According to Aaron, the end of the Lakers-Suns game was a vintage Mike Brown performance, featuring crucial defense down the stretch and a 16-1 run without Andrew Bynum. Which is crazy. I didn't watch it, but I'll trust him on that one. We've both have seen more than our fair share of MB defenses. But in any case, today at the Gothic we're not going to talk much about the games tonight but of two key players from these games. These players both have the weird property that their talent levels and aesthetics reflect certain (very specific) qualities upon their teams, only to find their teams reflect these same qualities back upon them. It's kind of complicated, and strange. So without any further ado, let's talk about our two Richard Jefferson and Chris Paul.

• • •

SAS 103 - MIL 106; A decent game that we will ignore to discuss RJ instead. [Alex]

I woke up screaming today. It's ironic: being the first night after buying extra pillows to elevate my awful-breathing throat, it was possibly the first good night's sleep I've gotten in years. Perhaps it's only because my head was elevated that I was able to muster the strength in my vocal chords to start screaming without even waking. Of course, then I woke up. Screaming.

So, let's talk about Richard Jefferson, because before all of this I was having a dream that Richard Jefferson was the best player on the Spurs. It was a wonderful dream at first, and even well-supported. His remarkable resurgence has been a breath of fresh air; RJ has elevated the Spurs, keeping their heads above water despite the tough loss of Manu Ginobili, their best player. It's no coincidence: RJ -- despite his ostensibly small role -- is playing wonderful, versatile ball. Jefferson's a great player in set plays, and shoots well above the percentages needed to call a player an ace or a sniper. Spurs fans call him "Rebound Jumperson" and call his famous jumping rebounds "RJbounds". He bought in, and Spurs fans have returned the favor. And he's even played more than adequate defense, recently.

Somewhere along the line that paragraph describing my dream turned into nothing but lies and half-truths. And as I realized it, my sleep was disturbed by screaming. It was a nightmare, all of a sudden. That's the last time I watch "Eraserhead" alongside a marathon of the 2011-12 Spurs season to date. But it's also the last time that dream - in its recurrence - will be at all pleasant. This dream will become a nightmare. The soundtrack to this "dream" will now be "One More Red Nightmare" by King Crimson.

Because it is actually a nightmare.

Why? Because RJ's relative quality and aesthetics are usually a sort of anti-canary in the hoops mine for the general quality of his team. And there are far too many days when he is and looks like the best offensive player on his team. Aaron has a theory about how RJ looks. In short, it follows that when RJ looks like a fourth option that can get hot with oops, finishes, and smart dribble-drives while rebounding decently despite average, banal, helped defense? He's probably on a contender, or a team that's better than its record. When he looks like a superstar, a prime-Ray-Allen-at-the-SF-with-more-hops-and-speed, that means he's on a 30-win team where the players around him are so bad that his volume-producing ways make him look far better than he really is (Bucks, Nets). To use the starkest example of why this is, jumping for a rebound dramatically (really his aesthetic signature) only looks really good when defense and effort are a scarce luxury on his team, and that only happens on a bad team (or the Hawks). Dribble-driving past a good defense to the rim a few times looks great, but doesn't really bode well for a team if he's the third-best penetrator, so he doesn't do it very much.

When he doesn't do these things (or when he does them less) his game looks markedly worse, but in the end the team wins more. Because, you know, prime Richard Jefferson is their third-best penetrator and that means you aren't looking at a bad roster or a poor allocation of possessions. The fact that this season he's looked like a minor superstar on so many occasions -- or at least the Spurs' best offensive player -- is severely troubling for the Spurs' prospects. It will give us sleepless nights. Manu may give us fits when he (on rare occasion) shoots us out of the game or (more commonly) threatens to do so, but at least he doesn't give us -- as they say in medical circles -- screaming-mad insomnia. RJ looks like the Spurs' best offensive player right now. That, Spurs fans, is the literal definition of a nightmare.

(By the way, obligatory context: RJ seems to be one of the nicest, smartest, most reasonable people in basketball, and before his infamous contract extension, the Spurs asked him to spend his summer completely reformulating his game down to the fundamentals, despite a widespread reputation as an above-average, great scorer, and he did it. He put in the hours. And when he returned (extension in hand) he really helped the 2010-11 Spurs offense work. So really not a knock on RJ, who I respect and enjoy as a person: he's just the messenger. The scary messenger.)

• • •

Q: What high school did Chris Paul go to?
A: Intensity High
Q: Heyo! I seriously dislike Chris Paul, though.

LAC 97 - POR 105; __A decent game that we will ignore to talk about Chris Paul instead. [Alex/Aaron]__

Actual, mildly edited conversation from during this game:

Alex: Let's talk about Chris Paul. CP3 is so tense.

Aaron: I'm going to be honest. He's been playing awful basketball for 3 or 4 games now, and the fact that his one or two good plays a game still inspire people to say that kind of annoys me.

Alex: I'm not saying he's playing especially well. Or well at all. I'm literally saying he is full of intensity. He is 'tense as a wound-up ukelele.

Aaron: That seems like a really weird sentiment to me. Really odd.

Alex: What do you mean? He's yelling at people constantly, jumping up from fouls, having to be slightly restrained, working the refs, working his teammates, working, working, working. Besides, how is that a weird sentiment? A weird sentiment would be that he avoids looking at the camera when he's glaring because he would break that camera. That would be a weird sentiment. [Alex's Note: One that I actually, literally believe.]

Aaron: I can't disagree. That's all true. But I think -- to some level -- I just sincerely dislike CP3's current game. As fun to watch as it was, years ago. I mean... I appreciate him. He's undoubtedly a great (and formerly MVP-level) player, but...

Alex: Then why? I could understand if it's because he's like LeBron with this media presence and branding BS, but. Gamesmanship?

Aaron: Because I hate his attitude, I hate his demeanor, I hate the way his aesthetics warp the perception of his game to push it beyond its actual quality -- and it's really fucking good. And yes. His gamesmanship. That's mainly it. Maybe entirely it. His dirty, excessive gamesmanship. At his peak he's underrated, but he hasn't been at his peak in years. Byron Scott destroyed his career with his insane practice regimen. And honestly, CP3/Blake is the absolute most annoying duo I have ever seen on one team. At least in terms of arrogant/dirty players who -- while great -- haven't really proven anything yet beyond their own greatness. They are great. In Paul's case, transcendent. But the aesthetics of their games can't overcome the way they approach this Clippers team. I can't stand watching the Clippers. It's like the opposite, in every way, of the collective Popovich-reflected Spurs attitude or Steve Nash. Maybe it's Vinny. I don't know.

Alex: That makes a lot of sense, but for my sake, I appreciate greatness for its own sake. More than that, in fact. I enjoy it and what it does to the game as a whole. His aesthetics may warp the perception of his game to fans (which is bullshit, yes), but they also warp the perception of the game to being more important and significant as far as his teammates and opponents are concerned, and he raises the tenor of the game in doing so. Sure, he may call attention to himself with a burst of light that isn't just about basketball, but the light is real and casts a shadow and a reflection from everyone else. When he loses despite making every right decision, despite working over everyone possible? That feels important. When he wins because of the same? That feels important. CP3 is important partially because he's important, and that's unfair, yes. But as a viewer? There is a real, substantive difference in the end product.

Aaron: See... I don't totally agree with that. It makes a difference to the lazy viewer, perhaps. (Not meant in a mean way -- it's not a bad thing to watch basketball in a "lazy" way, it's a matter of personal preference. Not a value judgment. Bear with me.) But to the observant, careful viewer who takes in every play, who sees Paul get absorbed in their dirty knocks, the wonder of his overall play is somewhat lessened and arguably erased by this attitude with which players like him and Blake approach the game. Effortless preening dominance without the results to back up the hype, I mean. The Heat are about 20-30x better than the Clips in this sense alone, because goddamn, they're arrogant as hell... but they back it up, and they don't let it control them. LeBron has, in the 5 Heat games I've seen him in so far this year, once neglected to get back on defense so he can argue a call. Blake does that 5-10 times a game, minimum. Same with Paul, so far.

And really, that's the story with Heat versus the Clippers. So far, the Heat don't really make a habit of showboating in-game on every other possession. They don't try and kill opposing players with dangerous screens and the old "tug on their jersey, endanger them midair" tactic. They don't do the sneering preening that Blake became slightly obsessed with late in his rookie year (and has continued this season). They don't punch Marcus Camby midcourt then cry foul so the ref T's up Marcus. The Heat don't do the dirtiest stuff. And their coach -- who, despite my hatred of the Heat, I very much respect -- demands effort and excellence. Unlike Vinny Del "No Creativity-ro". [Alex's Note: This nickname is now GG canon.] Now, this isn't to say I love them, obviously. The Heat are bad. Really aren't a ton of fun to watch. Free throws galore, occasional preening, the off-court arrogance, et cetera. But their coaching, their execution, and their relative lack of being self-absorbed on the court make them markedly more fun to watch if you completely decontextualize them and the Clippers as teams, during the games themselves. I really, really hate what the Clippers do to the game of basketball. They are a team that define preening, and a team that make all the ore than the Heat. more than the D'Antoni Knicks. more than Shaq. They just turn basketball into a petty game where arrogance and dirty play become synonymous with "intensity"

This is especially irritating when there are players like Nash who are intense without being dirty. Manu is intense without trying to kill Andre Miller every trip up the court. Even Wade, who's intense by drawing a shitload of undeserved fouls (which is incredibly annoying and sometimes completely unwatchable) -- even he's better than Paul and Griffin. There's just this general air of disrespect around the Clippers. They don't respect their opponent. They play dirty. And what's worse? They aren't even effective in doing so! They're a bad, mismatched team that plays lazy defense and reflects Vinny Del Negro's worst instincts. I should love seeing a talent like Paul and a talent like Blake fly across the court. I should love this team. I mean, hell, I love Mo Williams and I can enjoy Reggie Evans every once in a while. But in the 4 Clippers games I've watched so far, I can't say I love them. I can't even say I like them. I hate watching them together, in fact.

In short, I have a proposition for you. There's no one "right" way to play basketball. However, there is a monotonically WRONG way to play basketball. The Clippers embody that -- they play the game with no respect for their opponent, no respect for the intelligence of their fans, and no effort to play in a way that doesn't hurt the game and cheapen the sport. They play as though defense is nothing more than dirty hits and stealthy grabs, and as though arrogance and self obsession is the platonic ideal for a team of stars. They run lazy set plays and coast on their talent. Their coach runs their stars so many minutes that they take shortcuts and put in lacking effort for much of the game. In all forms of the game, they play under their potential and under what a "good" team would do. And that's why I hate this year's Clippers team, to this point. They aren't fun to watch, they don't respect their opponent, and they coast like no other. That's not good for the game, nor is it good for any of the players involved. In my view.

... And as if to prove my point, as I wrote that, Billups kicks Wes Matthews in the balls. Wonderful job, Clippers.

Alex: I respect that, and you're right: They're an annoying, dirty team, especially in combination.

But what about when Chris Paul was carrying the Hornets (who actively, strongly stood behind him for the MVP in 2008)? What about all those times he's devastated very good (and more talented) teams by unreasonable margins? When he was at his peak, his ego was more than compensated for by performance, and now because of his knee injury, only traces of the talent remain and all the arrogance remains. But it could be said that Paul signed the death warrants on the Spurs and Lakers dynasties. Just because his ego hasn't caught up with his lessened abilities does not invalidate what he's done, which is more than merely to prove his own greatness. He was arrogance; he was dirty; he was all of the above, but he was at heart a great competitor. And that hasn't changed.

