From politics to sports, the press conference is generally a scripted affair. There are certain things you mustn’t talk about — namely, religion, sex and especially death. Things run smoothly when a public figure simply stands at a podium and is asked questions about what they could have done better or how best to move forward. The answers are full of catchphrases and conventional jargon about needing to focus on the right things and to “keep doing the hard work.” It is often a one-size-fits-all ordeal where nothing of substance is ever actually said. Every once in a while, however, the veil is lifted and the interaction feels all-too-human. In those times, it can feel as revelatory as a fiery sermon on a sleepy Sunday.
Two days after a heartbreaking loss to the Miami Heat in the NBA playoffs, Boston Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla was asked how he was coping. What exactly was he doing to stave off the gloom? Was he watching movies or taking long walks? His response was astonishing. “Honestly,” he said, interrupting the reporter before the question was finished, “I met three girls under the age of twenty-one with terminal cancer. Watching a girl dying; and smiling and enjoying being with her, that’s what it’s really all about.” It was a profound moment, mostly because it felt so personal. His response was not based on vague axioms about first-world problems or how basketball is just a game. Instead, his attention was on three specific girls who he knows and cares about.
Death has a unique way of putting our day-to-day lives in perspective because it is the one thing that levels the playing field. We may compete for wealth and status, but the clock runs out on each of us just the same. Having personally encountered the encroaching hand of death, Mazzulla was not addressing the press as the head coach of an NBA team, but as a fellow mortal. He wasn’t merely telling people about three relatively unknown girls who were dying of cancer. He was reminding them that he and everyone else in the room would also die one day. After his response, I imagine at least a few reporters dropped their questions about how the team could improve its rebounding stats.
Strangely, the impending death of these three girls doesn’t diminish Mazzulla’s own disappointing loss. Death doesn’t render our daily tasks meaningless so much as it puts them in their proper place. In fact, the way these girls approach their own suffering likely informed how he handled his own suffering. If death is the decisive “No” of life, then our smaller sufferings feel that much smaller. In light of death, the failures and disappointments of life are mere shadows rather than the thing itself. Daily tasks such as time management and deadlines feel less threatening compared to the ultimate Deadline that awaits us all.
As if that wasn’t enough, Mazzulla then introduced the theology of the cross to the professional sports world. “You always hear people give glory to God and say thank you when they’re holding a trophy,” he said, “but you never really hear it in times like this. And so, for me, it’s an opportunity to just sit right where I’m at and just be faithful. That’s what it’s about.” I beg your pardon, coach? You want to sit in your disappointment and failure and trust God? Whatever happened to, “We have a lot of work to do”?
In her book Elderhood, Gerontologist Dr. Louise Aronson writes about how caring for the elderly has reoriented her approach to suffering and hardship. “The most difficult part of patient care of any kind is dealing with the hardest parts of what it means to be human,” she writes. “But ask most people about their most significant, challenging, and worthwhile experiences in life, and most will name these same hard parts, from raising children to the death of a loved one. Hard isn’t, of itself, a bad thing.” In fact, our vain attempts to avoid hardship altogether is what ultimately robs us of life’s meaning.
It’s no coincidence that Aronson learned her lesson on what really matters by people who are already on death’s door. In the end, the job promotions, press clippings, and all the small victories of life will not be at the forefront of our minds. More people are shaped by loss and tragedy than success.
Vanquished by a greater foe and still stinging from defeat, Mazulla preached a completely different set of priorities. He understood that his life is far more than just a playoff series. He seemed in no rush to be delivered from the pit of despair. From his perspective, dark is not dark if God is there.
This otherwise routine press conference was so inspiring because Mazzulla gave us some much needed perspective about life and death without denigrating basketball as a frivolous or pointless game. Counter to what we often assume, the reminder of death does not diminish everyday life, but enhances it. Unexpected failure (the Celtics, by the way, were supposed to easily handle the Heat) is not the end of one’s life. In fact, in light of God’s presence amidst our defeats, a setback is hardly a curse, but a gift in itself.
With his unscripted answers, Mazzulla imitated what every Sunday sermon aims to do: to first let the law of God bring death to sinners so that the gospel of Jesus Christ may then raise them back to life. He reminded us, albeit indirectly, that no victory in this life will last forever save the victory of Jesus’ death on the Cross. And then he told us that God was waiting alongside us in our own defeats.
As a Celtics fan, I was downtrodden after our loss to the Heat. We were on the verge of making history by coming back from a 0-3 deficit to winning four games in a row to win the series. And yet, Mazzulla somehow managed to turn my world upside down. Leave it to an ordinary press conference to remind me that, in Christ, I feel like I win when I lose. Maybe, in the words of Joe Mazzulla, that’s what it’s all about.
COMMENTS
7 responses to “The Press Conference from the Cross”
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Brilliant
Amen!
Great example of a man who knows who he is.
And has confidence in himself.
I love this!!!
A coach who puts his faith above his sport. Remarkable.
I love that Coach Mazzulla dared to bring up a subject more important. We didn’t get to see the “how dare you” glares from the media people asking the questions, but flipping the awkward but teachable moment onto them felt very Jesus like to me:
“Simon, I have something to tell you.” Luke 7:40.
Thank you for the well-written piece, Sam.
Brilliant!