It’s been 64 days without basketball and I have a tenuous grasp on my sanity.
With Covid-19 playing a suffocating zone defense and trapping us indoors, I’ve been going through as many NBA classic game replays and top 10 YouTube clips as humanly possible. It was as I was watching Andre Miller highlights that I realized my longing for NBA basketball was bordering on desperation. I miss so much about the game that I wanted to write about the little things that make the NBA such a perfect form of entertainment. Bear with me here as I list some of my favorite parts of the game along with bonus points I’ve assigned to moments I think are especially great.
The 1st Day of the Playoffs
In a normal world, the playoffs would have begun about a month ago and we would be a little over halfway through it all. Of course, there’s a lot of great things about the playoffs but my personal favorite has always been the opening day. Every year the playoffs start on a Saturday and you get four games played one after another starting around 10 in the morning. It’s kind of like the Christmas day schedule except you don’t have to watch the Knicks play for some reason. It’s wonderful. I always make sure I've got nothing else to do but sit around and watch each game, even the 1 seed-8 seed matchups that usually end in a rout. Generally, the games are entertaining though the higher seed wins unsurprisingly but sometimes you see something crazy like last year's random DJ Augustin game winner against the Raptors to kick off their title run. Other times you sit on the couch all day watching a few 20-point blowouts and maybe a close game between the 4 and 5 seeds. Then you do it all again on Sunday.
Bonus points if it’s like last year when 3 of the 4 lower seeds pulled of wins and had us all wondering if they could take the series. They couldn’t but it was fun to dream.
Mike Breen
Mike Breen is the all-time greatest basketball commentator. If you don’t know his name you definitely know his voice as he’s been calling games for 28 years now with ESPN and as the main play-by-play guy for the Knicks (the biggest tragedy in the Knicks being hot garbage is that they’re wasting prime Breen). You’ve also heard him absolutely carry the NBA finals broadcast team, comprised of Jeff Van Gundy and Mark Jackson, 2018 Lebron style for the last 14 years. At this point, his voice is synonymous with the game for me. The way he talks seems to elevate each game and always manages to catch my attention. I would watch him call a youth boys wheelchair basketball scrimmage just to hear him yell “BANG” and “HE PUTS IT IN!”
Bonus points if it’s Breen tearing up telling this story the day that Kobe passed away. Hearing his voice in a tone that was anything other than fierce and excited was so foreign, it was like seeing a skyscraper wobble just a little bit. This is definitely the clip that hit me the hardest regarding Kobe’s death and still gets me teary-eyed now.
When you hear Breen yell "BANG" in a tight game you just know you'll be thinking about that shot for the next few days.
Sports Hate
The concept of Sports Hate is very simple. Sports Hate is when you just absolutely despise a particular team or player with every fiber of your being. Let me give you an example, let's say you came up to me and said, “Boy I sure do love Lebron James.” Now I Sports Hate him so I would very much not like to talk to you in that moment. Let’s say I keep my cool though and then you say something silly like, “Wow I think Patrick Beverley gets a bad rap, he’s not a dirty player whatsoever.” At this point I would probably be walking away from you at a very brisk pace. But for the sake of the explanation let’s say you really want to push the issue. Now you’re walking at an equally brisk pace besides me and you just blurt out something along the lines of “The Houston Rockets are my absolute favorite team and James Harden should be a 4x MVP.” This would, no doubt, coax me into a heated argument which is what makes Sports Hate such a fun thing because debating what players do or do not suck is one of the very best things about basketball, right alongside the state of utter bliss you find yourself in when something awful happens to a team or player you dislike.
Bonus points if it’s James Harden getting benched while Corey Brewer and Josh Smith outplay him to lead his team to a win. Or James Harden’s game winner attempt being swatted by a decrepit Manu Ginobli. Or James Harden getting bounced from the playoffs by a Kawhi-less Spurs team in a 39-point loss where he imploded for 10 points. Or James Harden going for two FGs and 12 turnovers in a win-or-go-home game against the Warriors. Or when James Harden...
Plays That Make You Do This Face
If you’ve been watching basketball for a while, you’re familiar with this look. This is the face you involuntarily make after seeing an impressive move and is usually accompanied by some light shaking of your head. You don’t do this after an explosive dunk or a clutch shot (those warrant this face) but after a move that seems to defy all logic. A move that’s as confusing as it is incredible. Like this T-mac fadeaway that I've watched probably about upwards of 100 times. My mind still can’t comprehend how one would not only come up with such a ridiculous move but then attempt it in an actual game in front of millions of people and knock it down. This is the perfect example of a move that you see and immediately think “OK I am 100% trying that next time I touch a basketball.”
Bonus points if you make this face while watching Kyrie play because chances are you’re going to be doing it a lot watching him. You know that thing when kids make an ugly face and their parents tell them to be careful or it’ll get stuck like that? That should be a warning that rolls alongside a graphic of this face before every game Kyrie plays in.
Klay Thompson
I actually don’t miss Klay’s on the court presence as much as I do his off the court presence and all the wacky antics that come along with it. I absolutely love Klay and he’s a great player but if you’ve ever watched a Klay Thompson highlights mixtape you know that 90% of his best plays are 3s. He’s a lot goofier than he is flashy. I mean he once celebrated a dunk by raising the roof. He even became a meme because of this stat-line in the close out game of his first championship. Any other player would be mocked endlessly for these kinds of things, but he’s managed to gain a reputation as one of the league’s most beloved players. Why is that? Because he is Klay Thompson and he exists above the fray of the common man.