The problem with CP3 is partly ego but it's also exogenous: Now he's surrounded by people that he doesn't need to pump up, that he doesn't need to build up by setting an example, people for whom building up is probably worse than just harshly and loudly criticizing all facets of their game and asking to reciprocate the honesty. And being around these people accentuates the cheaper, dirtier parts of CP3's game. His rage and swagger is real, not just the rational trolling for points and possessions, and I admire that. But when you put him right next to the living embodiments of veteran cheapness (Billups), arrogance (Blake), and unwarranted hype (DeAndre Jordan -- not his fault, of course), you start to make these unpleasant comparisons directly. And it doesn't exactly help CP3 or make him seem like a franchise savior as much as one more unpleasant piece. The fact that he also has done a lot to dislike off the court (the oddest trade demand cycle of any superstar yet, and his recent insane levels of branding that exceed even LeBron's at least in terms of relative accomplishment) doesn't help an already cynical person.

Now, all that said, I think the "lazy/careful viewer" dichotomy is a bit silly. [Aaron's note: It really is. That was the wrong word for that. I'll leave it in, but I have to emphasize that it's not the right word.] People value different things in the game, and look out for different things, and that's one of the great things about basketball. If someone is looking for "swag" with nothing objective to back it up, that's kind of dumb, honestly indistinguishable from celebrity culture, really. Celebrity for its own sake. I get that. But what about the fierce, unrestrained, total embrace of competitition, with or without visual evidence? Is there really nothing of value there to an astute viewer in Chris Paul's game? I don't think that CP3 corrupts the game of basketball, nor is his style the end-all and be-all of the game of basketball. It's just one more dimension that he displays to such an extreme extent that it's instructive, entertaining, and inherently interesting when it matches up with another extreme like Nash, Manu, or Duncan.

Now, you and I personally love the Spurs' unselfishness and unpretentious attitude (along with their "we'll do what we do and if we don't win that's how it goes" approach), and I see what you mean about how the Heat conduct themselves comparatively. I also recognize that CP3 (and, before someone else says it, Bruce Bowen) is arguably the complete opposite of that. While I wouldn't exactly encourage kids to be like him, it still has its value to me as a viewer (though it's value lessened by his surrounding team, as you and I have both said now).

• • •

Epilogue to Clips-Blazers:

Aaron: Fair enough. Nothing to add. I think we're done with this Clippers stuff. Let's move on.

Alex: Okay, then we'll edit and publish it later, probably.

Aaron: You're doing Spurs-Bucks?

Alex: Yeah. "I woke up screaming today." First sentence of the RJ thing. Thoughts?

Aaron: Did you really wake up screaming? Jesus.

Alex: Well, I was building to a parallelism with your RJ theory, you know, where the quality of his teammates -- ...

Aaron: Stop. Can we establish whether this really happened before we go any further on it?

_Alex:_ ... No, no we can't.

_Aaron:_ Fine. Too many adverbs in the third paragraph. Get rid of "all at once." Hanging comma in the second. Patch it, please.

• • •

Thanks for reading.

Continue reading

I was hallucinating all night with a deathly combination of caffeine, tylenol, and the strangest sleep schedule ever. Technically, I'm not sure if I should've been up, much less writing anything. But Aaron would like us to take a new direction with The Outlet, and apparently, stepping into this new direction involves some growing pains in the form of hallucinogenic metaphors. Take my words with a grain of salt, my organization of concepts with a lot of leeway, and my concepts themselves as canon. I am going to attempt to describe the 2012 San Antonio Spurs, as they appeared last night in a thrilling game against the Warriors of Golden State.

• • •

It's been five games into this long and deadly season. The Spurs are in dire straits entering their sixth. How dire? Well, permit me a long metaphor: their conductor is dead - or, for those who care, on indefinite leave with injury - and all his replacements will not do, for they all lack the normal conductor's competence and fluidity and artistry. Now at the concert tonight, the orchestra plays disjointed, suddenly-half-remembered cues; the first violin steps up to conduct and finds again how hard it is. The program director asks if they even want a conductor tonight, if this is to be the alternative. All the while, from the stands, the injured conductor watches intently, moving the baton discreetly in his seat despite injury, the clipped bird flapping his wings and concerned at what he sees.

In spite of all of this, the audience applauds warmly. They've been to other concerts; they know the backdrop of injury; they know what music these people are capable of making with the right conductor. But the audience cannot endure the harsh tones much longer. Because they know the score. The conductor's void is palpable and hangs over every missed cue and every fourth beat that stumbles or rushes a bit to the next measure. Still, they clap. It's not just sympathy that moves the audience. The people in the stands also clap because they know that the orchestra is trying its best. That they've tried so many different, seemingly random conductors tonight, to everyone's muffled amusement (the third-chair trumpet reveals to the audience's laughter that he'd taken some conducting courses in college as he steps up). But a careful eye will also note the muffled horror on everyone's faces: How long can an orchestra like this - even one so brilliant - survive (much less thrive) without a good conductor? They've got the lanky, funny-looking drummer with the headband running the show now, getting assists from the wide, jolly bassist, and that's all well and good, but this is an orchestra not built for the most part on philanthropy or corporate sponsorship: this is an orchestra mainly built on its own acclaim and attendance. Built on its own recognition as the champion of orchestral accomplishment. And the way things are going, it won't command an audience much longer, and it certainly won't reach the end-of-year awards except on momentum alone.

This is an orchestra that will soon be silent, and at the intermission the silence to come hangs palpably over their fans.

But something is different when they come back from the intermission. All at once - after a pep talk from the program director - it seems they're starting to change the rigged game to one that they can win. They're using their acknowledged talent to find new paths to the heart of the music. They're taking matters into their own hands. If they can't find a conductor, well, as the concert has gone on, it turns out they know the score a little better than they'd thought. As their vestigial memories of Beethoven and Tchaikovsky return, they split the melodies up into chunks and deliver by committee.

Their program director, exhausted by apprehension and futility, had foreseen his opening in that pep talk and told them: "If you have something to deliver for this measure, then do it. If not, just stay out of the way. Whatever the case, stay on beat. Defend the first beat and make sure we get back to it at the end of the measure. Above all, the more the merrier. Attack the piece! Feel the music's direction and react, damnit!" Not in years has the program director gotten so livid, so animated, so soulful in willing his orchestra to action. And they respond, in time; they're attacking the piece, getting right to its heart, and the audience knows it. Making mistakes, but using each mistake as an opportunity for finer concentration. To build something better for the next measure. Dvorak's "New World" symphony has sounded much grander and more cohesive in other, better orchestras. But in their improvisation, they're rediscovering the emotional heart of the symphony: the long, grinding, arduous journey for innocent truth and affirmation, and then, at the end, a celebration for what has been regained and the journey that led there. They've made that journey, and they celebrate their "New World" that suddenly feels so easy by the end.

They've won.

No, they aren't going to be able to do this piece many times again. And they all know their orchestra is still in peril without its great conductor. But for a night they've staved off insolvency and shown their audience what it is that makes us look for music and its salvation in the first place. And, a bit merrier, they prepare for tomorrow's encore. The show must go on. And perhaps they can do it on their own, for a time. Perhaps the entertainers still have a few vintage nights left.

• • •

You know, I'm not a big fan of writing about the creative process: It's usually forced and overwrought (see above). But I had to say something, had to put it into my own words, because all I know is that the Spurs without Manu played in a way that evoked the unmistakable joy of rediscovered creation, and whether they won or lost, whether I can put it the right way or not, it's a thought worth remembering: An aging team that played an encore of "Summertime" and was bathed in light.

Continue reading

After years in the Association, stately, plump Richard Jefferson inevitably slid over from the bench to the scorer's table as a color commentator. By the end of his career, at the end of the bench, constantly making amusing, self-deprecating chatter, he had practically already busted his chops as a commentator. On the bench he'd say things like:

• "Tim Duncan still runs like a deer. Now, can someone get me the license plate of the guy that hit him?"

• "Ah, the starting small forward. I remember when that was me! President Reagan was in power, and we were all bemoaning Reaganomics at the end of the bench, when Red Holzman tapped me on the shoulder and said, 'Kid, you're starting tonight.' I was 35. I was three years older than Red. I was actually a shooting guard but I had been eating ice cream all summer because I'd thought I'd never play. I played 20 minutes before I nearly had a heart attack. I never started again."

• "LeBron James is still the most athletic player in the league at 30. He never developed a great perimeter game like Jordan or Kobe, but he never had to. He can just steamroll his way down the lane and bank it in for an and-one after drawing two fouls on every starter on that one single play. And then he can rest for the rest of the half while his team builds a lead. Then he does the same thing in the third quarter and steamrolls over garbage time and gets a triple-double in 15 minutes and his team wins by 30. It's sick. It's not even basketball. But you gotta respect the champs."

And so on. His teammates laughed, but they also noted that whatever he said rung of truth when they looked back at the game. And so it was that when he called a game as a test run for his alma mater, Arizona, they hired him on the spot, finding him funny, reasonable, and knowledgeable. Eventually, of course, it was these same traits (and the vetting experience at Arizona) that got him a spot calling color with the local professional team, the Phoenix Suns. After the offseason (filled, for Jefferson, with research on the newer players he hadn't played with), Jefferson was ready to show he could cut it as a commentator in the big leagues.

• • •

His first game - on opening night of the regular season - was to call a game between the Suns and their hated rivals (and his former team) the San Antonio Spurs. The Suns' organization - under new management - was excited about Jefferson and the new direction he'd be taking their color commentary, and even brought in legendary retired commentator Gary Bender to give Jefferson some tips before tip-off.

"Now, Richard, it's important that the fans like you from both ends of the court. You understand that?"

"Of course, Mr. Bender."

"Please, call me Gary. I mean, do you really understand that half your audience on TV is rooting for the other team? That a third of your audience comes from Europe and China? Do you understand that you are representing your country, your family, and all that sort of thing, Richard? Do you get it?"

"Yeah, I do. It's a total honor. I get it, Gary."

"Well that's good to hear, Richard. A lot of you guys just want to push your own favorite players, favorite teams, and so on. But there's more to it than that."

"I know. But of course, I'm glad to hear you tell me so."

"Well, anyway, I was at my home a few months ago and I just happened to catch your first game between Arizona and the Oregon Ducks."

"Oh, yeah, that one. Any tips?"

"Well, you made me laugh, Richard. That's important."

"Cool --"

"But you made me laugh only because I'd been talking to athletes for 40 years, Richard. As a fan, it didn't work so well. My wife didn't like it all that much. She's the harshest critic, of course. I'll do the best game of my life and she says "I switched over to the Portland network because I just wanted to hear someone competent call the games." "

"That's hars --"

"She's joking. It's a joke, Richard. It's very funny."

"Oh, haha."

"But she seriously, honestly didn't like your style that much, and she knows her stuff."

"Darn. Well, what can be done? Do people just naturally get better?"

"Not really on their own, no. It's not something where with practice you're suddenly good at it. Every sport has its own rhythm and every game has its own beat, and you're working for the fans on that beat. The more considerate you are of what people want to see and hear, the better you'll be, but that doesn't come with repetition."

"It's tricky, isn't it?"

"No, it's not hard at all as long as you have concentration. It's the most natural thing in the world. React and respond, over and over. Sometimes you'll surprise yourself with your response, but don't think about it in the moment. You're from Arizona so you've heard of Vin Scully, right?"

"Yeah, I wasn't like a Dodgers fan, but it was kind of hard to avoid hearing him and hearing about him. And then, when I'd been a pro for many years, I lived in San Diego. Vin came out of more cars than the Padres game, and if you listened to it for a few minutes it was obvious why."

"That's what I'm talking about. He uses a sense of humor, and a personality, and a voice, and the crowd noise, but at the end of the day he's just giving the fans what they want to hear. You've got funny, you're a likable person, you can think on your feet, Richard. Now put it all together and deliver for fans. Don't just make jokes. I can't really tell you more than that. But I wanted to tell you the problem you have to figure out day by day."

"Well, thanks, Gary. How's retirement, anyway?"

"Well, we have a garden, and it's been nice to slow down a little bit. But... put it this way, I was going out of my way to catch a Wildcats-Ducks basketball game, you know? It's a little tiring, and I'm glad we got out of the house for a little bit. Overall I like it, though."

