Hearing about United States President Barack Obama speaking on something basketball related should come as no surprise to anyone by now.
Hearing someone having a best point guard debate and making a case for San Antonio Spurs guard Tony Parker or Los Angeles Clippers guard Chris Paul should come as no surprise to anyone as well.
Obama’s former personal aide Reggie Love new book titled Power Forward: My Presidential Education Love talks about how Obama spent almost everyday of his 2008 presdential campaign playing basketball. There is also an excerpt from his book where he goes into how President Obama would pick Parker over Paul.
I’ll never forget the night I got an email from the future president of the United States consisting only of Tony Parker’s stat line.
I typed an email back to Barack Obama: “Those are good numbers. But it was against a weak team.” Then I added Chris Paul’s stats.
I had been Obama’s personal aide for a few months by then. But with that little exchange, something shifted in our relationship. I like to believe that learning to handle my responsibilities earned me Obama’s trust. But I also know that the strength of our friendship grew out of our shared love of basketball.
Basketball was our common ground—something we could talk about that didn’t drain him like his other daily conversations could. Basketball modified the tenor of our interactions and took us from boss and underling to something more like friends.
It began with that back-and-forth during the 2007 NBA playoffs. Who was going to be right? The debate went on for years. After Paul, a Los Angeles Clippers guard, won the All-Star Game MVP in 2013, Obama reluctantly conceded, though Parker’s collection of four championship rings with the San Antonio Spurs may make the president’s case for him a little better than mine for Paul.
You can order Love’s new book from Amazon.com for $18.48 hardcover or $13.99 kindle edition.
I’d also like to add if you ever hear someone having a best point guard debate today and you mainly hear Parker’s and Paul’s name, you should interject and let those debaters know who Steph Curry and Russell Westbrook is.
