Success does not equate to leadership

First, in the name of full disclosure, I am a Blazer fan.

Unless you are living in a cave (of which there are plenty here in the PNW) the sports headlines are dripping with the proverbial ink over the "outburst", or that is the spitting out of a mouth guard, at the Blazer bench in last nights game against the Sacto Kings. The perp is DeMarcus Cousins. DeMarcus is a very talented and productive NBA player and has not single handedly been able to show the Kings the winning path in the Western Conference. Last night is steeped in controversy  DeMarcus vs the Blazers  the story will speak for itself.

The point I want to make is a familiar one yet often ignored. Success does not equate to effective leadership and the community should never presume that just because someone is successful at what they do makes them a good leader. Those willing to consider individual success should look with a jaundiced eye toward elevating such an individual to be a leader. I have seen this both professionally, with promotions of individuals to a place they fail miserably, and to the public view like we saw last night. Sports, the NBA in particular, (the NFL a close second) seems to be a petri dish for creation of figures we would like to see as better than they are in life.

Although I may be attacking sports figures unfairly, the political arena will be a chronic pest in news consumption for the next four years, and there will be plenty of targets to criticize. I promise more on that later.