"Haha, yeah. It is relaxing but sometimes you just want to be busy."

"Oh, that reminds me, Richard. One last bit of advice: One thing you can do to really reach people is to point out things like tough effort. I know you guys think of energy as just another variable, another plus or minus. And that's fine, but to fans? Effort or its lack really speaks to people. It's kind of poetic and brings the game home to people. It's one of those big questions in life, and you can see it right on the screen. You know what I mean?"

"Yeah, I didn't really think about it, but you're right, Gary, and it's important. Thanks."

"Okay, well, we're going to go sit in our box, Richard. Best of luck."

"Thanks, Gary. Give your wife my regards."

And then Gary Bender departed, and Richard felt the powerful tension of a stimulant now, as tip-off was less than a quarter-hour away, and Suns-Spurs games always had decent ratings. A lot of people that he could make happy, a lot of people he could impress, a lot of people that knew him and what he was about. Many of them, as Gary told him, were Spurs fans and he felt the powerful, anxious weight of responsibility. But he thought he could carry it.

• • •

The Spurs were an organization steeped in class and tradition. So Jefferson - still reasonably well-liked by the management and coaching staff there (who'd liked his character even before they brought him in) - received a warm introduction before the game and the ring ceremony. Now mic'd up for the game, RJ began to talk a little about the Suns roster, largely an undersized group of scrappy vets that weren't going to win more than twelve games probably. An aging Anderson Varejao suddenly brought to mind what Gary had said. The words flew out when his play-by-play man gave him a lob.

"I want you guys to watch this Anderson Varejao, tonight, if you aren't excited about the season. Suns fans might not be familiar with the new signing, but he's hardly new to those of us that played in the Eastern Conference. He does so many good things for a basketball team, and over and over in his career he's sacrificed his body for the good of his team, not just his team as in the number of wins they get, but in terms of his team as people that have to get up every morning and bang their knees 10 times a week, which is the reality for an NBA player. Because they look at Andy and they see someone that bangs his knees 20 times a week and gets a little slower every year, and they know that if Andy can give twice what they're giving, they can give an extra 10%, and so they do. And if in 20 years they don't move quite as sprightly because of Andy, it's because they'll have done more and they'll have more to be satisfied about. That's gone unnoticed, and maybe that's something I can call your attention to."

His play-by-play man looked at him during the commercial break with a mixture of awe and astonishment.

"Was that alright, Jim?"

"That was more than alright, Richard, but we have some superstitions here so I won't say much more. Keep it up."

• • •

And now the ring ceremony was beginning. The Spurs (now in their second year without him) had been relatively busy, having won their fifth title in staggering fashion the year before: Each of their four playoff series went the full seven games (that had never happened in the league), and in every series they were outscored by their opponents (which only happened rarely for one series, much less four_)._ But the Spurs made up for it with the tenacity of warriors and the clinical intelligence of surgeons. Now the Spurs' "Big Three," certainly (and finally) too old to contend at this point, were taking one more half-year on the payroll at the minimum salary, largely as a victory lap through the league and the franchise that that they'd dominated for so long. The gold, beautiful rings were unnecessary ornaments; the five rings were the halos of respect and dignity around whatever lineup they had in at a given time, and those would last for many years.

After the ring ceremony, an intoxicated Spurs fan two rows in the stands said, "RJ, you're my hero, can I get an autograph?" and RJ obliged. When he got it, the fan proceeded to rip up the autograph and say, "No one idolizes RJ. No one. This is worthless to me! Ha ha ha," to which the surrounding fans mixed mocking support and classy jeers. After all, it was true. No one idolized RJ. But it still was pretty weird to say.

Things might have been different, and it's the funny thing about these Spurs and Jefferson (known to players and coaches alike by the childish initials "RJ"): Several years ago and on the good side of 30, RJ was once touted as the player that would bring the Spurs "over the edge:" In other words, the player that would take a very good collection of talent and inject it with the youth, intelligence, and experience that would grease its path towards a title (or at least toward contention). But it never happened: RJ's first year was lost and disjointed, and for the rest of his tenure RJ become associated (a little unfairly, a little justifiably) with the word "disappearing," especially "when it mattered." And despite his Spurs continuing to post very good records and getting into the playoffs as a real threat, they never seriously looked like the best team in the league come playoff time, and when the fans looked for answers they saw in RJ an $8-10 million albatross hogging the salary cap space, they saw upstarts (on the same roster) with more upside and talent than RJ. Most of all, they saw someone that was likable, reasonable, and nice as a front for a non-entity that made bank by saying all the right things and never putting the insane effort in that was expected of him as a highly-paid professional athlete. And there it was and RJ had probably heard the drunken fan's sentiment a hundred times in various media.

But suddenly, perhaps from pride in his defense of Anderson Varejao, RJ (unlike the previous hundred times) suddenly got really prickly and angry.

"I've never wanted to be your damn idol, and if I ever had, I'm resigned to where I am. But did I ever hurt you? What gives you the right?" With muscles tensed from anger as much as pride, RJ suddenly realized that the post-ceremony commercial break was ending in a few seconds. So he waited, and his grimace turned into a smile as the camera focused on him and his play-by-play man. And RJ continued his thought on Anderson Varejao.

"You know what? I just had somebody rip up my autograph telling me that no one idolized me. Well, you know what I said about Anderson Varejao? Maybe Anderson Varejao was nobody's hero. No one in their right mind would want to grow up to be a tenacious, clumsy interior presence wide by a seven-footer's standards and whose grace and tenacity were obscured by a funny-looking mop of hair. Nobody grew up wanting to be Anderson Varejao. And yet everyone that played or practiced with him tells me he's a great player, tells me he makes them want to work harder. Doesn't that count for something? All I wanted to do for people was make my teammates laugh, and, on occasion, win a few games! And dag namit, I did it! Sometimes I was injured, sometimes I was ineffective, but I was always there for them, and I wanted you guys to laugh. Tell me that's not worth an autograph, if you're already collecting the inscriptions of heroes and gods."

But they'd already cut to commercial long before RJ had ended, and he noted that the play-by-play man looked like death on the other side of him.

"Nice try, RJ, and you can say that again if you want, but try to be a little more... self-deprecating..."

"Aw, dag namit! Self-deprecating? Dag namit. Crap."

"Perfect. That's great self-deprecating humor, right there."

"Damn it! I mean, I just wanted people to know how hard someone like Andy works. I didn't mean to build myself up. But I want them to watch Varejao tonight, is all I meant."

"That's fine. But it has to be in the rhythm of the game. Prove your point by pointing out when they do something worthy of respect. As you know Andy's going to at least once. Then give your whole spiel. And even if he doesn't give you an opening tonight, he will sometime later in the season. He'll get his if you're willing to give it. It's a long season and you'll find the time to say anything you care to. Gary always found time. Everyone I've worked with - play-by-play or color commentator - found the time to say everything that was in their head. The problem is that it's not enough to fill 48 minutes. It's filling the time that's hard."

"Well, then, we just had a ring ceremony, can I talk about my Spurs for a few minutes? Size 'em up, talk about what they mean, and so on?"

"Go for it. You'd better, in fact. It's a good idea. We're live in 10 seconds!"

• • •

To be continued...

Continue reading

We've got a short collective memory in the blogosphere. This is probably a good thing: The rotation and D-league players on a team change drastically in the course of a calendar year, and "standing pat" in an offseason usually means making only one major roster change, as opposed to making several. Even the very best players have 15 short years to work in, and usually only 10 of these years are especially relevant. The MVP window is open for a vanishingly short 5 years, if a player is lucky. The average age of an NBA player is very young and the average span of a career is very short, able to change drastically on an awkward fall or a fortuitous random contract. You're better off forgetting most of what you could remember.

But I think if we're going to skim and forget, if we're going to drift over mounds of information like an incorporeal dune buggy, we ought to have a few rest stops out there. I'm talking about the stuff that makes you stop in your tracks, the best and most significant pieces that the NBA blogosphere has collectively produced over the years. The pantheon, if you will. These aren't the end-of-week links roundups, nor even the end-of-year bests, nor (in many cases) even the best an individual blog has to produce. No, these are the all-time greats, the shortlist. The articles that go far beyond what you could expect from them, the articles that change you as a reader, the articles whose first readings mark the timeline of your fan experience, the articles you bookmark and continually return to when you reminisce over the subject of the article. Articles that mark themselves as surely as a great sports event marks itself to its observers. Articles that truly stretch the game out for fans and writers, whether by their sentiment, their style, or their intelligence.

This page is intended as an ongoing index of our Pantheon, and we want everyone that sees something missing to post their favorites (and how such favorites influenced them) in the comments where we'll add your favorites/explanations (and the favorites we find as they're being written) as we see fit. And feel free to comment on the existing work here. Without further ado, here is The Pantheon as we've aggregated it so far.

• • •

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• The Consummation of Dirk by Jonathan Callahan
• What a Feeling, To Be Mortal by Rob Mahoney
• The Journey of Andre Miller, Point Guard (Part 1, Part 2) by Tim Davenport
• Brandon Roy Could Cook by Ben Golliver
• Dream Week by Various (featured on FreeDarko, curated by Brian Phillips of Run of Play)
• To Spursland and Back Again: A Foreigner's Tale (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11) by David H. Menéndez Arán
• Rolling with Leandro (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) by Gregory Dole
• One Last Bitter Moment by Joe Posnanski
• We Are All Witnesses by John Krolik
• Braess's Paradox and "The Ewing Theory" by Brian Skinner
• Requiem for a Shooter by John Krolik
• Your champs, in your eyes by Kelly Dwyer
• Where does Tim Duncan rank? Highly by Kelly Dwyer
• Got to Get Off This Never-Ending Combine by Rough Justice of There Are No Fours
• The Game Done Changed by Rob Mahoney
• Dirk Nowitzki and LeBron James: Black Swans? by tjarks at Get Buckets
• Traveling West Finds Cleveland by David Campbell (Includes _The Real Mr. West by Tzvi Twersky and _A Teachable Moment by Angelo Benedetti)
• Oklahoma City's Thrilling "Thunder U" by Bethlehem Shoals
• Federer’s Tears: Why LeBron and the Heat Will Probably Win the NBA Title, and Why That’s Okay by Shane Ryan
• QWOP: The World's Worst, And Only, Athlete by Jon Bois

UPDATE (1/21/2012)

• The Riverwalk Conspiracy by Rand
• The Pathology of Manu Ginobili by sungo
• David Robinson was a Fine Role Player by Timothy Varner
• John Wooden and the Culture of Ought and On Johnny “Red” Kerr by Timothy Varner
• The City’s Advanced Stats Primer and EZPM: Yet Another Model for Player Evaluation by EvanZ
• Regarding Moses by Matt Moore
• Tracy McGrady, 'freakish' talent and the peril of ease by Dan Devine

• • •

The Consummation of Dirk by Jonathan Callahan - A brilliant, hilarious, semi-insane short story that uses Dirk to talk about the nature of competition and that uses the nature of competition to talk about Dirk. I can't do "Consummation" justice with a blurb, but it definitely belongs in the pantheon just for the discussion of Dirk's hiatus* and Callahan's masterful command of prose. Written as a collage of different angles on the Teutonic superstar, "Consummation" features endlessly quotable individual sections filled with maddening, entertaining creativity. T.S. Eliot, interviews with no questions, send-ups of Bill Simmons and Hubie Brown, some of the most fun wordplay anywhere on the web. And it all comes together to bring to life a semi-fictional, ridiculous alternate reality that feels all too plausible.

*or sabbatical, or vision quest, or mystic performance-enhancing regimen, or journey into the heart of the silence, the light.

• • •

What a Feeling, To Be Mortal by Rob Mahoney - Not only does Mahoney's paean to the SSOL Suns have the best title of anything ever written, it also has a gripping spirituality about it. Only six paragraphs long, but it feels longer and truer as time goes by. Maybe that's because it's expressing the weight of six long, wonderful years.

