Tom Izzo is the de facto Mayor of East Lansing. He has the most juice of anyone in Sparta. He can say whatever he wants, he’s earned it. And during 2014 he’s doing just that. For some reason, he’s getting more glib. He’s always been a great soundbite, and told it like it is. However, in the past month he’s ramped up the candor and every time he talks to the media is getting more interesting than his last media availability.
We’ll take a look at why that might be. First, here’s what the Michigan State Coach has been up to. I’m enjoying every second of hard-liner rhetoric, but others might take it the wrong way.
Jan 3rd W 72-68 (OT) over Ohio State This was the nationally televised game in which the famous Tom Izzo screen capture above went viral. It’s also the night he went ALL CAPS!!!!!! in his halftime interview with ESPNU sideline princess Allison Williams. Another viral vid showed him going off on Branden Dawson and Denzel Valentine on the sidelines. This game reminded me of what Emperor Palpatine said to young Skywalker “I feel your anger.”
Jan 15th W 54-40 at Northwestern The “soft society/participation trophy generation” speech. The night of the famous “give ’em a trophy for 23rd place” presser. It was legendary, and I agree with every word Tom Izzo in my backyard of Evanston. The best part was when his SID tried to cut the media session short, and Izzo was like no, I’m going to keep talking as long as I want, and I’ll stop taking reporters questions when I feel like it. Quoting Beyonce “who run this mutha?”
Izzo does.
February 10th, Big Ten conference call in the wake of the Marcus Smart incident: Tom Izzo has been skeptical of social media for years, but he’s never taken as staunch a stance against Twitter as he did here. In the past, he was more on the fence about it, or at least gave the responses that would test better in focus groups. No PR corporatespeak here, Izzo ripped into the micro-blogging platform, and the people who feel emboldened by it. The Marcus Smart incident was the trigger. Later on the call, he made a somewhat cantankerous remark about how the media over-hypes freshmen to sell the game of college basketball and how if you have to stay in school four years it’s like you have the plague or something.
February 11th, local media availability: WATCH the video, skip ahead to 12:44 and watch until 20:45. Izzo was even better today with his local media avail than he was on the Big Ten conference call yesterday. Tom Izzo followes up his anti-Twitter rant by doubling down on his harangue against social media
So why is Tom Izzo not holding back this season? Or maybe he’s always been like this, and I’m just more hyper-aware. Because Twitter, and social media in general amplifies everything. Here’s some theories as to why Izzo isn’t mollifying anything these days.
-Theory #1 Tom Izzo has all the social capital possible, now he’s having fun with it
Izzo has taken the program to new heights that exceeded his predecessor Jud Heathcote. It’s the premier program in the Big Ten, and nationally relevant year-in, year-out. Tom Izzo is the biggest fish in the Tri-County area, so he’ll dictate the conversation on his terms. He turned down the Cleveland Cavaliers and the NBA to stay in East Lansing, so he knows what he’s doing.
-Theory #2 The expectations of being preseason #1 in the social media age
Izzo has had teams ranked this in the preseason before, but I don’t think he’s ever had one that was deemed national title favorite in this new era of communication technology. Izzo has won a national championship and been to six Final Fours, he knows how to handle pressure. Like he said though, this is not about Tom Izzo, it’s about his players. And his players were on a team ranked #1 for a decent part of this season. They got off to the best start in school history, the fastest start of any season under Tom Izzo. That raised the bar of expectations significantly. It’s one thing to be on the top ranked team, but imagine what being on the top ranked team is like when we have an invention that literally lets anyone in the word say anything they want to you whenever they feel like it, without censorship. That’s literally the power of Twitter. And as you know, a lot of people use it for evil. Watch this Bill Maher rant on Twitter hatred and instigation for a summary
Here’s where I’d throw in the competing third theory, the wild-eyed conspiracy theory, and I have thought up a couple that might be at play here with Tom Izzo at Michigan State. However, there’s no evidence to support any of those conspiracy theories, so we’ll save those for another time and place. Clearly, it’s #2 that’s at work here. No need to go any deeper than that.
Paul M. Banks owns The Sports Bank.net, an affiliate of Fox Sports. An MBA and Fulbright scholar, he’s also a frequent analyst on news talk radio; with regular segments on ESPN,NBC, CBS and Fox. A former NBC Chicago and Washington Times writer, he’s also been featured on the History Channel. President Obama follows him on Twitter (@paulmbanks)