Michael Guerin: Give yourself gift of Roger Tuivasa-Sheck

The artful Roger Tuivasa-Sheck is poetry in motion. Photo / Photosport

COMMENT:

Greatness doesn't always look how you think it will.

I once travelled from Los Angeles to Chicago to see the greatness of Michael Jordan. I happened to be in the country, my limited knowledge of basketball suggested Jordan might be the best ever to hoop so I reckoned it was even worth a dreaded domestic US flight to see the guy.

Jordan, as you might expect, was super human. But it wasn't the smiling, relaxed Jordan I expected in my head, chewing gum and leaping small buildings.

He was aggravated. The Bulls lost. This wasn't a night of six rings and highlight reels. This was a genius frustrated. Still glad I did it though. I got to see the best.

It is, after all, something special to see a best. The actual best of an era, or if you are really lucky, maybe the best ever.

I saw Michael Schumacher drive the Ferrari in an Australian Grand Prix. I didn't last long.

Mechanical problems ended that particular Sunday afternoon early for the Tifosi hero and he trudged back to pit lane dejected.

Now when I read those stories about how Schumacher may or may not be trapped inside his own body for the rest of his life, I can't help but feel sad, thinking how much he might now savour that walk of failure, any walk.

Some times the audience with greatness is worth the cost.

I fluked being in Barcelona two years ago when Barca played a friendly match against Chapecoense, the South American club who had lost 19 players and staff in a plane crash the previous year.

That meant the chance to see Lionel Messi live at Nou Camp.

They say great players have time and on an early evening in the Spanish sun Messi's aura gave him that time. When he got the ball opposition players waited to see what he would do next.

In the 28th minute the answer to that question was, score a goal.

Messi was graceful and gracious, rarely hitting the turbo button but I was close enough to hear that he struck the ball so sweetly it barely made a sound.

For the first time in my life, I understood what the saying poetry in motion meant.

Of course sportspeople, even the freakishly gifted, are still human.

I have met famous former All Blacks who I idolised as a child yet found underwhelming or worse. The flipside of that is a guy such as Kieran Read, who is exactly what you hope an All Blacks captain would be like.

Which brings me to Christmas. This is the time of the year, or even decade, when journalists do columns full of lists to fill space while they take their holidays.

My list is short.

If you love sport, or for that matter any human endeavour achieved at its highest level, promise yourself one Christmas present in 2020.

Make the trip, be it long or short, to Mt Smart to see Roger Tuivasa-Sheck play league.

You may not be a Warriors fan, or even a league fan. It matters not.

True athletic greatness is worth seeing close up and one day, like Stacey Jones, Tuivasa-Sheck will retire and you will wish you had seen him play.

He is the rarest of sporting heroes, a world class player and exactly what you hope he would be off the field.

It won't matter what game you attend, opening day sun or mid-winter drizzle, he will be the same player. Brilliant, balanced and brave.

So for your sporting gift this Christmas, promise yourself to see a genuine (Kiwi) sporting hero in 2020.

Because this one is a hell of a lot closer than the Nou Camp or Chicago.