We aren’t going to miss Concord’s Matt Bonner.
We will miss NBA forward/center Matt Bonner, who always seemed to work a little bit harder than everybody else, but Concord’s Matt Bonner is right here, just like he’s always been.
You can’t miss somebody who never left.
He was Concord’s Matt Bonner when he won state basketball championships at Concord High School, where he was also class valedictorian. He was Concord’s Matt Bonner for four years at the University of Florida, where he boasted a near-4.0 grade point average. He was Concord’s Matt Bonner when he was drafted, played in Europe and suited up for the Toronto Raptors. And he was Concord’s Matt Bonner when he won a pair of world championships during his decade playing for the San Antonio Spurs.
Today, Bonner begins a new career as a Spurs analyst for Fox Sports Southwest following his retirement last week. Even as he looks into that Texas TV camera, he will still be Concord’s Matt Bonner.
For the most part, professional athletes aren’t particularly good role models, although there are plenty of good people who play games at the highest level. But being a great athlete doesn’t make somebody a great person, and that can be a confusing distinction for kids, who are sometimes left to process how their hero could take steroids, beat up their girlfriend or commit other crimes. Sometimes the image is shattered by something as small as an unsigned autograph.
Bonner is an exception.
Like most professional athletes, he was blessed with physical gifts, a tall kid with a sturdy frame, but his work ethic was the difference between being a great player in New Hampshire and being a great player regardless of geography. Bonner was on an NBA roster for 12 years, which means that for more than a decade he was considered one of the 450 or so best basketball players on the planet.
But the work ethic stretched beyond basketball. Bonner was an elite student, too. He was CHS valedictorian in 1999 and Academic All-American of the Year in 2002 and 2003 at Florida, where he earned a degree in business administration. As dedicated as he was to basketball, school came first. Always.
The cities and organizations that called him their own never had a reason to cover their eyes. He used his popularity and access to raise spirits and money, for arts and athletics, wherever he could. As Monitor columnist Ray Duckler wrote on Saturday, Bonner was always a public relations asset. He is one of the good guys, and it’s hard to imagine him being anything else.
Even the way he said goodbye to the NBA on Friday – a very funny, self-deprecating video that is approaching half a million views on YouTube – was an example of Bonner doing things the right way. Too many professional athletes wear their uniforms like an unbearable weight. Pressure to win saps all the joy and so they play – play! – with incongruous misery. Somewhere along the way, they forgot that being paid to do something they love, for however long they are allowed to do it, is its own decisive victory.
Bonner always remembered. You could see it in the way he played the game and you can still see it now with his playing days behind him.
And so we won’t miss Concord’s Matt Bonner, the globe-trotting professional basketball player who never left home. We will be too busy watching him as he prepares to begin the third quarter of a game he has already won.