The legendary @JimPlunkettCole makes the @washingtonpost for the 2nd time!! https://t.co/0Pi0XDjTNS #Warriors
— PledgeSports (@PledgeSports) June 21, 2017
Right after the Golden State Warriors completed their NBA championship run, an aspiring distance athlete completed a Warriors championship run of his own. That is seen in the map above, created using the runner route tracking app Strava, a map from AAA, and the two legs of a British runner who goes by the name of JimGump. JimGump’s real name is Jim Plunkett-Cole (early 80s Raiders fans should love that name) and he’s currently attempting to duplicate the Forrest Gump stunt of running 20,000 miles.
Fifty of those miles were an homage to the Warriors title run, as JimGump’s on-foot travels brought him through San Francisco coinciding with the night the Warriors won the championship. “The whole city just went absolutely bonkers,” Plunkett-Cole told the Washington Post. “I could just see this was such a huge, huge thing, and I felt quite inspired to do some sort of tribute in my normal way.”
Plunkett-Cole is not done with his 20,000 miles, but he is still in the Bay Area and vowing his next mapped runs will be to recreate the logos of Google, Facebook, and Twitter. “I will be doing more tributes like that for big corporations,” he said, which compels us to lose interest in him and move on to a different Warriors-related topic.
It’s still an open question whether the Warriors would visit Trump’s White House for the traditional post-championship congratulatory visit and photo-op. San Francisco and Oakland congressional representatives Nancy Pelosi and Barbara Lee are trolling with an offensive move by inviting the team to the U.S. Capitol rotunda instead.
The Chronicle reports that Lee and Pelosi sent a joint letter to the Warriors offering them the alt-White House visit. “In celebration of your victory, we would be delighted to welcome you publicly as a team or personally as families to the United States Capitol,” their letters to the Warriors organization reportedly says. “Please consider this as a blanket invitation whenever your individual schedules allow.”
No word on whether the Warriors players have seen the letter, but coach Steve Kerr has. Kerr discussed that invite, and the possibility of snubbing Trump’s White House, in today’s installment of the Tim Kawakami’s podcast The TK Show.
“I just heard about that yesterday, we got an email inviting us,” Kerr said of the Pelosi-Lee counter-invite. “Very flattering, and I would imagine we’ll take them up on that.”
But what about the big question? Will the Warriors dignify Donald Trump with a White House visit?
“We have not received an invitation from the White House,” Kerr said. “The biggest thing for me is it’s about the players. This is a visit that’s about the team. We have not met about it, because we haven’t been invited.”
“But I would want to make sure the players gave this really a lot of thought,” he continued. “Everybody knows I’ve been a very outspoken critic of Trump, and as a result maybe we won’t even get the invitation. But I do think it’s very important to consider a potential invitation, because I think it could have really positive ramifications if we did go.”
“Like many of our players, I’m very offended by some of Trump’s words and actions,” Kerr noted. “On the other hand, I do think there’s something to respecting the office, respecting our institutions, our government. I think it could make a statement in a time where there’s so much divide and everybody seems to be angry with each other, it might be a good statement for us to go and to show ‘Hey, let’s put this aside, put all this partisan stuff aside and personal stuff aside, respect the institution.’ And maybe even if one of you players wants to voice your concerns over what’s happening, what better opportunity to do so?”
“That may be incredibly idealistic,” Kerr admitted. “But I’d want to at least bring that option up with our players rather than just saying no way, I’m not going.”
Kerr closed the topic on a philosophical note. “We all have to start thinking of ways we can connect with one another and stop this divide. Maybe sports is a good forum to try to help that,” Kerr said. “It’s about character and morality and those are things we have to really value as a country.”
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