ALIGNMENT CHART! NBA Players

I agree about Shaq; the rest seemed perfect where they were (and I love where Prince Charles is on the chart), but Shaq as True Neutral seemed jarring. I’m not sure what other big name NBA star could fit there, though.

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Michael Jordan=Black Lex Luthor?

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Uh, Chris, I’ve got Cleveland on the phone. They’d like a word.

That’s exactly WHY LeBron is LN. He played by the rules perfectly fairly, and even arranged to get TV to give a million dollars to charity just to hear him announce his decision, and then everybody got mad at him and he didn’t understand why, he was just being a free agent like everybody else!

LeBron = the Stannis Baratheon of basketball

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Dammit, being some kind of weird non-basketball-following guy I only know 8 of those 9 players… who’s Chaotic Evil?

Now I kind of want to see an all-Raptors version just to know where you’d put Bargnani.

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who’s Chaotic Evil?

Bill Laimbeer, easily the dirtiest, most lowdown star-level player in NBA history.

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Hrm, I kinda like John Stockton as true neutral. He was a fairly dirty player, but it was a means to an end, and he was arguably the best pure point guard to play the game (quick, name the all-time steals AND assists leader!).

That said, he did also have a quirky sense of humor. Such as when Shaq got fined for wearing “too baggy” of shorts… Stockton actually sent Shaq a pair of his old “nut huggers”. (Considering Stockton is like, 6’1″, it was more than a bit comedic when Shaq tried them on.)

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So, Shaq isn’t true neutral because he epitomes neutrality….he’s true neutral because he spread out all over the axises.

I had a few complaints about the players’ placements, but after thinking it over for a bit…yeah, they are pretty accurate.

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Ah, the age old debate about “TRUE” neutral — is it de facto neutral as we aggregate the behavior, or is it the strongest commitment to neutrality. The word “true” is just so … pure that the second option seems better.

In any case, it isn’t Shaq, who certainly is more good than evil even if you are using the aggregate approach. His behavior was erratic, but he wants to be good.

My choice would be Bill Russell, who developed a non-NBA agenda that “neutralized” his NBA behavior. Second choice: Wilt Chamberlain. 3rd: Kareem.

Kobe & Larry Bird should be splitting NE honors – tie.

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I admit I don’t follow basketball, but from what I know of it that chart nails it to a g-dd-mn tee.

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highlyverbal –

Shaq is definitely more good than evil as a public figure; gregarious, generous, as nonthreatening as a 7-foot 375 pound man can be.

But I think this chart is based on how people conducted their careers. Shaq as a player, and in his approach to playing? He wasn’t a villain, but he seemed to leave unhappy locker rooms behind every time he switched teams. He had a desire to be dominant – and he developed a relatively stoic attitude towards the fact that smaller centers felt empowered to maul him every night – but it’s hard to say that he capitalized on his talents to the nth degree, that he worked tirelessly in the offseason to get better, that he was deeply committed to keeping his body in top condition. As compared to Duncan, James, Jordan, and Bryant, to pick the remainder of the list that I think are Shaq’s peers as players (I would put both Barkley and Irving on the next rung down) … all those guys are expressing a commitment to something. What was Shaq committed to, other than Shaq and his bank account? He thought he was the best, he acted like he was the best, he often was the best, he thought he deserved to be paid like the best even when he wasn’t, and he didn’t think he needed to bend or adjust for the pursuit of further greatness. (Scheduling a surgery you could’ve had during the spring or summer so that you’ll miss part of the next season and, in his own paraphrased words, rehab on the company dime, isn’t the sort of thing that endears you to your supposed collaborators in the pursuit of greatness.)

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Medrawt, agreed that the public figure aspect should be ruled out — otherwise, Ron Artest and various criminals would bump Lambier, obviously.

But I don’t think alignment is truly measured by commitment, either. Lambier, again, was fully committed to winning in a way that boggles the mind, right? And very few players got more out of a limited set of talents, right?

Shaq’s conduct seemed to me to be a little casual, true, but he was definitely interested in being the good guy, way more than say Barkley, whom everyone loves as CG. Which brings us back full circle to the problems with the “aggregate” approach to TRUE neutrality — if he was generally nice but occasionally selfish or drama-producing, does that add up to TRUE neutral? Or can we do a better job of assessing his overall tenor and labeling some conduct as inconsistent or exceptional? I am in the latter camp. TRUE neutral is for someone who generally believes in a balance on both axes, not someone who is all over the map but likes goodness just fine. That’s just someone who has human frailty and failings.