• • •

The Journey of Andre Miller, Point Guard (Part 1, Part 2) by Tim Davenport (handle timbo on BlazersEdge) - Andre Miller is one of the sneakily great guards from the last decade. Davenport wrote this piece - culled from dozens of disparate/obscure sources - shortly after Andre Miller joined Portland. It's a model for good journalism and for finding a story that wasn't exactly hidden in plain sight.

• • •

Brandon Roy Could Cook by Ben Golliver - When I asked Tim Davenport above if he had any suggestions for the Pantheon, he suggested looking more deeply into Golliver and suggested in particular this great piece on Brandon Roy. It may be less than 14 days old as I'm writing this, but I'm pretty confident Golliver's piece is an instant classic. Golliver talks about the brilliant young guard forced too soon into retirement because of chronic injury and in doing so talks about Roy's impact on the Blazers faithful, on a captivated national following, and on Golliver himself. Like many of these pieces, I can't really do this one justice with a description, but I can safely say that it belongs.

• • •

Dream Week by Various (featured on FreeDarko and co-curated by Bethlehem Shoals of FD and Brian Phillips of Run of Play) - For a month, FreeDarko featured an exhaustive exploration on Hakeem Olajuwon from a bunch of great NBA bloggers. Each author brought to the table their own firsthand experiences and cultural perspectives on the center that so dominated the interregnum of Jordan's first retirement. It was a great week and in its totality easily clears the bar of the Pantheon.

• • •

To Spursland and Back Again: A Foreigner's Tale (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11) by David H. Menéndez Arán (handle LatinD on Pounding the Rock) - This is not primarily about basketball, but it must be mentioned in any Pantheon of NBA work. David is a diehard Spurs fan from Argentina that made a pilgrimage to America midway through the 2009-10 season. There he traveled around Texas and the West Coast to meet up with a bunch of regulars from the Spurs blog Pounding the Rock for his first trip (of many, hopefully) to the U.S.

Speaking and writing in half-broken English, LatinD rebuilds the fissured language with a crackling, deadpan wit, a smile in every sentence, and an observation about every corner. In the crowning moment of the series, David and Wayne from PTR have a buddy-comedy-esque afternoon (narrated in two parallax accounts) followed by a night of media access to the Spurs game, where the pair watched the games up close, asked Coach Pop a couple questions, and (a couple days later) met the approachable national hero of Argentina, Manu Ginobili. Coach Pop, on being introduced to LatinD, stole the show in his brief cameo; "Argentina? We actually have a player from Argentina, did you know?"

David's photo-filled, soulful, funny travel diary is simply one of the best things that has ever been put on the Internet, much less on the NBA blogosphere. The Pantheon is an afterthought. Forewarning: It's also insanely long. Put the coffee on.

• • •

Rolling with Leandro (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10) by Gregory Dole - Hot on the heels of "To Spursland and Back Again" is another masterful account of a South American's strange journey into the United States. Dole - a Canadian that lives in Brazil - helps speedster Leandro Barbosa around the country to NBA teams to be scouted for the 2003 draft, where he eventually found his way onto the Phoenix Suns (and became an important player on the SSOL Suns). Dole's account is by turns funny, sad, filled with emotional resonance and a bluesy sense that this is Barbosa's best (and possibly only) chance to become a pro basketball player. Barbosa tries to figure out if he belongs with the best, a sense of confusion compounded by tight-lipped organizations, bothersome injuries, and a historically deep draft.

• • •

One Last Bitter Moment by Joe Posnanski - The best sportswriter in America (with big personal ties to Cleveland) covers the last minute of the surreal Game 6 that eliminated the Cavaliers in LeBron's final game with the team. In what felt like a parody of the brilliant final quarter of the Cavs-Celtics game 7 from 2008, the team simply gave up and stopped hurrying the ball down the court, to Coach Mike Brown's eternal fury (fury followed quickly by disgust). I was following the Cavs then myself, and this minute was one of the strangest, most inexplicable moments in all of sports. And Posnanski nails it, evoking in me Steinbeck's famous orchard in the eponymous chapter from "The Grapes of Wrath" and setting the stage for that great topper: "The Decision".

• • •

We Are All Witnesses by John Krolik - Speaking of "The Decision," Krolik's has long been the specific piece I associate with the more infamous LeBron situation. An instant classic from the moment it was published, Krolik dropped this gem just a few hours before LeBron took his talents to South Beach. Krolik goes into an improvisational reverie about the LeBron era, reliving with celebration and introspection the wondrous seven years of Cleveland basketball in all its highs and lows. Krolik mourns for what would soon pass away forever, regardless of where James would decide to go, but in mourning gives us his personal testimony of seven years worth remembering.

• • •

Braess's Paradox and "The Ewing Theory" by Brian Skinner - This is what stats in basketball is supposed to be about. Skinner's clarity of prose greases the wheels of an unstoppable machine of enlightenment. Make a hypothesis, state your assumptions, build a model, test the underlying assumptions with data, and produce a theory. It's the simplest thing in the world to do, and the hardest thing to do well. Skinner does it well. And if you're not into math? Even better: This is what we're always raving about.

• • •

Requiem for a Shooter by John Krolik - At the height of All-Star point Stephon Marbury's very public meltdown, John Krolik came through with an extraordinarily nuanced narrative. Krolik's piece takes a wider view not only at Marbury, but also at the ones from Marbury's Coney Island neighborhood that didn't make it, including Marbury's brothers and Lincoln High School teammates. I don't think that Krolik's view is completely convincing (Krolik doesn't seem entirely convinced himself), but it's a well-thought-out, well-argued perspective that focuses more on demystifying Marbury than completely justifying or explaining the guard and the context in which he learned to thrive. Excellent stuff.

• • •

Your champs, in your eyes and__ Where does Tim Duncan rank? Highly__ by Kelly Dwyer - Kelly Dwyer's output resembles that of a great jazz musician - a few basic themes (with endless variations and repetitions), a vague, often unstated worldliness, a tendency to take on all the standards of his genre, and - most importantly - an endless, unfathomably large catalog, most of which is unnecessary for one person to experience in its totality. We're kind of KD connoisseurs, though. And inevitably (as any connoisseur will tell you), some of the best individual pieces and concerts get lost. Well, if that chain of logic made any sense to you, here are - analogously - "My Favorite Things" and "[Kelly Dwyer] & Johnny Hartman." These two gems are on their face rather inauspicious responses to two particularly dumb observations. But beneath the surface, these simple responses transform into two of Dwyer's best and most memorable pieces, and worthy representation for one of the best NBA scribes around.

Update (12/29/11): James Herbert submits this paean to obsessive fandom by Dwyer. It's a worthy addition.

• • •

Got to Get Off This Never-Ending Combine by Rough Justice of There Are No Fours - Deconstructing a traditional or simplistic narrative to find nuggets of wisdom seems to be the surest, shortest path to "Stretching The Game Out." It also helps if every time Aaron or I think of a word (in Rough Justice's case here, it's me and "athletic"), we're also thinking partially of your article. Because we've completely internalized your representation of it. Yeah. Everyone should write like that, okay?

• • •

The Game Done Changed by Rob Mahoney - Quoth Aaron: A great Rob Mahoney piece that nails the Positional Revolution better than any other post that came before or after it. "The most important development over the last decade of basketball was not Shaq’s dominance, LeBron’s ascendence, or Kobe’s redemption, but the recognition that square pegs need not be forced into round holes because the holes didn’t mean anything to begin with." is easily one of the best lines he's ever written and that's saying a ton given the sheer wealth of amazing things that have dropped from Mahoney's desk.

• • •

Dirk Nowitzki and LeBron James: Black Swans? by tjarks at Get Buckets - Quoth Aaron: This was a piece in mid-2011 that was quickly forgotten but became impossibly relevant once the 2011 Finals began and suddenly his theory was put to the absolute test. Great theory, great presentation, great post.

• • •

Traveling West Finds Cleveland by David Campbell - Quoth Aaron: This is one of the best basketball-related articles ever written. It's impossibly good. Just read it.

Update: For additional background and broader context about Delonte to Campbell's piece, check out The Real Mr. West by Tzvi Twersky and A Teachable Moment by Angelo Benedetti. They're both fantastic and worth reading in their own right.

• • •

Oklahoma City's Thrilling "Thunder U" by Bethlehem Shoals - The ideal Shoals experience is a paragraph-sized bundle of ham-it-up metaphors that acts as a one-time, one-way, non-stop metaphysical flight to the truth. And then, once you've taken mental pictures of the truth and spent a day there as a tourist, you go back to the bundle of metaphors that got you there and find that the paragraph has nowhere to transport you anymore and just stands there like a dead heap. The ideal Shoals experience is a portal that moves you exactly where it's supposed to with great emotional and metaphysical conveyance, then self-destructs and makes you wonder if it ever existed or took you anywhere close to the truth. While the trick is enlightening, and while quite a few of my mental pictures are thanks in part to Shoals, the trick doesn't exactly lend itself to posterity in the traditional sense (that is, in the sense of something like The Pantheon). The Thunder piece holds up, however: I'm on reading #10, and it still sends me somewhere. It's wonderful.

• • •

Federer’s Tears: Why LeBron and the Heat Will Probably Win the NBA Title, and Why That’s Okay by Shane Ryan - You know, the closest relative of this piece (ironically written by shameless Dukie Ryan) is probably Will Blythe's awesome book To Hate Like This is to be Happy Forever. In "To Hate Like This," Blythe uses interviews, his upbringing, philosophical meditations, and sociology (basically any perspective you can think of) to describe and attempt to explain his (quite strong) feelings on the Duke-UNC rivalry. In the more restrained context of a short article, Shane Ryan's "Federer's Tears" is - in the same vein as "To Hate Like This" - a yearning, multifaceted, interdisciplinary meditation on power vs. elegance that attempts to capture Ryan's embrace of Rafael Nadal over Roger Federer and the unbridled joy of the immovable, hard-nosed warrior using pure power to stop the apparently-unstoppable geniuses of athletic prowess. In this piece, Ryan's logic is sometimes slipshod and baroque, his dichotomies sometimes simplistic and anecdotal, his basketball worse. But never has clipping a bird's wings felt so right, and this might honestly be my favorite piece in The Pantheon, even though Aaron sincerely dislikes it. In any case, it's good shorthand for the type of sportswriting that I aspire to, which is what this is all about.

• • •

QWOP: The World's Worst, And Only, Athlete by Jon Bois - Actual conversation that led to this piece's inclusion was essentially Aaron saying "THIS IS THE GREATEST POST EVER WE NEED TO ADD IT" to my "Fine. But if I do this, then the entire Pantheon is sullied, I hope you're happy." It's actually a pretty funny article. Not... really pantheon, in my eyes, but funny. Heh. (Editor's Note: Hey, Alex. Thought I'd add this on. Essentially, this is my favorite sports humor piece. Ever. It takes an absurd concept, repackages it, and turns it into this dystopian future that in an offhanded and probably completely unintentional way provides a sincere examination into the process behind sports fandom and speaks to me -- a Cavs fan -- on a relatively personal level. Bois describes QWOP as many fans of bad teams (or at least me, personally) imagine the players on our team -- a tireless worker who simply isn't very good at his job, but as he's the best there ever is or ever will be, there's no use in piling on. I don't know. It's not the best piece ever, no, but it's one of my favorites and I think it's about 20x more complex and interesting than most would think on first glance. So, if you want an actual reason as to the inclusion of this piece, there it is. It does with humor and dystopic sports-related foolery what the rest of these pieces do with immortal writing. And it does it right.)

• • •

UPDATE (1/21/2012)

The Riverwalk Conspiracy by Rand - Maybe I'm revealing my bias for fiction here, but I just love a hilarious, well-characterized thought experiment. This piece (written in the midst of the 2010 playoffs) captures a strange, mystical caricature of Spurs' Coach Gregg Popovich and his methods, mid-flight. Owner Peter Holt acts as the perfect comic foil. [Note: Owes a lot to another PTR piece of fiction, the longer Ginobili vs. Dracula. I didn't include it here because it's mostly too contextual for a general NBA fan to enjoy, but I love this chapter which I think holds up pretty well without context.]

