[外電] 個性獨特的Noah

看板ChicagoBulls (芝加哥公牛)作者eertllams (Tree666)時間14年前 (2011/05/27 00:29)推噓5(5推 0噓 1→)

留言6則, 3人參與討論串1/1

http://tinyurl.com/3gfo8yj By Christopher Borrelli, Tribune reporter On the court and off, Joakim Noah not your typical NBA player A couple of afternoons before he shouted an anti-gay slur at a fan in Miami and was handed a $50,000 fine, Joakim Noah was at the Bulls practice facility in Deerfield, taking a few private questions after a workout. He sat in the hallway outside the court. When had Chicago turned the corner on him, he was asked, from ambivalent to embracing? He said nothing. He dropped his head and stretched out his long right arm, pointing to a picture hanging across from him. It shows him sprinting, driving downcourt, his hair flying. It's Game 6 of the 2009 playoffs; to his right, just behind him, is Boston Celtics forward Paul Pierce, struggling to keep up with Noah, who had stolen the ball. Moments after the image was snapped, Noah covered the length of the floor and dunked. "That series," Noah said. "That changed everything for me." Then he considered the question a moment longer and added, "I've always dealt with people saying stuff (about me), though. Because of my dad. My dad is probably the most popular person in France, and growing up it was always like he would make a comment about something to someone, and it would become a big deal within the media there. "It would get uncomfortable with my teachers sometimes — you're a kid, and you feel resented for something, and the truth is that it has nothing to do with you. They're reacting to something my father said and they're acting strange towards me. When I first moved to the states, I was 12, and I wasn't the son of Yannick anymore. "It was the first time I was a normal kid." His father is Yannick Noah, a celebrated French tennis star, now a reggae singer; his mother, Cecilia Rodhe, a New York artist, was Miss Sweden 1978. And this week, he's running into old feelings — this time for something he said. Coach Tom Thibodeau, asked at Bulls practice Wednesday about Noah's comment, scrunched up his face in a wince, clearly tired of the subject: "He's really a pretty sensitive guy, a high-character guy, but sometimes in the heat of battle you say things you regret — and it doesn't reflect who Joakim is. ... I think he feels badly, and it's a lesson learned, right?" "It's a perfect example of Joakim's overreacting emotionally," said sports agent Donald Dell, who represented Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, Yannick Noah and now represents Joakim Noah. "Joakim sits on the bench. He's in the moment and yells at some guy, and that has repercussions. He reacts way too quickly, and I'm always concerned about that with him. Because he's interested in certain things that many athletes I've represented over the years are not interested in. He's a really interesting guy, and much more intelligent than a lot of people know — he will go back to school, I bet. He's not what you call a natural basketball player. I hope he learns from this." Indeed, after months of positive press about his transformation from polarizing rookie into one of the Bulls' breakout stars (Chicago magazine: "Quite a turnaround"; Sports Illustrated: "Stunning"), it felt like an ugly misstep for Noah. Back at the Berto Center in Deerfield, when asked if he's given much thought to his image, he said that after he was arrested on a misdemeanor marijuana charge in 2008, he "realized there is a bigger picture to all this, and I need to be careful about the things I say and do. There is a responsibility with this job. But in terms of branding myself or changing that image? No. The people who respect me know that I am never trying to be anything that I am not." The world is full of the predictable, awash in duplicates. To reach the Berto Center in Deerfield, for instance, to find the Chicago Bulls on a day off, you drive past strip malls, creep through constant construction zones, pull into an office park with buildings so lacking in distinction that the facades look false, shimmery. Inside the Berto, you find the Bulls divided up, working with trainers, palms pressed expectantly on their knees, grunting in the same way, dribbling in the same way, pivoting in the same way, sprinting, rewinding themselves. Then there's Noah. No one looks like him here. No one moves like him here. Indeed, watching him shoot free throws, you're reminded of just how unlikely it is that this iconoclastic 26-year-old center — albeit, one of the NBA's best rebounders, and "the heart and soul" of the Bulls, said general manager Gar Forman — would become a fan favorite and citywide fascination. Noah lowers his shoulders at the baseline, sets his feet and shoots. And it's graceless. It's all Jerry Lewis, arms splaying outward as he releases, fingers spreading in a peacock flourish. He is an island unto himself here. Even his sneakers, Le Coq Sportif high-tops, red, white and French, with roosters on the side, are without peer; he's the only NBA player endorsing the French shoemaker. Couple that with accusations of dirty play and arrogance, a suspension, frequent struggles with foot-in-mouth disease and general goofiness, all since arriving less than four years ago, and Noah's ascendance to the ranks of beloved NBA figures was far from fated. Even if you ignore that he's 7 feet tall and so long his knees seem higher than his waist, or that his hair, a frizzy thicket of precooked Ramen noodles, demands its own publicist, Noah moves like a seventh-grader at his first junior high dance. Which, it turns out, is endearing: "He runs around with his head cut off sometimes, but I love it," Dennis Rodman told ESPN, summarizing Noah's appeal. "Jo's got like this glow around him," said Bulls guard Ronnie Brewer. "In fact, he's sort of like a Rodman in that way. Because there is nobody out there like him." ‧‧‧ Noah moved from France to New York City after his parents divorced. He lived in Hell's Kitchen, on the west side of Manhattan, with his mother and sister. At 13, he was 6 feet tall. He never connected with tennis and hated the pressure that being Yannick's son brought with it. So he gravitated toward basketball. By his sophomore year at the University of Florida, though, where he helped win two consecutive national titles, his old fishbowl existence returned: "It's different in the NBA. You live in the suburbs (Deerfield), a little secluded. I lived in a dorm in college. Everyone had access. What do you do when you have 10 people waiting every day outside your dorm? That's where I started to learn sometimes you have to be selfish about yourself." The player doth protest too much. There's innocence here: Steve Schanwald, executive vice president of business operations for the Bulls, said "autograph lines with Joakim take twice as long to get through as it does with other players because Joakim will not just sign and autograph, he will engage every fan." Dell recalls leaving the United Center with Noah a couple of years ago, then stopping to sign an autograph for a kid waiting outside the gate. "Except Noah says, 'You want to have dinner with us?' This kid almost faints. We go off to a Greek restaurant nearby, and they talk through dinner about basketball, school. We drive the kid home later. As we pull into the parking lot of the apartment building, there are cops everywhere and the mother is hysterical, and we're both saying, 'We just took him to dinner.' It was like a fairy tale." "That comes with winning a championship. I never think about the rest. Never." Brand management is not his strong suit. He doesn't tweet; he uses Facebook only to talk with classmates from France. He sits by a fire pit a lot, he says. He enjoys his garden. "What are you listening to?" he's asked at the Berto Center. "Lot of reggae, lot of Bob Marley." "Read a lot?" "Not as much as I want to. Definitely. You know what book I love? Dan Millman's 'Way of the Peaceful Warrior.' That helped me a lot. There are a lot of words of wisdom there, and it helped teach me about breathing. Phil Jackson used to give it to players here back in the day. I think that's my favorite book. My father even gave it to me." "Art?" "A big part of my life. Salvador Dali is probably my favorite artist. It's interesting to see flying (breasts)." "Movies?" "We (he and the other Bulls) were talking about this yesterday. I was talking about how there's nothing I've seen lately that I enjoyed. I thought 'Avatar' was pretty good. My favorite movie, though? 'Mrs. Doubtfire.' I really like 'Mrs. Doubtfire.'" "What?" "You mean, what do I like about 'Mrs. Doubtfire'? I like that it wasn't too much. You know? Not too much going on. So many movies, there is too much going on." "You're still a Robin Williams fan." "What do you mean, 'still'?" "You're the last Robin Williams fan on the planet." "Oh, really?" "Think so." "Why? I mean, Robin Williams' done a lot of great movies. What was that movie — 'Good Will Hunting'? That's a good one, right? 'Last of the Mohicans,' too. Robin Williams wasn't in that one. But anything with Indians and cowboys, I like that too. Though I'm almost always rooting for the Indians before it's over." -- ※ 發信站: 批踢踢實業坊(ptt.cc) ◆ From: 131.193.245.215