Do We Expect Too Much From Lebron James?

The calls are as predictable as they are ugly.

Typically anonymous, often riddled with profanity, they want to know why reporters aren't making a big deal about how Cleveland Cavaliers' superstar LeBron James hasn't married the mother of his babies. His son, LeBron Jr., is 2; he has a little brother due later this month to James' longtime partner, Savannah Brinson.

The voicemail of my colleagues, Plain Dealer sportswriters Jodie Valade and Mary Schmitt Boyer, keeps filling with these angry calls. I'm getting them, too, and they often accuse me of "typical liberal bias" in not writing about the example James is or is not setting.

What they mean, and sometimes even say, is this: You aren't picking on him because he's black.

They're on to something: This is definitely about race.

Not one reader has called me to complain about white celebrities who had children without a wedding ring. Two couples come to mind: Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, who married after their first child was born, and Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, who have one biological child and three adopted children and no wedding day in sight. I could wallpaper my house with the coverage given to their offspring, yet no reader has groused that they didn't marry before revving up reproduction.

But LeBron James? He's gotten way too big for somebody's britches. He was only 17 when he made the cover of Sports Illustrated under the headline "The Chosen One." He signed a $90 million contract with Nike before he set foot on the floor as an NBA player. At 22, he's not just the basketball superstar, he's a marketing powerhouse.

"He's on a journey like few people in the world have ever been on," Nike's Trevor Edwards told USA Today. "It's only just begun."

James couldn't wear a bigger bull's eye on his back if he were the patron saint for Target.

Those callers on my voicemail were right: I am, indeed, biased. I am pro-family, with all its configurations. I support parents who marry, parents who aren't allowed to marry, parents who used to be married and parents who don't want to marry.

The measure of a father is how he treats his children, and by all accounts, James is a loving dad.

He found his way despite a tough childhood with a single mother who knew more than her share of troubles, and a disappearing dad.

Why do we do this to athletes? It's not enough that they sweep in like superheroes and rescue us from the grind of our daily lives. We heap our every expectation on their shoulders. We want LeBron James to champion everything from breast cancer to lower gas prices, and we want him to market a cheaper sneaker, too, so that all the underprivileged kids who idolize him can afford his shoes. I'm as guilty as the next: I wanted him to join his teammate Ira Newble to fight the genocide in Darfur.

But why do any of us think James has to be more than he already is? Why aren't the millions of dollars he's bringing to Cleveland and the dazzling spectacle of his talent enough?

At a news conference last week a reporter, after acknowledging that James is only 22, asked him whether his post-basketball career will reflect the values of Muhammad Ali or Michael Jordan. As if those were his only choices.

James' response reminded me of the African American poet Lucille Clifton's admonishment: What they call you is one thing, but what you answer to is something else.

"I'm going to try to be more of LeBron James," he said.

Sportswriter Boyer offered a recent glimpse into the father he is already becoming, and that snapshot is full of promise. Character is what we do when we think no one is watching, and Boyer caught such a moment watching the giant James scoop up his wailing little boy and walk out of the arena.

The willful toddler was pitching one heck of a fit, but the man who never knew a kind word from his own father kept his cool.

"It's not that bad, my man," James told his son in a gentle voice. "It's not that bad."

That's the kind of father who can do a lot of good.

Connie Schultz is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for The Plain Dealer and the author of two books from Random House: "Life Happens" and "… And His Lovely Wife." To find out more about Connie Schultz (cschultz@plaind.com) and read her past columns, please visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

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