• • •

The Pathology of Manu Ginobili by sungo - This is one of those pieces where the sentences get better and better and the focus becomes clearer and clearer as the piece goes on. By the end it's something to behold, and to hold on to. You could change the tenses and adapt some stuff and it could be a HOF introduction or an epitaph, but it could never be changed to suit anyone else. Why? Well, because there will never be another Manu Ginobili. And I don't know if there's a better description of Manu out there.

• • •

David Robinson was a Fine Role Player by Timothy Varner - This is one of the most accurate explorations of the strange, unselfish culture of the San Antonio Spurs over the last two decades. Tim Varner (of 48 Minutes of Hell) traces the Spurs' culture directly to the contributions of one David Maurice Robinson. With every playoff exit by teams he had carried at an MVP level, Robinson saw all that was missing and tried again and again to be those things the next year. But Robinson found out that he just couldn't be all the that his team needed, not with Jordan there, not with Hakeem lurking in Jordan's shadow with a great supporting cast and an otherworldly 15-month stretch. So, when Tim Duncan came along, Robinson (with some early disdain and wounded pride) easily, unselfishly sacrificed his touches and his accolades in order to help the Spurs to win two championships and to create a great legacy and a long-lasting culture of character. And in doing so, the Admiral created the template for a different kind of legend: a different kind of star. Varner's title is ironic in the best sense and helms a piece that builds to an overarching narrative that anyone who has followed the Spurs to any degree will understand.

• • •

John Wooden and the Culture of Ought and On Johnny “Red” Kerr by Timothy Varner - You know, looking over the Pantheon so far, I notice that the criteria that seem to dominate our selections are depth of insight, passion, journalism, and imagination. But at the end of the day, it's probably Tim Duncan - along with his subtle virtues of integrity, intelligence, and competition for its own sake - that I'm tuned in to watch every night. It's our deep respect and admiration for Tim Duncan that motivated the existence of the Gothic Ginobili more than anything else (if you want to know second place, just look up at the banner/name). The same is true of sportswriting. We look first for writing that dazzles our imaginations, then for writing that expands our minds, then - without exception - we look for writing that stirs our souls and affirms our values. If you understand all of that, then the inclusion of Varner's pieces is obvious.

• • •

The City’s Advanced Stats Primer and EZPM: Yet Another Model for Player Evaluation by EvanZ - Math recognize math. I don't know enough about basketball statistics to really give you an unbiased, objective opinion on which stats and approaches are best. If ezPM is the best single-number statistical APBRmetric on the Internet I have no idea, and if it's hopelessly dated, well, I don't know that, either. I'm not a big stats guy. What I do know (from decades learning math and from reading about some of these statistics over the past few years) is that ezPM is a fine metric, and takes Dave Berri's already decent but flawed (no, really, it is) "Wins Produced" metric to yet another level of insight.

But more than anything pertaining to the ezPM stat itself, I'm mostly linking to this pair of pieces for the mental process behind them, the story told by EvanZ in the "Primer" of finding an abundance of these already-decent metrics like WP, building something a bit better in ezPM, and - in the scientist's dismal, grinding, purposeful way - in the end still not being totally satisfied with the outcome. After all, every scientist worth their salt understands intuitively and concretely that there are always more avenues for improvement, and there are always thoughts that can be re-thought, as history (and math especially!) suggests. It's a story that for the most part Berri frustratingly and oddly omits from his own work, and that we'd love to hear. Because (speaking not as a scientist but as a happy consumer of its products) the honest stories of science not only bring cultural exchange (as in the "Primer") but also tangible improvements in the science itself (as in ezPM).

• • •

Regarding Moses by Matt Moore - On the blogosphere, we talk so much about upsides, breakout stars, and devastating disappointments. Most of all, we talk about the nebulous, dynamic legacies of our stars, young and old. Our era has more upsides than it has downsides, and I'm not really complaining. But it was so refreshing when Matt Moore took an afternoon to do some research and reflect on Moses Malone. Moore comes away with a simple portrait of Malone, who knew he was great, had a lot of fun, and then got on with his life. Set against a modern pace of sports media constantly massaging and shaping legacies with each game, the article is well-done and neat. While the prospect of a book about Mo would be nice, this article is a fitting send-off in its own right - simple, enjoyable, important without being heavy. Strawberry soda pop.

• • •

Tracy McGrady, 'freakish' talent and the peril of ease by Dan Devine - When someone makes a good argument that carries with it the sketches for a much broader frontier of understanding, then they've "stretched the game out," quite literally. In Devine's piece, we get a stern deconstruction of the expectations that coaches, fans, and management place on their stars and the laments that follow when those expectations aren't met. And, as a result, we learn to undervalue what we have and overvalue what we could have but never might. On some level much of sports fandom is predicated on the hope that our teams and our players will do unreasonable things: Performance - even to the crustiest statistician or historian - is not the whole story. The missed shots, the skills that inexplicably don't take to a player, the rotations that could have been made: these expectations all matter, of course. But it's worth taking a step back, and that's exactly what Devine's thoughtful piece does.

Continue reading

Mike Brown and Kobe Bryant Hash it Out

Mike Brown and Kobe are walking towards each other in a large gym. Brown speaks.

Mike Brown: So uh... Kobe, I know there's been talk about us having troubles in the paper. Idle speculation, of course, but considering we're more or less both on long-term contracts, I thought we'd hash it out right now.

Kobe Bryant (shaking hands): You know, you're right. You guys really had our number in those last few years with the Cavs, and a lot of the credit goes to you. You honestly outcoached Phil Jax, and you brought the Cavs at least as far as Phil Jackson brought the Lakers for a few years, arguably with less talent. I think most of the problem with you was LeBron, not vice versa. I want to work with you, not against you.

MB: The same for you. Kobe, your moves are as sophisticated as any offensive player. I know you aren't as physically capable as in your peak, but you're still a top 10 offensive player. And I may be a stodgy defensive coach from way down south --

KB: Wait, Coach, didn't you grow up in Germany?

MB: ... -- but that still means something where I'm from. Offense matters. You matter. We all know that.

KB: ... okay. Uh. Well, this conversation is going pretty well, I think. It's clear that we respect one another's abilities and the winning mentality each of us brings to the table.

MB (brings two swords from behind back): Good. I think we're ready to hash things out, then.

KB: Wait what do you --

MB: Maybe "hashing" means something different where you're from, Kobe. Go on, select your sword.

KB: I'm... absolutely not! What the hell?

MB: Select your sword, motherfucker. This first one is big as shit, could kill a deer from 10 meters. A 33 foot sword!

KB: I thought you meant that we'd talk about our --

MB: Motherfucker, let me finish. This second one is tiny as fuck, but it's heavy and sharp as all get out. Could slice a goddamn human like a potato. Hell, could slice a boulder like a potato.

KB: I don't want to wield a sword. Coach, I don't wa... --

MB: Yes, this tiny sword could cut a boulder of diamond like a fucking baked potato. So which you want?

KB: Coach, just... just stop for a second! Let me ask you something.

MB: Alright, Kobe, what can I do for you?

KB: I don't want a sword. If one of us gets killed or cut up by one of these swords, that would be terrible. Our season would be ruined, almost immediately. What the hell is wrong with you?

MB: That's true, but these swords are safe if you've ever handled one. I can show you how.

KB: No, dumbass, I mean, it's not handling the swords that matters, it's getting hit by the sword in a duel that matters. It's inherently unsafe. I'm not made of diamonds and invincible super-fluid, even if most of my fans think so.

MB: Haha, you thought we were going to fight? That having a sword fight with my most talented, beloved player would be my first official act as coach? Hah. Hahaha. Kobe, I've always thought you were intelligent.

KB: Then why did you have me select a sword? Goddamn, man! Tell me this, then, what were you planning on cutting, coach?

MB: Potatoes.

Mike Brown pushes a button. The other half of the gym is instantly filled with gigantic potatoes.

KB: What the... what the hell?

MB: Oh, sorry, Kobe. Where I went to high school the best way to get to know someone was to cut a gym full of potatoes. It's a custom that's followed me ever since, and with good reason: Teaches you everything you need to know about a person. LeBron gave up after five minutes.

KB: That's stupid.

MB: Let me just repeat that: LeBron gave up after five minutes. On the other hand, I still invite Delonte over to cut potatoes sometimes. Shit works.

KB: Okay, haha, that's awful. Five minutes?

MB: To be fair, he chose the heaviest sword.

KB: I've never heard of this potato-cutting custom before, but I already love it.

• • •

2 hours later.

KB: Well, coach, I had my doubts, but that was a great experience. I learned a lot about you, including this strange potato custom, but I hope you learned a lot about me. We really "hashed" it out, and I'll never be able to think of potatoes without thinking of you, coach.

MB: Yeah, I'm just surprised Phil Jackson never did this with you. It's a pretty long-standing tradition between players and NBA coaches.

KB: Really? I've never heard about it before today.

MB: Well, it's a bonding experience. There's nothing more to say.

KB: Oh, gosh, look at the time. I have to go. Thanks, though.

MB: No, Kobe, thank you.

• • •

5 minutes later.

MB (on the phone): I got that shipment for you, Tony.

Tony: Haha, already, Mike? But that only took you 2 hours! What, did you hire some migrant laborers or something? That's amazing.

MB: Yeah, I think he was from Italy. An Italian immigrant, yeah. Built like a steam drill, Tony.

Tony: Well, I'll be right down from the dock to pick it up. Thanks again, Brownie.

MB: Hey, anytime, Tony. You'll give me a check, then?

Tony: Cash only. That's how we roll at the dock.

MB: Cool.

• • •

That night.

KB (crying, on phone): You know, Phil, I don't know why you hate me, but we're going to hash it out tomorrow if you care at all about our friendship.

Phil Jackson: Okay, Kobe... I'm not sure what you're talking about, though.

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"The Italians have a phrase, inventa la partita. Translated, it means to “invent the game.” A phrase often used by soccer coaches and journalists, it is now, more often than not, used as a lament. For in watching modern players with polished but plastic skills, they wonder at the passing of soccer genius—Pele, di Stefano, Puskas—players whose minds and bodies in not so rare moments created something unfound in coaching manuals, a new and continuously changing game for others to aspire to."

--Ken Dryden, "The Game"

A couple weeks ago, Aaron wrote this must-read piece about tenacious Spurs rookie Kawhi Leonard that got a lot of traction. The money quote is probably this take on Duncan:

"Never mind that Duncan on defense has always been one of the most beautiful things the league has to offer. The defensive structure of the Spurs as a whole, really, but Duncan especially: Tim’s defense has always inhabited a brave world oscillating between the bounds of reactive and impressionistic fluidity on one end to a prescriptive and predictive rigidity on the other. Duncan’s defense has always been equal parts shutting down what the offense gives him and preventing the offense from giving him anything he can’t handle in the first place, through reputation and savvy alone."

This quote hints at what makes a player great or interesting, as opposed to merely good or simply lacking. When we're making projections and figuring out which team will hold the trophy in June, we sometimes talk about where in the rotation the D-league players come up. We also like to talk about the black holes on offense, the players that make terrible rotations on defense, the players that can't buy a rebound, and so on. And this makes sense: Often when a team gets eliminated you can point to a single thing that went wrong, a single matchup or difference in depth at a position that got exploited over and over. But this is only half the story.

