The Wesleyan Argus

Author: Alex Tripp

  • The Legend of Kobe, Through the Lens of a Defining Play

    The Legend of Kobe, Through the Lens of a Defining Play

    c/o latimes.com
    c/o latimes.com

    “Most of the change we think we see in life is due to truths being in and out of favor,” Robert Frost once wrote.

    The various truths we cling to are more fickle than ever in the modern NBA, where only part of the action takes place on the court. Rivalries were once hashed out in person. The new battleground is everyone’s favorite social medium: Twitter. One notable recent incident has been the historical examination of one of Los Angeles Lakers’ legend Kobe Bryant’s quintessential moments. On March 7, 2010, Kobe was guarding Matt Barnes of the Sacramento Kings on the inbound pass. Rather than throw it in, Barnes appears to fake a chest pass directly into Kobe’s face. This clip confirmed everything the world knew already about Kobe: he was an unstoppable force.

    Recently, however, Kobe-truthers have uncovered what might well be considered the Zapruder film of the NBA. A second angle reveals Kobe’s head to be ‘back and to the left’ of Barnes’ fake. This startling finding has placed a large asterisk on one of the defining moments of Bryant’s career. For a player whose career is a sum of myths and legends, moments that bring us back to earth present an existential threat to Kobe’s legacy. USA Today listed this moment as the fifth greatest of Kobe’s career in 2016. What other player can count plays where they don’t even touch the ball among their top 10 (other than Manu Ginóbili swatting that bat out of the air, naturally)? Particularly for Kobe Bryant, who built his entire mystique upon his impenetrable cool, this revelation could rattle even his most ardent supporters.

    But then again, who are we kidding, these are the fans that literally drove to Temecula to fight someone who besmirched Kobe’s legacy on Twitter. It’s no surprise then that the new angle, while it has raised doubts about the original footage, has not convinced everyone that Kobe doesn’t really have his legendary composure.

    “As far as I know, that s–t went in his face and he didn’t flinch,” said fake-out perpetrator Matt Barnes, per TMZ.

    Confusingly, however, Matt Barnes didn’t seem aware that the ball went in Kobe’s face when he actually faked the pass.

     “When I did the pass, if you look at me, I’m looking at the play developing, I’m not looking at him. And then I realized how close it got and that he didn’t flinch after the fact,” Barnes said just last month with ESPN.

    Matt Barnes’ defense of Kobe points out a fundamental feature of human nature: we are helplessly drawn towards self-mythologization. Even those who serve only as a foil character to greatness still cling to the legend as a cornerstone of their past. If society collectively decided that the ball went directly at Kobe’s face, could we not believe that once again?

    Lakers fans, for their part, have been collecting further points of evidence of Bryant’s steely self-command. On the Lakers subreddit, a fan posted a video of the mascot of the Milwaukee Bucks ineffectively attempting to jump and scare Kobe, who pushes the mascot to the side matter-of-factly. Discreditors will point out that Kobe is wearing headphones that could undermine the “jump scare” nature of the prank, but this seems like a minor detail.

    More importantly, there are also questions that address whether the new angle even invalidates the impressiveness of the original clip. For one thing, when viewed statically the ball does appear to go to the side of Kobe’s head. In the video clip, however, we can clearly see Kobe swaying back and forth, so that his airspace is much wider than the one still frame of his head. Second, would it really be less impressive if he did not flinch at all as a ball came incredibly close to his face, albeit obliquely? As a lifelong scaredy-cat, I know I would certainly flinch. These combined factors point to the value of the narrative truth of the moment rather than the information that any individual photo can afford us. More important than the facts of the occasion is what this moment told us about Kobe Bryant. In some ways, our collective misinformed memory is still a faithful retelling of Matt Barnes’ fake inbound pass.

    Throughout human history, myths have existed to explain the unexplainable, reify rulers and systems, and otherwise bring order and ritual to an uncaring universe. Why then, must we be like petulant children demanding that the magician show us how the trick is done? Why can we not appreciate the poetry of the moment without interrogating its validity? The Lakers are in the Wild West after all, and when the legend becomes fact, print the legend.

     

    Alex Tripp can be reached at atripp@wesleyan.edu.