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Kobe’s going to see this alignment chart, rehab his injury, and work like hell to take that Lawful Evil spot.

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maybe it’d work better if instead of trying to do players teams were aligned.

The Spurs would be Lawful Good

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If you were going to replace Duncan as Lawful Good, you’d replace him with Magic Johnson.

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How about Moses Malone for True Neutral?

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Michael Jordan = Tywin Lannister.

:shudder:

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Shaq the player was more chaotic lazy than anywhere on a good or evil scale. Didn’t do much work in the offseasons, played into shape during the season or let injuries linger so he’d be rested for playoffs.
I like Russel as an another option for TN. He did his own thing and didn’t care if you didn’t like it. Great man though.
Another option might be Allen Iverson. More in line with the timeline with the other players as well. He had no concept of what others thought of as the “Right” or “Wrong” way to be a professional. “We talkin’ ’bout practice?” was all about the fact that nobody played harder than him in a game (and was right) and therefore practice was meaningless (he was wrong).

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Now that I think about it, I sort of want to put Vince Carter as True Neutral.

Vince Carter is Chaotic FUCK YOU.

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I definitely agree with Dr. Nerdlove: David Robinson fits in LG.

If the NBA ever had a paladin, he was it. He happily mentored his own replacement, for crying out loud. How many other players of that calibre would do that?

My favorite David Robinson fact is that he didn’t enter the NBA until two years after he was drafted because he was busy fulfilling his active-duty obligation to the Navy – after being told they would let him go from that obligation.

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My breakdown of Archer would probably be :
LG : Cyril
NG : Pam
CG : Gilette
LN : Lana
TN : ???
CN : Sterling
LE : Malory
NE : Krieger
CE : Cheryl (Carol)

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I’d put Kurt Rambis in the CE spot myself. I retch whenever I see his ugly mug on the TV. But Lame-beer is a good choice.

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Garnett was actually my first choice at Chaotic Evil (the reason Tim Duncan hates Garnett is because Garnett made “your mom” jokes to Duncan during a game RIGHT AFTER DUNCAN’S MOTHER DIED) but I couldn’t find any good quotes for him.

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I submit Chauncey Billups as TN.

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Sterling is definitely evil, he actively chooses to harm others (whether or not he benefits). Routinely. He compromises missions and safety of co-agents to impress women. He frigging shoots Bret all the time and then yells at him.

And Mallory is definitely not lawful, she calls in bomb threats to get her agency hired (often, merely to snub her neighbor, Trudy Beekman). Again, routinely.

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The mention of Sterling makes me want to see a NBA owners alignment chart; I assume Donald Sterling would fit somewhere in the evil range, and Mark Cuban would be chaotic good.

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Wanting others to follow YOUR rules is nowhere near the definition of lawful. Lawful is when you are willing to sacrifice or put aside your own interests on some subset of occasions when your interests conflict with the laws.

I challenge you to name one. single. time. Mallory has done this.

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Mallory is lawful evil because she works to maintain the formal structure of her power, like Tywin Lannister or Jessica from Suits.

Hey MGK, consider doing an alignment chart for Suits.

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Lawful good is idek, dead grandma?

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So, can’t name a single time, eh? We can agree to disagree on the salience of that gap, I suppose.

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Gladly, if you will agree that it wins the argument. Let’s fix the goalposts before I start trying to kick.

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As long as it’s a major character, that’s fine. Go ahead.

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I’m a little surprised that Rasheed Wallace (who apparently broke so many rules that they made one in his “honor”*) wasn’t on here somewhere.

*The so-called “Rasheed Wallace rule” is that a player who gets 16 technical fouls in a season will be fined and suspended for one game.

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@Jonathan

“The fact she makes the rules enforces her as Lawful Evil, as she expects others to follow those rules…”

Opening shot: is the character of Michael Scott from The Office some variant of Lawful?

