I don't know if you guys follow basketball, but Joel Embiid is the starting
center for the Philadelphia 76ers. He is a franchise player and a very serious
player. He is very interesting because for him to push himself, he trolls. He
is a playful troll who is the type who toes the line of talking trash. While
some people troll to put down others, Embiid trolls to push himself higher. He
was motivated by the mentality of Kobe Bryant, and replicates his "mamba
mentality." Bryant's description is "...it means to be able to
constantly try to be the best version of yourself...that's what it
is...it's a constant quest to try to better today than you were
yesterday." Embiid's road to the mamba mentality roots from his personal
experience watching Bryant play and watching him play sparked his learning of
basketball and pursuit of greatness like Kobe Bryant. The way Embiid becomes
the best version of himself is through trolling. He constantly is joking but is
actually serious in his comments on social media. He criticizes others so when
they retaliate, he is pushed to greater limits to back up his trolling. Ramona
Shelburne, ESPN senior writer, sums it up perfectly when she says “All this
trolling, this button-pushing, it's just a warm-up-- his [Embiid’s] way of
summoning the greatness to back it up.” This positive trolling only sheds more
light on the diverse, complicated, and different aspects of trolling. Trolling
encompasses more than just harassment, and Joel Embiid is showing that to us.
References:
ESPN: "The Greatest Story Ever Trolled" by Ramona Shelburne
ABS CBN Sports: "So what does Mamba Mentality really mean?" by Paul Lintag
Yea, people do have different ways of pushing themselves to greatness, just hope this trolling doesn't get to his head, or he might receive bad medicine...
ReplyDeleteThis was an interesting read for me because this might be an example of the word "troll" having multiple diverse meanings. To some, it may mean a person who likes to make harmless jokes, while to others, it could mean somebody who regularly tries to harass someone. On the other hand, his trolling may be positive for himself, but it might be negative for the other players. However, they might not even care at all, because I don't know too much about the environment of competitive sports.
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