Michael Ventre

Fans and media tend to evaluate a professional athlete based on what is readily apparent. That usually involves statistics, salary figures, the size of the entourage, the wattage of the bling.

What most people fail to notice is the career as it relates to lifespan. Simply put, athletes hit their peaks in life at a relatively young age. In most professions, people build toward the bigger and the better; ideally, a career path is typically a steady incline, with the greatest payoffs both personally and professionally coming toward the latter stages.

But the professional athlete is usually done — if he’s lucky — by his mid-to-late 30s, sometimes into his early 40s. And that’s it. Then the amusement park closes.

The applause stops. The huge checks stop rolling in. The guy on the street doesn’t get quite as excited by seeing him as he once did. Younger, bigger, stronger, tougher replacements take over the spotlight.

Some such individuals move into the broadcast booth. A scant few, like Magic Johnson, become as successful in the business world as they were in the arena or on the field of play. But the vast majority of them struggle to cope with the fact that life will never be as good as it was when they were at the tops of their games.

This came to mind immediately when the news broke Friday that Isiah Thomas reportedly overdosed on sleeping pills. He was unconscious but breathing after police responded to a 911 call and took him to the hospital, according to NBC News. Madison Square Garden spokesman Barry Watkins said, “Isiah is fine,” but few other details were released.

Speculation and truth will be doing a dance together in the coming days. Some will conclude that he tried to commit suicide — though police said that wasn't the case. It may be that he unintentionally harmed himself.

Yet the idea that this Hall of Fame point guard who led Indiana University to the NCAA championship in 1981 and later directed the Detroit Pistons to NBA titles in 1989 and 1990 had fallen so far in unsuccessful attempts to achieve in his post-playing career what he had while in uniform underscores the bittersweet reality that athletes often spend the first half of their lives on a pedestal and the second half wondering why it’s so difficult to find another one upon which to be placed.

Since Thomas retired as a player in 1994, his career has been, to put it politely, one long scoring drought. He served as general manager of the expansion Toronto Raptors but left after four years and little success.

After a stint in broadcasting, he took over the Continental Basketball Association and was blamed by many for that league’s eventual demise. He ran afoul of management as head coach of the Indiana Pacers and was dismissed in 2003.

But perhaps his waterloo came in New York, as head coach and president of the Knicks. He not only made personnel moves that inflated the payroll and did nothing to improve the club, he further stained his legacy in a sexual harassment suit brought by an employee named Anucha Browne Sanders. Thomas and Madison Square Garden lost the suit, and MSG had to pay $11.6 million.

Thomas was let go in April, replaced by Donnie Walsh. The Knicks were a disaster, and most of the blame fell on Thomas as both president and coach (he replaced his hire, Larry Brown).

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