YOUR definition conflates LE with clever NE (and possibly CE). Several characters that are consensus non-Lawful already on this thread don’t hesitate to invoke authority if they can… Archer himself loves it when he is in charge of an operation, and waves it around like a flag. The two Barrys run the friggin’ KGB, and in a much more strict fashion with respect to challenges to their authority (a la Tywin Lannister). I’d rather work for Mallory’s ISIS than Barry’s KGB! Kobe Bryant loves to say it is “his team” and give direction about what coaches to hire, etc. None are Lawful.

Using people’s receptiveness to authority to manipulate them doesn’t make you Lawful, sorry. It makes you manipulative. This has been understood since premodern times… The devil can quote scripture.

Have you ever played a game with a 6 year old child? I played some nerf basketball with my niece, and she made more rules than shot attempts. At the end, she was taking several shots for every one of mine, I was shooting from my knees, she was three times closer to the basket, and some of the baskets I made were not even counting. Surely you aren’t suggesting she is Lawful?! … because her mother could use to have a huge laugh.

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You seem to be focusing too strongly on the “sacrifice” part of my formulation. It can be merely expending effort. Think of, instead, Tywin Lannister and how he would handle challenges to authority. Mallory’s authority is undermined by her own actions, and openly mocked by everyone as inconsistencies surface. Yes, Mallory will invoke her authority but won’t lift a finger to preserve it. Tywin understand that to be evil but lawful requires an ironclad dedication to the lawful part of things, but that this investment will be returned. Tywin will bestir himself to shore up his authority, ensure the credibility of his regime. Mallory often says “because SHUT UP!” She justifies her decisions with “I don’t know, pick one.” These are running gags. Tywin-esque? Seriously?

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Cyril, however, has committed dozens of crimes. He’s

– Embezzled funds (he still DID it)
– Illegally stowed away on transports
– Committed corporate espionage for money (When he planted the computer virus, even if he intended to fix things and be the hero)
– Murder/Disposing of Evidence (Utne, twice if you count the time he thought the hooker was dead and was complicit and trying to get rid of Trinette)

Those are the things that immediately come to mind. Mallory ordering him to do it does not absolve him of responsibility; a lawful character would not break the law simply because their boss ordered them to. So yeah, I don’t think anyone will be convinced of that one.

Ray defrauded his medicare account. That alone would completely discount him if we are getting all uppity with what Mallory does.

Lana has done just as many illegal things as Mallory has since, well, she’s generally one of the instruments to execute those illegal operations. “I’m only following orders” is not a defense for doing illegal actions… unless you accept that the profession she is a part of demands her to do illegal actions. Plus Lana helping Archer from being “burned” by staging it as an “ODIN Black Flag” and knocking out Barry is definitely going against what the profession would dictate and is her basically being Neutral Good. She ignores orders to save him, which is why I’d probably list her more as Neutral Good. Not quite as Lawful as Cyril, though I suppose I can see the argument for it.

I would also point out that most of Mallory’s “unlawful” activities are generally things which would be acceptable within her field, but she is doing them for personal gain, yet another thing something a Lawful Evil person would do. Almost everything she does is basically a spy op, but they are focused so that she benefits out of it, despite it possibly being legit. Her profit focus is practically the definition of Lawful Evil, and in a profession where the top spy company regularly bribes the UN inspector responsible for overseeing intelligence to maintain the contract, what she does is basically par for the course.

So yeah, if that’s all you have then I think that’s just a bunch of special pleading. You can’t make cases for them that wouldn’t be putting up a double standard. I do agree that Cyril is about as Lawful Good as you get on the show, but I’m not sure he would keep that if we compared him to accountants on other shows.

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I value kender for, ultimately, divorcing halflings from the old ‘hobbits but we can’t call them that because Tolkien will sue us’ definition and making them a reasonably unique player race in their own right. But I have never had the misfortune of playing or running a game with actual kender, and I pray I never shall.

Yeah, I have to agree that the Archer universe tends towards both evil and chaos. Malory, in that context, is LE. Yes, she makes the rules AND twists them and uses them for personal gain. She is the ultimate authority in ISIS. She runs the place. If that means she can’t be LE, then I guess you can never have an LE tyrant. Except you totally can, so…

Also, Michael Scott is not lawful, no. But he has never been the ultimate authority at Dunder Mifflin. He has always been kept in check by higher authorities and by the rules and regulations of his company (as enforced by LN Toby, frequently to Michael’s gross displeasure). He’s a salesman promoted to the level of his incompetence and stranded there. No one is arguing that all managers are lawful. We are simply arguing that, within the context of the Archer universe, taking its natural biases into account, Malory is as close as you will ever get to LE. I honestly can’t think of anyone else on Archer who could qualify as LE if she doesn’t.

