The wide-angle lens of the Olympics always made Jackie Joyner-Kersee appear to be a redwood, an ageless giant of her sport.
On the basketball court, she suddenly is scaled down, one sapling among many reaching for the light.
There is no way this particular tree could be obscured by a forest, however. Joyner-Kersee is a draw, a novelty, even sitting on the bench. And since she signed with the Richmond Rage of the new American Basketball League, she has put in far more time patiently explaining her motivations than she has actual playing minutes.
No, with all due respect to Michael Jordan, she does not think her crossover quest is anything like his foray into baseball.
“I know Michael,” Joyner-Kersee says. “We’re totally different. The biggest difference is that I played college ball and started for four years at UCLA.”
No, she is not seeking lost youth.
“I’m proud to be 34,” she says. “I don’t want to go back to 24.”
No, she isn’t addled by post-Olympic depression after her dramatic curtain call, in which she overcame a sore hamstring to win a bronze medal in the long jump in Atlanta.
“This was my most rewarding Olympics ever,” she says. “The bronze medal was a blessing. Besides, there are things to be depressed about. People are homeless. People are starving.”
No, she is not a mere hood ornament.
“I feel like my skills are the same as these girls’,” Joyner-Kersee says, gesturing across the gym toward her teammates, who are shouldering duffel bags after morning practice. “I just haven’t played in 11 years. I’m still playing catchup, but I don’t mind doing a little extra.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen. But I didn’t want to sit at home and do `shoulda-coulda-woulda.’ “
Joyner-Kersee knew she was in for a lot of questions. The experiment seems risky on its face. Her winning image, minted before the world in three gold, one silver and two bronze medals over four straight Olympics, now is attached to an underdog venture.
Last Thursday, there were 3,165 tickets sold for the Rage-Portland Power game at the Richmond Coliseum, which holds many times that. The scene: Joyner-Kersee trots out through a mini-version of the Bulls’ fog-and-lights show as the Rage is introduced over a muddy public-address system.
The start of the game is delayed 15 minutes because the floor, which sits over hockey ice, is awash in condensation. Arena staff crank down the air-conditioning to dry things out, creating a hockey-like environment. The national anthem singer loses his place and is nearly drowned out by crowd guffawing.
The whole thing has a small-time feel, and Joyner-Kersee, for so long identified with the big time, looks like the mismatched figure in the old picture quiz: Which Item Does Not Belong? But she smiles continuously and hops up with the other women to hurl rolled-up T-shirts into the enthusiastic crowd.
“I get annoyed with this media hype saying that she’s just here as a symbol,” says Rage head coach Lisa Boyer. “She has way too much pride to put herself in that position. Anyone who thinks this is all fun and games for her doesn’t know Jackie Joyner-Kersee very well.”
Basketball in past
Basketball was an itch that Joyner-Kersee never got to scratch to her satisfaction. She led East St. Louis Lincoln High School to a 33-0 record and a Class AA Illinois state title in 1980 and was an all-Pac-10 forward at UCLA, where she is still the sixth-leading career rebounder.
Joyner-Kersee says if a league had been up and running in the early ’80s, she would have played then. As recently as two years ago, she says, she and her husband/coach, Bob Kersee, toyed with the idea of having her play with a foreign team.
Last summer in Atlanta, Joyner-Kersee watched the women’s Olympic basketball team play its way to a gold medal and felt the old tug. In September, she signed with the Rage, emphasizing her desire to see the league succeed so other women would have the options denied to her.
That will be a challenge, even with Joyner-Kersee and most of the 1996 Olympic team members on board.
The ABL, hoping to build on the increased popularity of women’s college basketball and the lingering Olympic glow, is fielding teams in eight cities. Most are mid-sized cities in close proximity to established college programs.
A single-entity league owned by entrepreneurs in San Jose and Atlanta, the ABL’s largest sponsors are Reebok, Lady Foot Locker and Nissan. Projections call for $5 million of red ink in the first two seasons and a $2 million profit in 1998-99. Player salaries range from $70,000 to $125,000. SportsChannel stations around the country are giving the league some regional coverage and broadcasting a national Sunday Game of the Week that is averaging a .5 rating in Chicago despite the absence of a team here.
“It’s been one of those nice surprises,” says Joe Corno, SportsChannel vice president and general manager. “They’re not tearing it up yet, but we definitely sense an interest.”
But with the rival WNBA beginning play next summer, backed by the NBA’s marketing might, some analysts are pessimistic about the ABL’s chances.
Alan Friedman, executive editor of the Chicago-based Team Marketing Report newsletter, said the dual league startups may be premature and predicted that only one will survive, if that.
“I’m of the opinion that interest in women’s basketball is being satisfied by very competitive women’s college teams,” Friedman said.
But he added that Joyner-Kersee’s signing “is of tremendous value to the league. It gives them one of the most recognizable women athletes in the world . . . It is possible to market teams with anonymous players. Minor-league hockey does. But it’s hard.”
Like the league itself, Joyner-Kersee, who intends to compete in the long jump and 100-meter hurdles for another season or two, faces an uphill battle to get into basketball shape. While she says she expects basketball drills will complement her track training, it is harder to control her chronic asthma in a stop-and-start game. She is averaging about four minutes a game and has collected a total of seven points and two rebounds.
“At times I’ve been frustrated,” she says. “I’m a competitor, and you want things overnight. But I’ve been enjoying myself. The team atmosphere is so different from track and field.”
Joyner-Kersee also has obligations to sponsors and charities, including her own inner-city foundation, that will pull her away from the team. On Monday, for example, she will be in Chicago for an appearance with Jordan and Gen. Colin Powell at the new Boys and Girls Club building named for Jordan’s late father. She has played in six of eight games and estimates she will be available for about 28 of the Rage’s 40 games.
Above the crowd
There is no denying the psychic distance between Joyner-Kersee and her new colleagues. On the first day of practice, she obliged an autograph request from 23-year-old Rage reserve forward Etta Maytubby. The Olympic players seeded throughout the ABL have fresh memories of Joyner-Kersee’s addressing them in the locker room before one of their games last summer. She says now that their play inspired her.
Olympic team forward Katy Steding, who plays for the Portland Power, nearly falls off her chair at that one.
“That’s very generous,” says Steding, her eyes wide. “For someone like her to say that really throws me for a loop. She is the epitome of what athletics is all about.”
Awe is not in evidence on the floor, however, when Joyner-Kersee enters the Rage-Power game late in the third quarter and immediately matches up with the agile, aggressive Steding.
“It was an interesting feeling, but I didn’t think about it much,” Steding says.
Joyner-Kersee plays her standard four minutes and commits one turnover driving toward the basket. She looks somewhat tentative, but there is a flash of something there: muscle memory. Emotional memory.
No, she doesn’t care what people are saying.
“I’m a winner regardless of what I do,” she says.