Basketball is not just a game of mistakes, of - you might say - mere violations in the fabric of a designated right way. We all know about players that defend a star perfectly and have to live with a mismatch or an offensive clinic. It's that Dirk triple-move on poor Nick Collison and more generally it's Dirk's greatness in creating space. It's Chris Paul slowing the game to a halt or bringing it to its true, blistering speed. Skills and creativity determine far more than mistakes and holes at the highest level of play. There's a affirmative, creative, impressionistic, reactive part of basketball that brooks no law and finds no need of patterns, and it's where the soul of a great basketball player is found. It's the oscillation between the reactive/impressionistic and prescriptive/prepared - and the total, competitively-motivated embrace of both tendencies - that seems to me the essence of a baller and the poverty of a scrub.

• • •

What do I mean? Well, take Manu Ginobili. Or Kobe. Or Wade. They are all students of the game, all with relatively great vision. All of them are fundamentally solid and laden with substance and knowledge in every facet of the game. They know when to set screens, they all can play in the marginal inches of space enough that tiny rules changes actually mean something big to them, and (most tellingly) they all troll for free throws and any cheap, marginal advantages they can get without being dirty. They all seem to love contact, and besides a nasty tendency towards the heat-check three, each of them is about as efficient on offense as you could imagine shooting guards of their respective builds to be. Opponents regard the trio well, or, at the very least, begrudgingly regard them as great competitors. They are about as solid and as substantive as possible for players whose job is to hurl a ball 30 feet at a rim with roughly 38% accuracy. They all understand the game and have - through practice and dedication - simply plugged all the holes. They don't often make mental mistakes because the rulebook and the playbook are burnt into their brains.

And yet, if that was all these players did, well, they wouldn't be so familiar to us. It's not just that their minds and actions are one dull stream of hit-your-free-throws-and-pass-to-get-a-better-shot-and-set-a-screen-to-get-open straight out of Hoosiers. No, they live in the moment and see the floor in its totality and use their intelligence, the perceived "flow" of the game and how they can change it, the observed behavior of their opponents, and their creativity: all of it they use to react to the situation at hand and create plays and strategies that no one has ever seen before, and possibly that no one ever will see again. They put their individual (and in the case of great tandems, their collective) stamps on the game and in doing so embody both the letter and the spirit of the game. That's what it means to be a baller. If you could take out the outcome, the possibility of injury, and all the exogenous factors, these guys would still be appointment viewing in a 5v5 scrimmage, because they can still make goals for themselves and plans for the team and then execute them with frightening intelligence, efficiency, tenacity, and creativity.

A scrub, on the other hand, lacks some great deal of either the improvisational or the prescriptive. There are a lot of endogenous and exogenous reasons for a player to be a scrub: Maybe it's because they're cynically jacking up threes for the stats and a big payday. Maybe they lack the fundamentals or a strong grasp of the flow of the game. Maybe their style (especially in the short term) clashes with that of their teammates or the officiating crew. Maybe they just don't live too much in the moment and have drilled a lot of shots in practice and in college without thinking about say, the inefficiency of a contested 20-footer. There are a lot of solid reasons, yes, but in the end tally (almost without exception) all the discerning viewer will note is a note of disgust or boredom, perhaps with a side of vexed confusion. Examples: "Why did you screen that random player on the weakside after passing to the wing, Mike Bibby? What possible purpose could that serve?" or "Why did you jack up that three, Antawn Jamison? Don't you realize there are much better shots your All-Star-level point could have helped you with?" or "Why are you in the game, Roger Mason Jr.? Is this the end of days?"

When I was bouncing previous drafts of the post off Aaron, he brought up the "teaching example" of Kevin Martin, who qualifies as a scrub despite being a legitimately above-average player. Every single one of his games he pulls out the same three tricks on offense built on a good mid/long-range shot with a high release point and an ability to get to the line. There's hardly any creative force behind it, and any narrative you try to project into his will as a competitor is probably false. He knows what to do with a pass and an open shot, and he can get open. Is Martin a bad player? Of course not, but he's not the force behind the points he gets. His highlight films are random sequences of mostly-assisted jump shots and lateral fades along with apologetic dunks. As Aaron puts it, "When Kevin Martin scores 10 points in the 4th quarter, he scores them. When Manu scores points in the 4th quarter, he causes them. They each are great shooters and may be equally assisted. But the way they score, the way they improvise, the way they read defenses? Drastically different. When Manu scores, you remember it. When Kevin Martin scores, the recap notes it." Extrapolating, I'll add that Kevin Martin is like shopping at K-Mart to buy one item, while watching Manu is like an eclectic imports store that has the same item. You'll remember to mention the imports store when you tell your friends where you got it.

P.S. In video-game circles, there's a pretty famous "Playing to Win" article which also designates "scrubs" by their approach. I mention it only because it's a similar, but mostly orthogonal take. The nearest analogous concepts in basketball would be Hack-a-Shaq, flopping, and other strategies on the margins of the rules or that conflict with the social conventions of basketball, and the "scrubs" there would be players with objections to these strategies. It's an interesting article, at least.

• • •

Okay, I think I've explored this dichotomy of ballers and scrubs enough, and I'd like to set the stage for a conclusion that actually uses the title. After all, I can hear your questions: "What's with that title? Do you think you're FreeDarko or something? Who the hell do you think you are? Are you just trying to drive traffic by using a popular athlete in your title? Come off it: it's not clever. Die or retire." Whoa, ouch. That's very painful, Internal Voice of Doubt. Let me explain the title: Steve Nash has led dozens of inexplicably awesome random regular season games in the last decade, more than any other player. And Nash is unquestionably a baller. Sure, his defense is hilarious sometimes, but on offense, and in terms of the general flow of a game, Nash is the consummate intelligent, fierce, grinding competitor, making scrubs legit, making already legit players into ballers, and taking ballers into another sphere entirely. When you have enough ballers like Nash, Ginobili, Kobe, Duncan, KG, CP3, and so on in a game, and their talents are allowed to flourish, and the talents involved on both sides are close enough in skill level, then you have the potential for a game to reach the highest emotional, logical, and spiritual heights that basketball has to offer.

John Nash's famous "Nash Equilibrium" is a concept from mathematical game theory. John Nash's games (and forgive the glossing-over) often involve developing strategies in the presence of perfect knowledge; that is, "knowing that your opponent knows that you know that he knows..." out to infinity, reaching an stable equilibrium in a surprising number of cases. Basketball (unlike John Nash's often simple, stark games) isn't a sport of perfect knowledge, but a sport where a discerning player's mind can create a gigantic space of possibilities at any moment that his willful body can navigate efficiently. When a game has 10 such discerning players, each pulling and tugging and pushing at the fulcrum points of a game with screens, cuts, switches, and flares, the game moves asymptotically towards a sort of equilibrium that is absurd and singular and revelatory and transcendent. That's the Steve Nash Equilibrium to me. And given all the incredible games he's given us (and given the sad possibility he might retire without an NBA title), I thought it'd be only fair to give Steve Nash the title of this concept. Call it a consolation prize if you must, but at worst it's a special, important consolation prize that captures what is great about Nash.

Of course, despite all this talk of transcendence, perfection, and stability, the element of chance is still present, even when you have 10 ballers at their peak abilities. There are always going to be factors the players can't control, like imperfect calculations and straight-up missing information in every player's literal blind spots (not to mention physical limitations), and chance is the natural outcome of such imperfect knowledge and control. And even the best game can hinge on the inches of chance. But the forces of chance present in the best games are not quite the same as the forces of chance present in those awful games filled with two teams full of scrubs jacking up threes. The mathematical probabilities might be identical, but the whole tenor and aspect and casual chains are different. Almost by definition, these scrubs rob these forces of chance of its connection to human intelligence and animal spirit, making chance into nothing but inelegant, dismal, impersonal luck, no different from a crap shoot or a hand of blackjack. By contrast, the type of chance that dominates a game of 10 ballers - in its look and its reach to the heights - aspires to the will of the gods.

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“Lord, thank you,” [12th-man Bell, the only senior on the team,] said, “Thank you for letting us be a part of this game and this season. Thank you for letting me be part of this team and for the people in this room. I know they’ll come back and win this tournament next year and no one will cheer harder for them than me. Thank you for making them part of my life.”

--Forever's Team, John Feinstein, after Duke lost to Kentucky in the 1978 NCAA championship game

But ask us after a game. After we’ve played the Bruins or the__Islanders; after a playoff game. If you don’t understand the excited__tumble of words, look at our gray-white faces, at eyes that glitter and__pop at you. Look at our sweaty smiles, at hands that won’t shut up. An__hour later, a day’s tension sucked away, look at our bodies. All gangly__and weak, so weak we laugh it feels so good. Look at our faces, at__smiles distant and content.

[...] Coaches like Vince Lombardi and George Allen have told us we must play for certain reasons. As children, our parents and coaches told us something else. But after the Bruins series, Chartraw came much closer, "I don't play for money," he laughed, "I play for the party after."

--The Game, Ken Dryden

So the other day, Aaron linked me to Craig Lyndall's fantastic article about chasing rings. I think a lot of it rang true and if you're into the experience of being a fan (quite a general category), it's a must-read. The piece is earnest, filled with credible self-doubt (who doesn't like Big Z?), and attacks a foundation of NBA culture, namely that the ring is king.

Lyndall successfully deconstructs the notion that a ring is meaningful in an absolute sense and in and of itself, which is a common premise used to justify ring chasing by players ranging from players with such diverse backgrounds as Wilt, Barkley, Chris Paul, and Zydrunas Ilgauskas. Essentially, Lyndall argues that a given ring is only meaningful in the context of the complex circumstances which produced it: The ownership, the fanbase, the locker room, the coaches, the games, and finally, the players themselves as individuals. This is a very clever and important point: A ring (especially for an older vet like Ilguaskas) only matters to the extent that that player is able to make meaningful relationships with the others (most importantly to Lyndall, the fans) involved in the title.

And Big Z, Lyndall argues, would have gotten something transient and ultimately meaningless in his ring if the Heat had beaten the Mavs this June. Without the total emotional involvement of the Cleveland fans that had stood by him for so many years in recovery, without a fanbase that had come to respect him as a great player cut down by injuries, and a class act and a franchise cornerstone at that, a title for Big Z would be a relatively hollow achievement. There was a deep and mutual respect between Ilgauskas and the city of Cleveland which would have made a ring with the Cavaliers as sweet as any title could ever be, at 5 mpg or 35.

On the other hand, the Heat fans, not having much of anything to do with Ilgauskas beforehand, would instead (by and large) see him only as a limiting factor at C that rode in on LeBron's coattails. They would see only the clumsy veteran that couldn't get it done anymore, and possibly never had gotten it done. Juwan Howard was and is in much the same boat. (Both these players, it should be noted, have apparently had a real and positive impact on team morale which has been widely reported. Still.) To all but the most careful of Heat fans, the emotional connection between Ilgauskas and the fans simply wouldn't have existed. That doesn't sound like a very special thing.

One reason I like Lyndall's approach is that it forces us to confront bare statements about certain players being better than others because they have more rings. The question then becomes: What rings? To what extent were they involved in producing them? Did their ring represent a culmination of their career and fan narratives, or was it just a vet-min, 15 mpg swan song in a different city? Bill Simmons' Alpha Dog-Everyone Else approach is problematic, but really, it's one step away from a much better question: Was this player directly responsible for their ring?

But look at the actual wording of a few crucial paragraphs of Lyndall's piece and see if the wording doesn't clash with your own experience (bold mine):

"Championships are complex things. It is a complex achievement in team sports because it relies on so many relationships. It encompasses relationships between players, teams, coaches, owners and most importantly fans. I hate to put fans first as some sort of cheap ploy to get everyone on my side, but it is true. Holding up a trophy is meaningless without a bunch of crazies in the seats screaming their heads off. You can’t get showered with praise in a parade if there aren’t a million fans lined up along the route. We can’t win the championships as fans, but we also shouldn’t sell ourselves short as a part of the equation. NBA players, almost as a rule in this day and age, sure are selling us short."