  • TV Dinner: New Technology and Other Changes to On-Campus Dining

    Eating in the Usdan Marketplace is, for many, an out-of-body experience. It begins at the moment that students ascend the stairwell. Like St. Peter at the pearly gates, the cashiers swipe the faithful through onto their next journey. From there, students are peristaltically pushed through the open doors into a world divorced from traditional beliefs of time and space. Fusilli from Italy and cheesesteaks from Mongolia are just a quick jaunt away from one another. Produce can come from anywhere, from the familiar Long Lane Farm to the curiosity-piquing Horse Listeners’ Orchard. The water is “fortified,” and the pastabilities are endless. We are torn from this alternate dimension when forced to confront a fundamental identity choice: Do we belong to the Apollonian Quiet Side or the Dionysian Loud Side? The choice, of course, is artificial. We sit with our friends, and they sit with us. Confusion, ecstasy, and ego death: a winning formula indeed.

    It may come as a surprise, then, that this year the Marketplace has chosen to shake up the experience. Students arrived at the dining hall to find several mounted TVs placed at strategic locations around the Marketplace. The TVs cycle through the menu options of the day, far more visible than their paper predecessors. The move represents a leap forward for the school into the electrical age. However, at a time when campus budgetary decisions are under scrutiny, the TVs struck some students as yet another inexplicable purchase. When viewed alongside our new sundial and questionable new logo switch (and then switch back!), students are rightfully concerned about the University’s priorities.

    For once, this concern may be misplaced. As it turns out, the decision to buy the TVs, among all other renovations to the marketplace, fell under the purview and budget of Bon Appétit. In other words, the money spent on TVs was not Wesleyan’s to decide what to do with. This does mean, unfortunately, that the conspiracy did not go all the way to the top as I had hoped. Rather, the decision took place completely independently of University staff members. Still, Director of the Usdan University Center Michelle Myers-Brown is a supporter of Bon Appétit’s decision.

    “[The TVs] support sustainability efforts on campus, as it eliminates the constant reprinting of menus and it allows for fast updates when menus change, critical for students with allergies and intolerances,” she said.

    This sustainable change is mirrored in the switch from paper to-go containers to the hard plastic variety.

    While it is news to many that Wesleyan was not directly responsible for the changes to the Marketplace, this answer is not satisfying to everybody. Many would prefer a different allocation of Bon Appétit’s budget.

    “I wish they would just spend it on cheese,” says Cole Stevenson ’21.

    This concern, though legitimate, does not seem to be shared by the rest of the student body. To others, the changes are a true neutral.

    “I came back after the summer and thought, ‘Oh, they updated’,” one Usdan cashier told The Argus.

    She also points out, however, that some students have been thrown off by the Late Night options being displayed on the opposite side of the register. Overall, the student body appears to have acclimated quickly to the change, and it is back to business-as-usual.

    A legitimate qualm to be had about the new TVs relates to their supposed environmental sustainability. While it is true that the TVs can be used in perpetuity where the paper menus are continuously rotated out, there are other complicating factors. For one, paper is easily recyclable. If the TVs need to be replaced, it’s much less likely that the material will be repurposed in a sustainable manner. Furthermore, the energy cost of keeping all of the TVs running from morning through Late Night is non-negligible, particularly given the large screens and bright white background color. In this sense, the waste is abstracted away from the palpable image of paper to the less tangible power plant. This is not to say that the move to TVs was not a change for the better, but that there are certain externalities to consider beyond reusability.

    Though the majority of the updates in the University dining halls this year have taken place in Usdan, Summies—not wanting to be left behind—has also instituted some new changes for the school year. One notable change is the scribbling out of previous menu items in Sharpie (another environmentally conscious choice). In addition, they no longer leave out individually wrapped desserts, thwarting many students who would have otherwise squirreled away dozens of brownies in their dorm rooms. Some changes are even more ambitious.

    “It is, in a word: sushi,” says Hannah Berman ’21 in summary of the new sushi offering.

    As Berman observes, most food at the University is what it says it is: nothing more, nothing less. The cosmetic and environmental changes to the Marketplace may have an effect on our collective experience but only to an extent. Whether we read the menu in printer ink or LED pixels, the food is the food is the food.

     

    Alex Tripp can be reached at atripp@wesleyan.edu.