The shooting deaths of Steve McNair and Sahel Kazemi in Nashville early Saturday morning were far more startling than the death days earlier of Michael Jackson.  In context, the King of Pop had long lived a life outside the lines.  The former All-Pro quarterback of the Tennessee Titans had lived well, literally, inside the lines.

McNair’s toughness earned him the respect of his teammates, his commitment earned him the gratitude of his community and the stability of his family made him the envy of people who didn’t follow football.  In a single moment, though, on Saturday morning, that “story” of his life came undone.   The context in which we knew McNair, which we now know was only a partial construction, no longer made sense.

Sports Illustrated’s Don Banks put a finger on the sometimes tenuous link between what we think and reality:  “As McNair’s grisly murder reminded us again over this holiday weekend, the truth is we don’t know (athletes) anywhere near as well as we presume, and our conclusions can often be exposed as woefully uninformed.”

It is not just athletes we don’t know as well as we think.  Politicians (from Vitter to Spitzer to Sanford) and financial wizards (in a line from Greenberg to Thain to Madoff) get the lion’s share of the headlines, but as Garrison Keillor once wrote in an Op Ed in the New York Times, the grandest public monuments are financed as penance.

McNair’s death is a reminder that our adoration (as fans), our participation (as citizens) and our endorsement (as consumers) cannot be given lightly or only once for all time.  They rightly need to be constantly tested and re-evaluated.   This is easy to do thanks to the growing digital web of information available, but it is not easily done.

As we have come to hear in recent reports, the relationship was a secret out in the open.  TMZ has pictures of the two on a vacation,  Kazemi’s nephew had a long story to tell of how his aunt thought she and McNair had a future and neighbors at the condominium where the shooting occurred saw the two often enough to know.

Yet even in the face of contrary evidence, it is hard to discard a story we have come to believe.

McNair’s former Titans head coach Jeff Fisher is a case in point.  This is from a Bloomberg story: “Detectives also said they had been told that McNair, who was married with four children, had been dating Kazemi for the past several months.  Fisher said he decided to focus his initial comments on what McNair would have liked him to say, speaking to McNair’s family and seeking to move past his former player’s imperfections.”

It will serve no purpose to ignore what we know and will come to know, but it would be wrong merely to swap the old context for the new story.  Both are true.  And the story that tells only part of the truth is no story at all, whether for individual, institution or company.  It is an alibi.

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