"Let’s pretend that the Miami Heat defeated the Dallas Mavericks last year. Zydrunas would have gotten a ring. He would have attended a parade. He would have held up a trophy. Then what? Professional athletes rely on their history and legacy and their relationships with fans usually far outlast their time playing the sport. Zydrunas Ilgauskas was never going to set up shop as a fixture in Miami. Some Cavs fans might have felt good for Zydrunas, I guess, but there’s no longevity to it. In the end it is a really fleeting feeling."

My problem with this is not that the stuff about fans is categorically false: All of the above holds true very often, but holds true in a highly contextual way. Sure the fan-athlete relationship outweighs the time spent playing the sport. But what about long-lasting athlete-athlete relationships? What about the brilliant coaches in college sports that have (in their own ways) changed the way we look at team basketball? It's telling that the neatest context for Lyndall's above statements comes from Cleveland sports. It's not a "cheap ploy" to invoke the fans; it's the very context from which Lyndall is writing: A Cleveland title would be inseparable from the long train of "almosts" and archetypal Four Horsemen that have conspired to push Cleveland to the edge of titletown, only to pull it away at the last second through fluke, opponent miracle, or dark, cynical work. The city hasn't won a title in something like 50 years, and yet they have followed their teams with tenacity and dedication. The team that finally wins a title will be heroic, enshrined inseparably from the fabric of the city. It will truly be one of the city's titles, not just that team's.

But in so many other cases (including the two accounts I started this piece with), the fans seem to be tertiary to a) the satisfaction of the players and coaches' intrinsic competitiveness and b) the relationships the team has among themselves as a collective. Bill Russell and Boston had a tenuous allegiance that easily veered into outright hostility at times (which had a lot to do with racism in that era). Russell and the city have patched up a great deal of their differences (albeit very slowly), and surely that must matter to Russell. But, if anything, doesn't Russell's jaw-dropping, undeniable success mean more in the context of the adverse hostility he faced? And, given that Boston wasn't behind Russell 100%, isn't it fair for Russell to look instead to the beautiful collective basketball he and coach Red Auerbach envisioned and implemented, to look instead to the relationships he made with his team and coach as far more than a consolation prize? What about Russell's legendary respect for the other greats of his era? Where does that fit into a fans-first narrative? Sure, the screaming fans may have added something to his enjoyment, and their gradual reconciliation with Russell must mean something big, but in the meantime doesn't Russell have a lot of history, legacy, and - in the end - a lot of intrinsic and extrinsic joy behind his rings to look back on? Wasn't he throwing up every night because winning mattered to him more than anything? Couldn't you say exactly the same thing for Jordan? What about Mo Malone, Julius Erving and the 1983 Sixers? Wasn't that mostly about a group of players (Malone included) that had made it right to the edge of the mountain so many times but couldn't quite clear the top? Of course the rabid fanbase matters. Of course the title is very special for the City of Brotherly Love. And of course I'm playing The Sound of Philly by MFSB right now (people all over the world!). But that title had its own narratives, its own relationships, and its own sense of special history, even without reference to the great fan base.

My point is not that fans don't matter, but that in nearly every single primary account I've ever read from athletes and coaches (no exceptions really come to mind for me), it's the internal obsession of the athletes and "the party after" the win that matter most, and the fans form a much smaller (though important) part of the equation. The fans pay the salaries, yes, the fans help us make sense of the greatness of an athlete, and, in the Cleveland perspective from which Lyndall is writing, the fans are an inseparable part of a team's success. But in general it's not the first well of feeling or justification for an athlete or a coach to drink from.

This season, Big Z could've won a title with one of his longtime friends and teammates who would get much of the credit, but who would gushingly praise Ilguaskas and his work ethic, character, and accomplishments. Despite playing for a completely indifferent fan base, Big Z could have provided a real and important consolation prize to the city that dislikes his new team but still loves him dearly, and he could have had a small vindication for his career by being a small basketball and a large spiritual presence on a team that would have been objectively the best for that moment in time.

The fans from the city that made him a man surely must matter. But regardless of this, or of how you feel about the Heat (or the Mavs), if the Heat had won, that locker room thousands of miles away still would have been special and the fond feelings for and from a gentle giant would have stayed with him for a lifetime. That vindication - that feeling of ultimate success - truly matters, and not just as a transient afterthought.

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"Review forthcoming. Not a joke."
__ -- Me, December 4, to I Go Hard Now.

Well, I wasn't joking, but I may as well have been! Starting today, I'll be giving points out for effort here at Juwan a Blog? (but only for me), and, in this new paradigm, I'm going to go ahead and award myself an "A" for this entry, despite having just 40 or so words so far. See, these 40 words were preceded by at minimum 10000 others, in dozens of edits. My eight-day quest to write this is nothing short of heroic: Since starting this review, I've read about 50 basketball drills, probably 200 other blog entries, the entirety of "A Season on the Brink," and about a quarter of that one hockey memoir. I also found time to save a lot of people from various fires. All of this in an attempt to understand this one neat NBA blog centered around the Cavs. (To that end, I read their last 5 months of content as well.) But all my heroism counts for practically nothing without results: Most of the people I saved died from smoke inhalation, and after 8 days I still only have about 200 words and an endless graveyard of GG drafts within and without this review.

Long story short, it's a tough world we're living in. A tough world... rather like the Cavaliers are living in right now!* And I Go Hard Now is a blog about this tough NBA world. Named after Christian Eyenga's terse summary of everything, I Go Hard Now is a slightly longer summary of slightly fewer things. Fewer things like...the NBA! The Cavs! The experience of sports fandom, especially towards a troubled small-market team like the Cavs! MSPaint drawings of Micky Arison doin' stuff with a steak! Really sad, important stuff!

* Transition brought to you by impromptu speeches from Alex, age 8.

• • •

So, that's a summary of IGHN. But is it any good?

Well, you'll have to work that one out for yourself. I can't tell you what to like. There's no accounting for taste. On my part, I liked most of what I read of IGHN, and I read quite a lot of it. It's usually pretty funny and well-written. There's little in the way of pretense, and while they have newsposts they don't seem to have much filler. During the lockout they had kind of a crunch for content, and they did suffer, but it's an NBA blog and you can't get blood from a stone, so this is kind of a quibble. Overall the blog is quite good in ways that I'm not always primed to appreciate in an Internet community that simultaneously moves very quickly and - apart from that - seems to take moving very quickly as a central goal and virtue. Personally, I can't keep up with any of that shit. I haven't moved any of my furniture in weeks. I haven't found a new band I really like in a long time, and I just heard dubstep for the first time last week (and downtempo is where it's really at). What I listen to is as likely to be from any year between '28 and '08. I've never mixed energy drink with a tasty alcohol. I barely leave my apartment. I'm not a man about town, so to speak. I'm just a fan that thinks a lot about the NBA and writes a lot about what I see and what I think about it. And in that sense, IGHN is right there with me. They do the fan experience well. I don't have to be an NBA blogger or junkie or focusing on what to write about next when I'm reading them. It is what it is.

Part of what I like about IGHN is just that they write with a voice that isn't generally "writerly", if you get me, and one that I can relate to in my own writing. It might sound like a backhanded compliment to say that, but for contrast I look at someone like Aaron or (even better) Kelly Dwyer and I realize that they write in a uniform, highly professional voice which is ready-made for expressing authoritative, highly well-thought-out opinions about...almost anything. I am convinced that when Aaron was three days old he already had a complex, well-formulated opinion about the fall of Communism and scribbled it out in 800-word position papers on spare menus in his parents' house. When he edits something I write, I can spot the edits immediately by the kinds of words and transitions he uses. It's in the dictionary for "distinctive" as far as I'm concerned.

Me? Shit, I'm still not convinced I have the qualifications to review this other blog. To my detriment, I don't fix on a writerly voice. I don't know if it's that I can't, or if I simply haven't read enough, or if my mind is just too cluttered or what. Usually I have to read a lot in the short-term before I can write anything worth reading, shamelessly and unconsciously appropriating my targets' style like some sort of Markovian Joe Posnanski Machine. My style is so improvisational, so new to me at any given time, that I feel that on any given sitting I could be the one to write the next "Frank Sinatra Has A Cold" or find myself unable to describe an introduction to a blog entry about another blog. If I don't have the right amount of coffee, or time, or space uncluttered, my ceiling is mere banal competence. It's a sickness, I say, but just stick around here and I'll show you the ceiling, God willing. And then I'll talk some more about Richard Jefferson.

I think the difference - at its core - is that Aaron usually has things figured out before he writes or converses about them, and I'm constantly reacting to these things as if they were new and otherwise catching up. Aaron has more archetypes, domain knowledge, and contacts, and tailors his style and content to convey (asymptotically well) what he already knows and is trying to say. Thinking about unfamiliar players, he has a few workaday processes and memories to draw from to make them familiar and then he starts to draw on that familiarity to write something. On the other hand, thinking about unfamiliar things, I'm always like a kid thrust on stage at a jazz concert: I hear all these instruments bleating the truth loud and obviously to a well-listened ear, but I don't know the standards or the conventions or even the basic musical forms. But I have to say something, because I have no patience. And so I start out trying to sing my one little melody when the other instruments get quiet, and I end up either reinventing downtempo or pouring that acid from Breaking Bad into the piano in sheer frustration.

As a teaching example, both Aaron and I watched Eric Gordon last summer at FIBA, and both of us (thanks to League Pass Gravity's resident Black Hole, Blake Griffin) have seen him play a number of times. But Aaron was a little more tuned in, had a little more thought from FIBA to tune into this guy, had a little more of a takeaway from Gordon's defense. So now Aaron has a sophisticated opinion on Gordon and I'm just trying to keep up. This dichotomy is a bit stark, a bit unfair, even: A lot of the difference is probably just a gap in experience with subject matter. Hell, two of Aaron's best pieces on here (two of the best pieces on the Internet for my money) were improvisational and impressionistic, and weren't the same going in as they were starting out. Every tweak to the structure or content he made was out of the spirit of figuring out what it is he had to say. But there's something to this dichotomy. Just about everything I write has a highly open-ended (and cluttered) feel of process, of becoming, even when I know what I want to say about the topic. Book reviews, reflections on games, fiction: These things don't have any inherent structure going in, and I have to create structure and content at the same time that I'm reacting to the structure and content before me. What schema, what basic conclusion, what central conclusion could I have started with that would have produced this very piece?

The only possible answer is that I've thought about IGHN a lot, and I wanted to say something about them, and thought whatever it is had something to do with me. Everything follows from that. The endless drafts, the obsession with getting a good intro/context, the dozens of related dichotomies I thought up just to solve the problem of this piece. I wanted to say something, plain and simple, and looked for everything in my arsenal of experiences and prior reading to figure out how to place it. And almost everything about IGHN follows from that same impulse, that same line of thinking. They have something to say, but most of all, they've thought about the Cavs and the NBA a lot and their own place as fans, and they're trying to put it all together by starting conversations or putting arguments into words about their subjects, and at the end, hopefully, they have something worth sharing. Writing is the means for their understanding, not a bureaucratic afterthought of understanding. They don't know the answer going in, but they did know something needed to be said.

"When you get the blues in the night
Take my word, the mockingbird'll sing the saddest kind o' song
He knows things are wrong, and he's right"

Ella Fitzgerald's version of "Blues in the Night"

They see something Bill Simmons wrote and they know there's something wrong about it, something fundamentally and systematically rotten or short-sighted that is far more condescending and patronizing to their own status as fans than an ordinary reader could possibly have gleaned. And so they break it down, examine the underlying assumptions and find the rotten core. And then they tell us how they got there. They love to watch the way certain players play and they feel they have to say something about that, in and apart from context. They feel something is wrong with the occasional sentiment from and towards Cleveland, and they have to put the conversation into their own words for our perusal. And they're right on target pretty often with perspectives that few were in a position to see. My favorite time period from IGHN of what I read was when LeBron was in the Finals. IGHN produced a lot of introspective (though worldly) thought on Cleveland and their own fandom and really got at the meat of what was really happening with the "haters" that LeBron went so far as to address as his main takeaway quote from 2011. And in doing so IGHN really hit on something that I hadn't really realized.