Bonus points if it’s Klay being randomly interviewed by a New York news station about scaffolding. Imagine that. You’re a news broadcaster looking to make a name for yourself in the big city. You see a huge 6’7 Squidward’s-house looking guy walking around, probably drawing looks and comments from bystanders who recognize him, and think, “wow he would be perfect to talk to about scaffolding.”
Klay Thompson: Scaffolding Enthusiast and Part-Time Basketball Player
Stripping
Get your mind out of the gutter. I’m talking about the act of slapping the ball out of a player’s hands as they go for a shot or ripping it away from a lazy dribbler. It’s a beautiful and heavily underrated play that only a few guys are elite at just because it’s so risky. With the level of flopping prevalent in the game today any downward swiping motion from a defender generally results in a foul (even the cleanest strips get called as a foul sometimes) but those few that get through cleanly are just so satisfying. It’s hard to say who’s the best at getting strips but off the top of my head I'd say Andre Iguodala, Chris Paul and Kawhi are up there. Kawhi does more of a disrespectful rip though, as you can see here when he forced poor Ben Mclemore back to the bench and essentially ended his stint with the Kings.
Bonus points if it’s Iguodala doing it in the clutch against guys like Westbrook and Lillard. Also bonus bonus points to him for taking a size 15 to the Iggys during this game sealing strip on Lebron.
Probably the league's best clutch-time strip guy
Non-Calls
You know that thing when a player pump fakes and their defender hops just a little tiny bit and then the player launches themselves (shoutout to Dwyane Wade) flailing into them and somehow gets a call out of it? I hate that. We all hate that, that’s why it’s so satisfying when those calls don’t go in their favor and they force up an airball or do something like this. Of course, the yin to this play's yang is great as well when no foul is called and someone just launches the ball through the hoop like this. I strongly believe the NBA should dub this shot and any like it as a “Yeet” and make it worth 27 points, but that’s just me.
Bonus points if it’s Harden expecting a whistle and just walking out of bounds like in this play. Instead it was a turnover, the Rockets went on to lose, and I died of laughter.
Marv Albert’s Increasing Senility
Now usually it’s frowned upon to laugh at an old man slowly beginning to lose his mind but in the case of Marv Albert it’s actually hilarious. Before we get all up in arms about this let’s remember that Marv is a convicted sex offender that was going around biting hotel workers in the 90’s. Now that’s also something that’s frowned upon so I think I'm justified in saying how funny I think it is when Marv can’t tell us what quarter it is or what a player’s name is, which is essentially his entire job. I mean in this video he turns Jaylen Brown into “Jaylen Green” which makes me assume that Marv thinks every player’s last name corresponds to the color of his jersey. He then somehow goes on to make up the name “Elston Turner.” His name is Myles and Elston is not even a name, I type that into my computer and a little red squiggly line shows up because no one has been named Elston since the great depression. Sure, maybe it’s kind of sad viewing a hall of fame broadcaster’s fall from grace night in and night out but how can you keep a straight face at Marv watching Draymond Green in isolation and only being able to stutter out, “....Durant.”
Bonus points if it’s Marv calling an obvious two-pointer a three before walking it back with his hottest catchphrase, “now they’re saying it’s a two, had a foot on the line.” I’m never sure what line Marv’s talking about here because these shots are almost never near the three-point line. I suppose it could be the free throw line or the baseline or some other imaginary line he’s conjured up, Marv really keeps you guessing which is why I’ve got the volume on max every time he’s on the call.
On one hand, I don't think Marv should be calling games anymore but on the other, it is pretty entertaining when you get videos like this.
Wholesomeness
What makes basketball truly special is the individuality of each player. There’s an abundance of stars in the league but they’re all so different in their playing styles and personalities, which leads to each of them having die-hard fans of all ages. One of my favorite things is when a player takes the time to acknowledge a fan by taking a photo or even gifting them their shoes right of their feet. Sure, it doesn’t mean much to the player, (no way is Lebron’s sweating about the $200 shoes he just gave away) but that fans going to cherish that moment and tell everyone they know. Even this simple smile and nod from “KEVIN DURAAAANT” is going to be something this kid thinks about for the rest of his life.
Bonus points if it’s Westbrooks tradition of finding a kid higher up in the stands and getting his shoes to him. Sure, it’s easy to pick a kid out of the front row, but they’ve already been able to sit so close to the game that they can hear brand new swear words from the players on the court, which is already cool enough. Going the extra mile to surprise a kid like that is an incredibly cool gesture from Russ.
Refs Falling Over
Being an NBA referee is not easy. I don’t know why anyone would want to do it. Running up and down a court in a Foot Locker uniform having to call an incredibly fast paced game while thousands of people engage in an incredibly coordinated chant meant to express how much you suck is not my definition of a desirable job position. Basically, if you’re a ref, there’s only two reasons why anyone knows your name: either they hate you or you fell over on live TV. Refs getting knocked over is every sports fan’s guilty pleasure. We love it. It’s like righteous vindication after every call we’ve ever disagreed with. Maybe it’s not necessarily “right” or “fair” to laugh at elderly men being smacked around by gigantic athletes but that definitely doesn’t mean it’s not funny.
Bonus points if it’s Carlos Boozer literally winding up and punching Danny Crawford down low in one of my all-time favorite basketball moments. Just imagine calling a foul in a guy’s favor and then that 6’9, 258 lbs. behemoth of a man spins around and launches his fist at your groin. Shout-out to Crawford for somehow not calling the game right then and there like I would have.