He is the ornery, irrational and yet delightful Willy Wonka of America. And you can’t help but admire the guy, and then chuckle. Aside from the SEC’s recent and very legitimate allegations, Cuban is in so little words, someone I'm intrigued by.
What Mark Zucker did to the Rolodex, P. Diddy did for the popular vote, and Sarah Palin did for lacrosse moms (hockey moms are still in exile) Mark Cuban has done for the dorks. He gave them a reason to be cool. Gave permission for big boys to pursue the little boy dreams once assumed collecting dust with Babe Ruth baseball cards. Instead of having a fantasy team or a Playstation he plays basketball coach/commentator/pontificator. He has taken brown-nosing to a respectable level that includes philanthropy and learning how to dance the tango.
Might sound demented but hear me out. I love football. And sometimes when I’m on the elliptical glider and I witness Jay Cutler throwing an interception I sort of make frustrated sounds toward the television and sort of frighten the women huffing on the stationary bikes. Most people would play QB but I’d rather not be responsible for making the calls and being pummeled by 800-pound angry linemen. So instead the position of running back is preferable. Catch the touchdown pass and hump the field goal like Shakira (not that Tatum Bell has ever done that…).
Cuban would make the original Samuel Maverick proud (a 19th century Texas cattleman famous for not branding his animals). Cuban’s interactive NBA purchase isn’t just metaphorical for his actions in life, but every aspect of his biography IS the iconic America story. And if he has anything to do with it, his legend will be passed through generations for millenniums to come. He is the 21st century entrepreneurial hoodlum, a less satirical version of Winston Churchill. He quotes himself as he recently did in his blog, reminding readers how he should have listened to his own insightful premonitions about the ultimate failure of overzealous hedge funds just a year ago.
If he can’t be a basketball coach, he will buy a team. If his wisecrack remarks and millions of dollars fined by the NBA irritate anyone, he’ll justify his sophomoric behavior by donating millions to charity. (Nothing criminal about that.) If Hollywood won’t make him a movie star he’ll produce movies himself. He’s altruistic too… keeping an eye out for the insatiable hunger for unrealistic entertainment the American public is recovering from. In 2006 he hired six individuals to compete for $1 million by accomplishing insane and crazy things. Instead of keeping all the amusement for his own viewing pleasure, he suggested ABC create a reality show, so we could join in the fun.
When he insults refs by yelling, “I wouldn’t hire you to manage a Dairy Queen” and then receives an official complaint by the company, he doesn’t apologize or retract his remark. He spends a day acting as an ice-cream manager, ultimately generating an additional $2 million in revenue for Dairy Queen. He is able to monetize his silliness by responding the way people would at least expect a multi-billionaire to do. It isn’t fodder it’s genius.
Maybe sadly and maybe proudly if Cuban can’t unearth his next toy, he doesn’t invent it, hire someone to find it, he instead creates an industry, no an entire marketplace for it. Last year he innovated a website www.sharesleuth.com to nail CEO’s for their ill-mannered ethics, my hypothesis is so he could make more money off their malaise, proceeding to short their stocks… it all sounded so lovely. He makes O’Reilly look like a timid pussycat with blog headings such as, “The Stock Market is for Suckers.”
Serious journalists and equity boys are still haughty toward Cuban’s unpredictable and often precocious ways. But regardless of how staunch and boring their Brooks Brothers ways might be, they cannot make the argument that Cuban isn’t a sparkling personality, a mensa in the media world, or doesn’t make large monetary contributions to the community. And while he might irk the LA Lakers, Cuban has handed America something more than High-def TV or a good laugh. Whether his playfulness is benign or a disenchanting echo from our unregulated past....
Cuban has reminded us that the only rulebook we're really restrained to, is our own.
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