Am at MSG for the Wizards-Knicks game. Was standing by the court a few minutes ago, watching John Starks. The one-time New York star works for the team in community outreach. He still looks really young, and is insanely approachable.
In the, oh, 10 minutes I spent standing there, Starks must have posed for four of five photos at midcourt. Which means he surely poses for hundreds of annual photographs.
I’m by no means ripping Starks, or sports fans, or photographs. But I wonder if ex-athletes ever get resentful, being treated (somewhat) as cardboard cutouts. Nobody asks to pose with me or you, and that’s a good thing, I think.
Nobody wants to be forgotten. But if we’re never remembered to begin with, it works out quite well, too.
PS: Boneheaded moment of the night—think I called Shawne Williams “Erik” by mistake. Thinking old-school NBA. If I did, he didn’t correct me.