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@Themiscrya: “No one is arguing that all managers are lawful.”

On the contrary, that is almost exactly what Jonathan (and any moose) is suggesting. Making Michael Scott a very salient example.

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After reading about Shaq participating on a botched SWAT team raid of an innocent man, I am even more willing to believe in his Neutral (and not Good) status.

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Michael Jordan=Black Lex Luthor?

I thought Clancy Brown was the black Lex Luthor.

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Okay, I went ahead and made the Archer one.

http://i188.photobucket.com/albums/z309/cg_pix/alignfinal_zpsa2633d25.png

You inspire me, MGK.

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Except it’s not, highlyfinkle. You fail because you have to meet two criteria to actually kick it through the uprights:

1) You have to prove your own definition of lawful. You basically use the idea of “following authority” (Which, by the by, is a horrible definition in and of itself, but that’s a whole post for a whole ‘nother day), and you do accomplish this… by completely linking it to them doing what Mallory orders them to do. This is important because it ties into the second part that you ultimately fail at…

2) Mallory Archer can not be lawful. The whole point of the previous post was to make sure that you couldn’t scramble away from the fact that you can’t declare someone “Lawful” on the basis that Mallory does “unlawful” things. Instead, you tie the Law directly to Mallory, making her the authority figure on which the law is based. Because her orders constitute “the law”, you undo your own argument by recognizing her authority as the law. Hell, your own argument recognizes Mallory wants everyone to follow her rules, which makes trying to put her into the Neutral camp pretty damn hard since she’s not actively undermining her own rules outside her own authority structure.

And before you try and strawman Michael Scott into this, remember that Michael Scott regularly goes outside of the power structure in ways that he is not allowed to: He is not the ultimate authority at Dunder-Mifflin and never was, while Mallory absolutely is the ultimate authority at ISIS.

If the others are still lawful while breaking the law simply because they follow Mallory’s orders, then Mallory is absolutely lawful because she is the one giving the orders and works to maintain that structure as you yourself admit when you talk about how she wants everyone to follow her rules.

So yeah, nice try. You might want to check if the laces are in on your next argument, however.

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Uh, where? You present only a few arguments as to why she’s not Lawful:

“And Mallory is definitely not lawful, she calls in bomb threats to get her agency hired (often, merely to snub her neighbor, Trudy Beekman). Again, routinely.”

Which doesn’t mean much since everyone on the show commits a variety of crimes, including the most obvious candidate (Cyril).

“Wanting others to follow YOUR rules is nowhere near the definition of lawful. Lawful is when you are willing to sacrifice or put aside your own interests on some subset of occasions when your interests conflict with the laws.

I challenge you to name one. single. time. Mallory has done this.”

You said this, but I pointed out that the challenge is contradictory: Mallory is the law at ISIS, so she can always maneuver to be in the right (or at the very least push the damage off on others). Asking an evil person to sacrifice when they have no reason to under the law makes no sense and is contradictory to the concept of “Evil” in D&D.

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Huh, this posted early. One sec…

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… Okay, look. I’m writing this because I think this argument has gotten to you a lot more than it has gotten to me. But I’m not trying to create any internet enemies on one of my favorite sites, especially when I honestly don’t even dislike you.

I’m not trying to troll you with my responses (though I can be rather flippant some my responses, I admit). In all honesty, your view of lawful is apparently drastically different from mine, and at this point there’s no point in arguing when I don’t think there is really common ground. You seem to find lawfulness in obedience (I wouldn’t presume to say you’ve given your full definition yet), I find lawfulness in one’s perception of the world and of order itself. This is why I kept arguing: because, to me, you had violated a basic, implicit tenant of lawfulness in your answer. We had the same goalposts, but apparently they were at different football fields.

I do concede that you fulfilled your half of the bargain. I still find the answer contradictory in nature, but that doesn’t lessen my concession. I bear you no ill will and meant none in return; the jokes I made were, as I said, jokes. I figured when you said “Go Bills”, you got that. On the internet, though, smiles and sarcasm don’t always transfer.

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