There are a lot of ways that we can interpret the interactions of players and almost all of those interpretations are directly linked to the conclusion that we want to confirm.
Now, it's been evident for a while that something might be off here in a way that transcends talent. Mental makeup is really important in sports and I think a few of the guys on recent teams have suffered from the curse of great expectation - they followed a few guys in Giffey, Bazz, Daniels, and Boat that really set the bar about as high as you can set it.
We as fans have to balance the line between allowing for the fact that those guys were rare and also "holding them accountable" (as much as it makes me squirm to use that phrase as a fan, I can't think of anything else that fits here). One of my fears whenever a team is in the midst of an ugly season is that people will conflate reasonable expectation with "this is a symptom of why I'm not getting what I want." For example, it's a convention in sports that you're not supposed to be happy after a sub-optimal performance, even in a win. The fact that a normally laid back poster like tcf will blast the culture is indicative of how deeply ingrained this idea is. Not only do you have to harbor a cut-throat attitude during the course of play, but you also have to maintain it after there is no longer any practical value in doing so. Essentially, the idea is that the great competitors take the losses hard. I can follow that.
But there are a lot of different types of personalities and temperaments that co-exist throughout the spectrum of sport, and in many cases the same traits that we claim we want can actually submarine performance, and vice versa. I was the type of player in my limited basketball career who would take the losses extremely hard and overthink every situation. Did that always lend itself to me performing my best when it mattered the most? Of course not. On the contrary, it's frequently the players that enrage us the most - think Nick Young - for their perceived carelessness that are able to be the most loose on the big stage. The phrase "no conscience" is rooted in psychology - a player that isn't sober or aware of his environment cannot be effected by nerves. Some of our best, most clutch players have been guys like this - the Rashad Anderson's, the Marcus Willims', the Charlie Villanueva's, the Andre Drummond's...dudes who you could easily envision rolling with a loss but who at times used that relaxed nature to play their best basketball in big moments.
To be clear, this particular exchange sounds at least slightly problematic. "Turnover machine" isn't joking material, especially immediately after the game. If he had razzed Purvis about stepping out of bounds, that would be one thing, but to apply that label in a circumstance where it would have been preferable for Jalen to self-proclaim himself as such is taking a stab at the jugular regardless of intent.
I'm just saying that there are probably people on here who took Kemba's smiling as in indictment on his competitiveness and devotion to the game when he was struggling in 2010. I bet there were plenty of people who wanted Brimah to screw his head on right until he was taking a free throw to save our season - then we wanted the crazy guy who didn't know what gym he was in.
Guys like Bazz and Kemba and Boat are tough to find. The irony is that last year and two years ago I had had enough of D-Ham/Purvis/Facey and more kids like Jalen. Jalen, in my mind, had the toughness and the swagger of those guys. Most of all, I thought he was enough of an a-whole to keep guys in line. It's tough for me to pivot off of that position now because he is playing on a horrible team. Perhaps it is as simple as the fact that it takes a lot of nerve to be great. Most of the time you can't be care-free enough to excel under pressure AND competitive enough to go as far as you have to to get it. Most guys are one or the other, or some combination of. Your strength is because of your weakness. I just don't know how you would handicap that.
