"TALL Respect!"

"There's no way Michael Jordan would have gotten in this photo!"

Last summer I wrote a Hot Joint entitled "I've Got No Respect For Jordan" that started with this paragraph: "The most powerful and influential person in the history of sports has been Michael Jordan. However, he's never used that power to do anything but play basketball and sell shoes. If life were only played on the court he'd be a national hero. Unfortunately, life goes well beyond the game of basketball." I went on to say that "throughout our history in this country especially during the civil rights movement guys like Jim Brown, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Muhammad Ali put their careers on the line daily by supporting the civil rights movement and other social issues in this country."

Well, I'm proud to add Dwayne Wade, LeBron James and the entire Miami Heat roster to that list of athletes that have used their influence for more than the game itself. Dwayne Wade changed his Twitter avatar, or profile picture, to a shot of himself in a hooded sweatshirt on Friday, Miami's WFOR-TV reported. "He also used the hashtags hoodies, stereotype, trayvonmartin in the post with the photo. Soon after that at 1:30 p.m, the entire Miami Heat team followed suit and posted a picture of the team in hoodies on LeBron's Twitter account.

Michael Jordan would have found an excuse to miss the photo shoot! Keepin' it real, you wouldn't have gotten him on that picture even if you would have promised him three more championships bruh! Tiger Woods would have found some broad to distract him for the afternoon and Kobe would have just flat out said no,  but not the Miami Heat.

I've got TALL respect for this group of athletes because they could have joined Tiger, Mike and Kobe in the sand box and never acknowledge the situation. Hey, in their minds it has nothing to do with them.  However, LeBron and Company realized that it has everything to do with them because Trayvon Martin could have easily been anyone of them. We all have been Trayvon at one point or another in our lives and it's only by the grace of God that we didn't die during those episodes.

I've lost count of the number of times I've been pulled over for no reason only to be harassed by the police. I was pulled over in a rural Indiana town and held up for a half hour without being given a ticket just two week’s ago bruh. While in college parked in front of the student center with the fella’s waiting for the guy to open the door for us because we were going to DJ the party in that building later that evening. Someone called the police with the description of  four suspicious black guys. The police pulled up with guns drawn and here we were strapped belling down on the squad car to later be released to go on our way. I can remember shortly after graduating from college, driving a new car only to be pulled over with the police drawing their guns again never to be given a ticket. I could easily have been Trayvon Martin and my teenage son could be him now.

LeBron and the rest of the team can probably share those same experiences with you as well. Whether we knew Trayvon or not we all share a common brotherhood with him. Both Jordan and Kobe have that killer instinct as I wrote about in my recent joint " The Infamous Trait" because they both are naturally selfish. So it's easy to take the last shot even when some one else is open.

LebBron on the other hand, isn't naturally selfish as I explained in that same article and that's why he's more likely to make the right basketball play as opposed to just taking the shot. Just like he made the right social play and encouraged his teammates to represent for our fallen brother. I’ll take the guy that embraces the folks that support him when he doesn’t have to. Sometimes it’s bigger than the game bruh. It‘s times like these that we NEED our celebrity's power of influence to shine the light brighter on the very injustice that affects us all.

Ya'll can support Jordan all you want but I'll continue to go on record saying "I've Got No Respect For Jordan!" However, guys like D. Wade, LeBron and the rest of the Miami Heat get TALL Respect from Ya Boy!

Holla At Ya Boy!
Jay Graves
Follow me on Twitter: @jaygravesreport