Anthony Davis May Not Be a Natural Born Leader, but He’s Trying to Act the Part

NEW ORLEANS — A choice is posed to Anthony Davis, who often stirs his teammates up in debate from his spot in the back of the team bus with his “Would you rather…” questions.

Would Davis rather win NBA MVP or win another of the league’s year-long awards, the NBA Cares Community Assist Award for charitable efforts and dedication to community outreach?

The question is no joke. Davis takes his off-court projects quite seriously.

Then again, only one of these two awards needs no explanation. Who wouldn’t want to be MVP?

Not even a millisecond of furrowing that famous brow can pass before Davis answers flatly.

“Community Assist, for sure,” he says. “MVP, that’s definitely one of the things that everybody who comes into the league thinks about. But I’m so into the community, man. I love the kids. I love giving back. I want the season-long Community Assist Award. If I had a chance to win that, that’d be big.

“And then we can talk about MVP. MVP’s definitely a dream, but I just love the community. It’s just me. MVP will take care of itself; I’m not worried about it. If it happens, it happens. But the Community Assist is definitely on my bucket list.”

Honest as that answer is, it is a response that will drive some fans of Davis and the New Orleans Pelicans crazy.

The record shows that Davis has not won an NBA playoff game in four years. He’s coming off another injury-plagued season in which his team might’ve been the single greatest disappointment, and the guy is more concerned about having a big year of community service than dominating the league on the court?!

Well, here’s where you either accept Davis for who he is or you don’t, because everything about him springs from this value system.

He does love basketball—so much that he says he’d be a coach or trainer or “something regarding basketball for sure” if he wasn’t a player—but the game does not define him.

Maybe it’s because he wasn’t a longtime blue-chip prep hotshot stuck on himself. More likely it’s just the sort of victory in human maturity we don’t often herald when we can just refer to the won-lost standings.

Dismissing Davis in the competitive arena for not being a killer would be a mistake, however, because he is just now figuring something out.

It has been a gradual process of learning this complicated life of NBA franchise cornerstone—Davis is still just 23—but he has learned how to lead.

His way.   

In the summer of 2015 at a Nike event, Davis got some long-desired quality time with Kobe Bryant, a player whom Davis considered more than a decorated rival, but a big brother. It was Bryant who, more than anyone on the gold medal-winning 2012 U.S. Olympic squad, took the most interest in Davis, the lone college player on the team.

Having just signed a five-year contract extension to stay in New Orleans in the summer of 2014, Davis felt it was time to take ownership of his team. He asked Bryant for advice.

Bryant pooh-poohed the notion that a leader is just someone who puts his arm around you. He argued that a leader doesn’t care if everyone likes him, which obviously shook the caring Davis at his core. But a leader makes damn sure, Bryant told him, that everyone respects him.

That respect is tied to a willingness to challenge guys for their own betterment and the team’s greater good.

“A guy has something in his teeth, and other guys just talk to him and let him be. They’re not going to tell him,” Bryant told Davis. “I’m going to be the guy to tell you you’ve got something between your teeth. Then it’s on you whether you want to walk around looking stupid. But I am going to tell you.”

The message stuck with Davis—even if he wasn’t quite strong enough or frustrated enough to act on it until now.

“I was always a guy who was quiet on the basketball floor,” Davis says, noting how Kendrick Perkins and Quincy Pondexter were more equipped with experience to be team leaders last season. “Even in high school, at Kentucky, here, I was always a quiet guy. Outside the locker room we can talk and kid all day. But I’ve always just been a guy who is real laid-back.

“I know in order for us to win, in order for us to have success, I’ve got to get out of my comfort zone. That’s what I’m determined to do this year.”

When you’re coming at everything from kindness, however, love for your fellow man can muck things up if it discourages you from healthy confrontation. So Davis has tried to channel his strengths—his work ethic and kindness—to gain his team’s attention.

“These are my guys,” Davis says, adhering to the true alpha-male lingo. “These are the guys who are out here with me battling every night. So I can’t have one guy out here slippin’ or one guy joking around when we’re all putting in the work.”

The voice that other players might develop from being “The Man” on teams all their lives or by being four-year college guys appears to have arrived for Davis.

“On his head!” Davis bellows brightly from the sideline when Lance Stephenson goes up for a dunk in a scrimmage.

“Good shot, Buddy Hield!” Davis sings to the team’s prized rookie on another possession, rising to his feet from the bench.

Davis stops drills to offer instructions. He interrupted the second day of camp when he sensed players trying …

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