Performing with injuries separates good from great

Before the doldrums of summer sports hit me square in the face some time in the next month, I have forced myself to be glued to coverage of the NBA Finals, the race for the Triple Crown and the U.S. Open these past couple weeks. Coincidentally, all of these events have featured their biggest stars facing ‘devastating’ injury. Some of the hyped-up ailments are unquestionably more legitimate than others.\nIf you weren’t watching game one of the NBA Finals, Paul Pierce twisted his knee in the Lakers-Celtics colossal match-up. The collective heart of Celtic-nation skipped a beat when the guard writhed in pain while on the floor. Pierce seemed as though his left leg needed to be amputated. No. 34 was then carried from the court to the underbelly of the TD Banknorth Garden where he was wheel-chaired to the locker room. The series was in limbo for the Celtics.\nI take you back to the weeks leading up to June 7’s Belmont Stakes. Superstar horse Big Brown had a crack in his left hoof. After weeks of repair and surgery on the animal’s foot along with hourly updates on his condition, his status for being a lock for the last leg of the Triple Crown was still up in the air.\nTiger Woods had knee surgery a couple months ago after the Masters Tournament and sat out eight weeks from competitive golf to recover. His season hung in the balance.\nFive minutes after Pierce was wheeled off with his “injury” he was back on the court. And five games after Pierce’s spill, it’s all but inevitable that the Celtics will be crowned NBA Champions. Something’s fishy.\nPierce has sizzled in the Finals and any ill effects from his knee injury are not visible. The emotional effect he had on his team by running out from the locker room and igniting a comeback was electric, but to really believe that the likely Finals MVP was hurt at all is ludicrous.\nBig Brown came in with god-like 1-4 odds on winning the Belmont. He finished dead last. After a spectacle on who was to blame for the horse not winning, Big Brown was deemed fine to race. Money talks, but horses walk – apparently not too well with a crack in their foot. Big Brown had the heart of a champion but the hoof of hack.\nWoods lead by a stroke after the third round of the U.S. Open this past weekend. After many of Woods’s mind-blowing shots, he was noticeably wincing in pain from the pressure put on his wounded knee. Woods, in front of 52,000, dazzled the crowd with an array of eagles and back-from-the-dead recovery shots to post an amazing back nine on Saturday, all without the full support of his leg.\nLooking at the three injuries side-by-side, Pierce is a faker, Big Brown is a loser and Woods is gritty. Pierce is putting up one of the better finals performances in history, but to credit him with being the next Willis Reed, a former New York Knicks star who played a game seven on a broken ankle, is utterly absurd. Woods, who was ahead in the Open at the time this column was written, is putting together a storybook performance and putting another finishing touch on his epic career.\nThere is a difference between great and legendary. Pierce is a great player, but his forced dramatics in game one really put a damper on what could have been a comeback for the ages. Woods is a legendary golfer, and his ability to contend for a major championship while on a bum knee is incredible.\nIf performance under fire is any indication, Tiger Woods will go down as the greatest athlete ever to live. At the same time, Paul Pierce should be remembered, to me, for his theatrics as much as his skill.