The talk at the water cooler last week was about basketball players. That’s sad, but understandable.

LeBron James…his decision to leave his home state team for Miami won’t do a lick about curing cancer.

Carlos Boozer and Kyle Korver …their signing to jump ship with the Jazz and sign lucrative contracts with Chicago won’t help stem the oil gushing into the Gulf waters.

Derek Fisher’s interest in Miami and the potential of Wesley Matthew’s leaving Utah for Portland…their future “employment” won’t put a dent into the stubbornly rigid unemployment rate threatening our economy.

Yet most of us were undeniably interested. It’s easier to predict the strength of a sports team than it is to solve world hunger. And is also added drama to a human conundrum most of us have faced: Loyalty.

The LeBron James saga (along with the other NBA moves) really wasn’t about money. The superstar’s decision to leave some $20 million on the table – the extra money available if he remained in Cleveland – didn’t cause concern among bankers. After the first $3 million or so, the rest is monopoly money. The interest in the James move was whether he would remain loyal to an economically-challenged Midwestern city.

He’s now a pariah to many Cleveland residents. They’re burning his jersey and trash-talking his mother. He’s the Benedict Arnold, not the George Washington, of Cleveland’s sporting world.

Most Utahns I spoke to thought he should have remained loyal. Cleveland’s management had drafted him right out of high school and given him his first shot at becoming a national figure and a money-making machine.

But I have to question how many of these critics have remained similarly loyal to their employers. How many have changed jobs for “slightly more” money? How many have remained loyal to old friends? How many have switched allegiance to co-workers in the effort to gain better favor with the boss?

We’ve deluded ourselves into thinking that a sports team is “our team” and that the players are “our guys”. In reality, all teams and cities do is lease athletes for our spectating pleasures and short-term bragging rights. The players also know they are commodities to be bought and sold; they are Skippy Peanut Butter jars with limbs.

Yes, it’s understandable why so many Utahns were intrigued by last week’s basketball moves. We could individually understand and debate the thinking process of the athletes more readily than we could understand the process of capping that darn British Petroleum pipe.

But it was also sad – sad that so much ink and so much air time was wasted on something of rather meaningless significance.