Chicago School of Professional Psychology - Essay Example

My life is at risk. I have a lot of risks here. I got my family to feed. Sprewell is due to make $14.6 million this year. Sprewell, 34, described the team's latest offer, reported being worth between $27 million and $30 million over three years, as being insulting.’Well-documented and heavily scrutinized quotes like above, have spoken the negative aspects of the identity that resonates within the athletic population. The media has had a field day with these perceived self-absorbed athletes who believe they are the greatest influence on the sport in which they partake.

This kind of information makes its way off the playing field and on your evening news, around the water cooler, or through the internet. While Latrell Sprewell was regarded as a talented professional basketball player, his comments spurred the rest of the non-athletic population in regards to making over $14 million this year and not sufficing to feed his children. While the quote did not question the appetite of his three children, to those who are not accustomed to the life of a professional NBA athlete, these comments are considered to be selfish, unrealistic, and distinguished as out of a touch of reality.

They also speak the idea of self-worth and identity associated with the athlete, the lifestyle that may not be relatable to those who are not identified as athletes, as well as the potential microcosm of the established ego, identity and self-perception that led him to believe nothing was wrong in his own comments. Athletes have trained and worked at their craft diligently to the point that if they have made it to the collegiate or professional level, an inflated sense of self-worth and value may be attributed, manifesting in a specific self-identity, as it can be formulated throughout the athletic process.

So what happens to Latrell Sprewell and those who have resonated in the inflated sense of self when the game stops? Their father time is undefeated and in that, these athletes are unable to engage in the game that those who have found identity in it cannot partake in forever.