Expectations are a big deal in professional sports coloring everything teams and athletes do.  If fans expect a team to contend for a championship, but they fail to make the playoffs, the disappointment and venom are multiplied.

The same is true for players.  If an athlete is expected to have a breakout season, but performs poorly, his play often becomes a referendum on his character.

Expectations can work the other way as well.  When an NBA second round pick becomes an All-Star, he has far exceeded expectations, and there's often a greater sense of joy than when the top pick in the draft achieves the same level.

If a team everyone thinks will stink rises up and plays well, they receive attention for exceeding what people thought they could do.  Very often, it's still a mediocre team, but they receive positive attention anyway.

No one is immune from expectations.  Many made lofty predictions about what Patrick Ewing would do in the NBA, and those prognostications tinge evaluations of his ultimate worth as a player.

Ubiquitous as expectations are, they have no place in assessing Ewing's career.  It doesn't matter what people thought he could do.  What matters is what he actually did.  And what he did was pretty damn good.

Ewing does not top the list of all-time greats.  The Rushmore of centers would include Wilt Chamberlain, Bill Russell, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Shaquille O'Neal.  Ewing isn't in their class.

He's among the elite of his era, but ranks below Shaq, Hakeem Olajuwan and David Robinson.  That's fine ? all were great basketball players.  Ewing was consistently very good, compiling nine consecutive seasons of better than 20 points and 10 rebounds per game.

He was an intimidating presence who blocked shots and forced teams to change their game plans.  He scored well both inside and from the perimeter.  Ewing was the best jump shooting center in league history.

Ewing never won a championship, but that can hardly be held against him.  Michael Jordan did most of the winning throughout Ewing's career, and Ewing never had a worthwhile supporting cast.  John Starks may have been Ewing's best teammate, and he went an unforgettable 1-18 from the floor in the seventh game of the finals.

NBA history demonstrably shows that winning championships requires more than one elite player.  Ewing was in the elite, but he never played with anyone at his level.  Starks was a glorified role player.  Larry Johnson was damaged goods by the time he arrived in New York.  Rolando Blackman and Derek Harper were old when they joined Ewing.  Mark Jackson was never more than pretty good.  Rod Strickland was troubled.  Charles Oakely was a role player.  Mo Cheeks?  Kiki Vanderweghe?  Xavier McDaniel?  Old, old, old.

By the time Latrell Sprewell and Allan Houston arrived in New York, Ewing was past his prime.  He was cursed by substandard teammates when he was a true star, and by getting quality complimentary players when it was too late in his career.  What would he have accomplished if he'd played with Gary Payton four years sooner?

Had Ewing been paired with any number of elite players from his era, he would have won championships.  But the Knicks were never able to land that complimentary star.

Ewing's legacy is that of a hardworking star who could never quite get to the top.  He was often let down by his teammates, but sometimes he was at fault himself.  Somehow, despite all the things he did well, Ewing is best remembered for his failures.

The dominant mental pictures of Ewing are his blown layups and the huge ice packs wrapped around his gimpy knees.  Even though he won significantly more games than he lost, my mind's eye sees him walking off dejected, not victorious.  I can still see the look on his face when Jordan hit the game winner against him in the NCAA final.  It was eerily similar to his expression when Villanova played a perfect half two years later.

I remember Ewing battling Olajuwon in the NBA finals while the nation turned its attention to O.J. Simpson's slow-speed chase.  

It takes more work to call up more positive images, but that's the way I prefer to remember Ewing.  I remember him wearing those T-shirts at Georgetown.  I remember him blocking shots, grabbing rebounds and glowering at opponents.  I remember seeing him in the gym at Georgetown working with young big men who followed him to Center U.  I remember Ewing catching the ball on the post, dropping his shoulder and spinning baseline for that fade-away jumper that always seemed to fall.

Most of all, I remember Ewing standing at the free throw line late in a game, focused on the rim, going through his slow motion shooting ritual.  As he bends to bounce the ball, sweat pours down his face.  And slowly, his seven foot frame unwinds and he releases the shot with grace and tenderness.

He may not have been the best who ever played, but Ewing was great.  It was a privilege to watch him work.