing, and that’s the need for cameras on the field and on the court. There are boundaries for a reason, and that “walking with the stars” angle TV networks constantly use has never shown much value to the viewer. Baseline cameras, however, show a unique angle to the game that enhance most telecasts. They may be unnecessary to Rodgers, but they are a benefit to most of the viewing public.
And yet, the controversy of why cameras are allowed on the baseline, or that close to the court, is now a topic in our industry because LeBron James of all people fell into one and got hurt. The worst part of the fall—other than the screaming, bleeding, missing scalp pieces and curse-laden finger pointing—was that we didn’t even get that angle on the ABC broadcast because the camera operator was, per his bib, working for NBA TV.
Player safety is the biggest conversation in American sports today across all leagues, so the legitimate concern about LeBron’s wellbeing should take precedent to anything else about the game last night. All of these questions are more pertinent than if the photographers should move off the floor.
Is the man’s head okay?
When LeBron told Doris Burke he had glue put on at halftime, what kind of glue was it?
Was it Elmers, or stronger, like Krazy Glue?
Did he use Krazy Glue or something like Gorilla Glue, which always expands way more than you expect it to?
Why does Gorilla Glue expand so much? I know it says that on the bottle, but THAT much?
At what point in The Lego Movie did LeBron realize the Kragle was actually a folded up bottle of Krazy Glue?
Have you ever Krazy Glued your fingers together by accident and thought that when you tear them apart your fingerprints were going to be different?
Would you be able to get away with crimes after that?
Would LeBron be able to get away with crimes by telling the police hovered around him on the court that he can’t be held responsible for his actions because he was missing part of his scalp?
Did they attach the parts of his scalp back on with the glue?
Has LeBron gotten up yet? I’ve run out of questions about glue.
The one question we shouldn’t be asking is what the camera guy did wrong, because that answer is a pretty clear “nothing.” There are universally defined lines on the baseline of every NBA arena—you can see them in the video on that play—where the camera guys have to sit to avoid being a part of a play like this.
I talked with NBA TV’s Stu Jackson, a former executive with the NBA who worked on rules and regulations like this, on my SiriusXM show today and we discussed the specifics to this rule and how basketball differs from other sports in terms of media proximity, a challenge for the league for years.
https://soundcloud.com/bleacherreportradio/stu-jackson-tells-dan-levy-why-cameramen-near-the-court-makes-the-nba-different-than-other-sports
The simple solution would be to move the photographers back. Sure, oftentimes players dive into the crowd and clobber a camera person, but the injury usually comes to the person being hit, not the athlete doing the hitting. In most cases, from personal experience and working with photographers for years, the biggest issue is damage to equipment, not personal injury. To say this is a rare case is an understatement. To say it’s the camera guy’s fault is ridiculous.
And yet, the conversation of whether or not there is a need to be there is fair. In truth, no, media don’t need to be sitting courtside at all. But for those of us who use basketball photos for our jobs, or any of us who had our favorite player’s poster on our walls as kids, where do you think those shots come from? The baseline.
Moving back even a few inches would put most photographers and videographers at too severe an angle to get any usable images around the basket. That backboard can be an unforgiving window.
Not only are baseline spots at a premium at big events like the NBA Finals, but in most cases every spot on that baseline is reserved for specific outlets, so no smalltime opportunistic photographer from the Midwest Podunk Tribune can get there early and steal the best spots from Getty or AP or the bigger photo services and media outlets. And as always, the video guys get the closest spots of all, which is why LeBron went tumbling into a video camera, not a still photographer.
https://soundcloud.com/bleacherreportradio/matt-yoder-says-things-would-be-different-if-someone-other-than-lebron-crashed-into-a-cameraman
Can the NBA move those spots back? Sure, it might make the players a little bit safer, but in most cases when a guy dives for a loose ball he’s not stopping at the cameras, so unless you eliminate baseline media altogether, moving back a foot or two isn’t going to do much of anything.
Eliminating baseline media would be incredibly reactionary to one severe yet isolated incident involving the planet’s best player. The Twitterverse may be that angry, but the NBA probably has better sense.
Now that we have that cleared up…about that whole player safety issue. Can we work on letting a guy sub out when his head is cut open without the threat of ejection? Maybe let’s work on that, and talk more about why LeBron wasn’t checked out for any serious internal head issues—i.e. concussion protocol—before getting back on the court to shoot free throws. Guys are going to get hurt. Scalp is going to get lost. It’s what the NBA does immediately after that matters most, not moving the photographers, so LeBron could have nearly decapitated himself on someone’s selfie stick in the first row instead.