Dear Russell:
I’ve observed you now for slightly over a decade. You’re the same age as my son. If my son yelled up to a woman in the stands in Utah he was going to fuck her up—then my son and I would be having a talk regardless of what her husband had said to my son.
If my son went out of his way to be consistently rude to a decent person like Berry Tramel then as his father I would probably say a thing or two.
This isn’t a basketball intervention. I could care less whether the Thunder beat Portland and advance. In fact, as a longtime fan of Terry Stotts—I’m hoping they kick your ass. But still, this is more of a life post as in how we should all treat other people we come in touch with on the journey of our lives.
As in how we should apply the Golden Rule to others and treat them with the same respect and courtesy we like to be treated with on a daily basis.
Your Marshawn Lynch routine with Berry Tramel makes you appear to be a punk. And here’s the thing, I don’t think you’re a punk. I think you’re a young man who has some wonderful qualities about him. You’re a world class son. A good husband and caring father. A doting brother. A loyal teammate. A philanthropist. A young man who’s trying to be a leader, but perhaps needs some more depth and polish in that regard…but you’re not a punk.
But if you’re not careful some will soon be perceiving you as someone they wouldn’t want their son to emulate. Would you want Noah to be overtly rude to an older person for no real reason? As a father…I would hope you wouldn’t.
You owe Berry Tramel an apology. If I were Tramel I would have told you to fuck off already. But Berry Tramel is a classier person than I am, plus his job description does not allow that type of interaction with a person he’s trying to get an adult answer from at a press conference.
You know, you can clearly ignore everything I’m writing on here. That’s your choice. But as each year passes in your life and you accrue life wisdom you’ll realize the most important thing all of us do in our lives is how we treat other humans in relation to showing some decency and compassion.
I know what you think of Donald Trump. I think the same thing. He is not a man I would want my grandson to emulate. I want my grandson to be smart, to be tough, to be kind, to be empathetic to others—just like you are for the most part. But most of all I want my grandson to treat people the right way.
So this would be my suggestion…give Berry Tramel a call sometime and ask him out to breakfast. Find out what common ground you two guys have and put the past in the past. I think what you would find is that Berry Tramel would become your biggest fan and you would look like not only the leader of a basketball team, but the leader of a city which could use one from someone your age.