To wit, the ESPN commentariat (as Aaron puts it) doesn't just do an injustice to post-July-2010 Cleveland by reducing them to haters doing little more reacting to economic decline, being spurned by LeBron, etc. It does an injustice to all of us by looking at the problem through traditional sports narrative as if the city were a "guy who is bitter about getting dumped that just needs to get over it". Maybe for the case of Dan Gilbert (who is actually a self-interested crazy person and everyone knows it), but in general? No. That's a narrative that implies that there will be new heroes, a new positive vibe, a new hope in the future. And that misses the whole point. The questions - the real questions - about sports fandom still remain for us to deal with.

My feeling (gleaned from Cavs fans mostly, and very little from the non-stop coverage on ESPN) is that LeBron tore at the fabric of sports fandom in the first place, and Cleveland was just in the meltdown radius (and "The Decision" was just a startling demystification that showed to the whole country what exactly he was doing). If you liked LeBron and any coherent thing he claimed to stand for, you didn't (just) have your heart broken, you questioned whether even your most generously basic and contextual respect for LeBron was ever real, and you suddenly doubted whether LeBron had reciprocated or understood any of that respect in the first place. And then you worried that LeBron was probably not a singular exception in the annals of sports, but rather an accidental look (like the MJ HOF induction) behind the ugly, heavy curtain of personal branding. Finally, you gained a sort of sociopathic distance from athletes, always in the back of your mind wondering if they weren't just cynically playing you for respect or Q rating. Cleveland was just a little closer, and feels the distance and the frustration a little more strongly. The media doesn't get that there's no getting over LeBron, there's no turning back the clock, and there's no active bitterness: There's just a fog of coldness, blunt feeling, and vague, inexpressible disgust that runs all through sports.*

*For my part, I know that Game 2 against the Magic really rekindled my love of the NBA and really got me highly invested in the Cavs in LeBron's final year. I watched as people that loved the Cavaliers felt hopeful apprehension as one of the best teams in basketball made grand statement after grand statement as the old standards seemed to be failing. And it just never happened, and the way it went down was not just crushing but disheartening. You have to think even the Celtics, on their way to the Finals, must've felt a little bit dirty those last 52 seconds. It was just surreal, the kind of game that makes you wonder if you're watching something in real time.

I don't know how true or justifiable any of that is, but I do know this: Reducing (as most of sports media seems to do) all of it to "haterade" (always the blind, unexplainable kind, almost as if they never tried to explain it) and confining it to a city that needs to "get over it" only serve to make rebuilding sports as a credible myth-maker and source of admiration more difficult. Having five-minute conversations with people who are actually living through these feelings or that actually have a history with the Cavs is infinitely better than listening to 100 hours of talking heads.

I Go Hard Now is a collection of those conversations, and it does it well. Go give them a try.

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Aaron's fascinating look into the inherently deleterious effect of the compressed season on injuries (focused on effects wrought solely because more games fit into the same recuperation period) got me thinking. As stat posts are wont to do. What if it weren't the number of games that were compressed, but the games themselves? We've all heard the tired LeBron jokes. I tried to make change with LeBron, but he didn't have a fourth quarter. Well...what if nobody had a fourth quarter? How would we make change then?! What if that was the price of the lockout? What if Commissioner Stern, in a jaw-droppingly flamboyant abuse of power, declared that the cost of a lockout would be felt every night, for 12 missing minutes?

... well, I had some spare time and wanted to try my hand at these public Google Doc spreadsheet posts that Aaron has been using, guess we're going to find out. Follow me hither to the magical world of endless, tedious data entry, where Aaron and I frolic among the sparse statistical flowers of wisdom to be found there. This is kind of a curiosity, but there were a few interesting surprises.

• • •

Part I: the Data and the Damage Done

For this part, turn to Sheet "Game Data" in the spreadsheet.

Let me walk you through this sheet: As you will quickly notice, the results of each game in every 2011 playoff series (15 series, 81 games in all) are listed; Eastern Conference first, Western Conference second, Finals last. My source for this was the decent 2011 NBA Playoffs Wikipedia page. For each playoff game there are two rows: one row for each team, containing their performance in each of the four quarters and OTs if necessary. These seven columns (and then the "F" column denoting final score to the right) are straightforward. After that, NQ1, NQ2, NQ3, and NQ4 give the final score of each of the games if (respectively) one of the quarters had been unceremoniously lopped off the game (the latter naturally, by $tern, thereby protecting his most marketable player LeBron from his characteristic fourth-quarter meltdowns). The next four columns summarize which team (if any; there were 5 ties) won the game when the quarter in question got lopped off. For example, the first series listed is Bulls-Pacers. If you lop off the first quarter of Game 1 (which the Bulls actually won 104-99), the new final score is 81-72 Bulls.

Part II: Series Swing, via Django Reinhardt

For this part, turn to Sheet "Series Summary" in the spreadsheet.

"If only Stern had gotten rid of the fourth quarter like I've been saying for months, we might've beaten the Mavericks!"
--Heat, Thunder, Lakers, Celtics, Pacers, Bulls fans

This page concisely summarizes some of the data from the "Game Data" page. Here you see the 15 series from this year's playoffs, with 5 groups of columns: First the actual result (so, say, for Bulls-Pacers, the actual result was 4-1 Bulls). Then the four alternate results of the series if you remove one of the quarters from every game. If you remove the first quarter of each of the games in CHI-IND, the series is a less dramatic 3-1-1. It was a hilariously close series (not so much if you're a Bulls fan), wasn't it?

Anyway, a big takeaway is that a lot of series swung on individual quarters (full list below). If you take out the fourth quarters, the 4-1 Bulls-Pacers Series becomes 2-2-1. (You can see this in the Game Data page, but it's clearer and more concise on the "Series Summary" page). This 2-game swing was actually quite common for series: In fact, in 13 of 15 series, removing at least one of the quarters either swung or tied the series. Even the two sweeps (Celts-Knicks, Mavs-Lakers) had a quarter (3rd, 4th respectively) that, if removed from every game in the series, tied up the series at 2-2. Of course, the Thunder-Grizz series was 4-3 Thunder (as the series ended up) except for with the 2nd quarter removed, in which it's 4-3 Grizz. That sounds about right.

Strangely, the only two series that didn't hinge on any of the quarters were Bulls-Hawks and Lakers-Hornets. More on the Hornets series later (because it's a hilarious exception to everything here, as you'll see).

Here are the quarters without which various series swung victors or were tied up:

Eastern Series Swings:

• Bulls 2, Pacers 2, 1 Tie, Q4
• Heat 2, Sixers 2, 1 Tie, Q2
• Celtics 2, Knicks 2, Q3
• Magic 4, Hawks 2, Q1 (Magic take a decisive victory!)
• Heat 2, Celtics 3, Q4 (And the Celtics likely advance without the Heat's fourth quarters)
• Bulls 3, Heat 2, Q4 (And the Bulls likely advance without the Heat's fourth quarters)

Part III: the Most Exciting and Least Exciting Teams

For this part, turn to Sheet "Results by Team" in the spreadsheet.

If any of this seems "unmotivated" or "slipshod" to you, you're probably right. This is mostly a curiosity. I wanted to use the larger sample size of a regular season, but I couldn't find a database with readily available quarter data for each game. A spidering script would probably be necessary, and although Aaron is actually really good at writing those, he's busy right now and I don't have quite the experience he has. Even with the larger sample, the results simply wouldn't be very meaningful in all likelihood, at least not without lineup data and some (READ: any) degree of statistical sophistication.

That said, there's still an mathematical interpretation that motivates all of this: The number of quarters on which a game hinges approximates the probability that you're watching the decisive quarter at any given point in time in that game. If there's a game where removing the second or fourth quarters of a game can change the outcome, then if you pick a quarter at random to watch, you're 50-50 going to be watching a decisive quarter (and then at some point, very likely, a decisive run). This logic goes for series as well: Let's say you're watching the Spurs-Grizzlies series for one quarter, where 6.5 total quarters turned out to be decisive (that is, where removing the quarter changes the outcome of the game [I awarded .5 for ties]). That means if you're tuning in, there's about a 25% chance you're watching the quarter, the run, on which the whole game may swing. Granted, it might not be very exciting to watch a first quarter that the Grizzlies win by 8, even if the Spurs come back to lose by 2, but the point is, the quarter mattered directly to the outcome (and hence the narrative) of the game and of the series, and you had a relatively high chance to see it.

It's kind of silly to call any close game inherently exciting, but March Madness is so iconic for a good reason: A highly contested outcome can make decent games into great games and great games into transcendent games. And it's hard for a game in which two quarters are separately decisive to the outcome not to be incredibly close. With this slipshod and specious logic in mind, let's consider the most "exciting" series of the playoffs by the total number of decisive quarters:

I'm not going to trumpet these numbers. I do think it's telling that whenever a series seemed more interesting than these numbers establish, it's usually because the fourth quarter accounted for most of these swings (see, Mavs-Heat). Also, if you listed your most exciting 5 series from 2011 as the 3 Thunder series, Spurs-Grizz, and Mavs-Blazers, you wouldn't be too far off. There's at least some sort of strong correlation between excitement and total quarter swings. But yeah, the numbers seem just a bit off. So I made an adjustment: I did a weighted average of the first through fourth quarters, where the fourth quarter swings count (arbitrarily) 6 times as much as the first quarter swings. I also weighted the 2nd quarter swings twice as much as the first and the third quarter swings three times as much. Below is the new result:

Okay, well, that doesn't change all that much in terms of rankings, but every Heat series goes up, every Thunder series goes up (!), and every Dallas series except the Blazers went up. That sounds about right. Also, the Hornets-Lakers series goes down even further? This makes sense: It was by far the series with the fewest quarters that outcomes hinged on. In fact, there was only one quarter in the whole series that was decisive to the outcome of a game, and that decisive quarter was Q2 of Game 4. The Hornets actually hung on to win by 5 while winning the quarter by 7. Using quarter swings (with or without adjustment) just isn't a perfect measure of excitement, as the Hornets series tells us -- that series was exciting as hell.*

*An exciting series not in the "close game" way; it was more of a "Chris Paul may be tiny but he's also the most technically skilled, tenacious, creative player in the entire league and there's an outside chance he shocks the world in this series" way.

Anyway. The bottom table on this page of the spreadsheet is just a retread of the stats in "Series Summary." On the top table, we look at actual W-L records by team, and their alternate records if all of one of their quarters had been lopped off each of their games (by $tern; I can't $tre$$ thi$ enough).

Here's a summary chart:

For me, there are a few incredibly strange details here: ATL had a rather inexplicable 3 game net in the first quarters, and Chicago had a pretty surprisingly negative haul considering they went to the ECF. But really, look at Miami's: It's the one with the red/green bars above the line and nothing else. Apparently - even with the infamous Finals chokes - they overall netted 2 games in the fourth quarter (i.e. they would've lost or tied 2 more games without the 4th). And then they netted 3.5 games in the second quarter and then nothing in the first and third quarters. I guess... asking LeBron for change is actually a very strange proposition. Maybe you get two of those Kennedy half-dollar pieces or something?

Whatever coins you'd get, it's not as strange as asking Dirk. I'm kicking myself for not making the color scheme above out so that the Mavs (that gigantic pillar a bit right of center) would have a German flag in the three colors. Whatever the colors, they show us a marvel: Out of 21 games and just 16 wins, the Mavericks netted 5 games on decisive fourth quarters. I mean, many of us saw him claw back to dominance in Games 4 and 5 of the OKC series and Games 2 and 4 of the Heat, not to mention a couple Lakers games. Still, it's pretty amazing that despite that B-Roy throwback in which Dallas choked harder in the fourth than possibly any other team this playoffs... in the end tally, they still netted +5 wins in the fourth quarter. And then they netted 2 each in the second and third quarter. I think it's fair to say that Dallas was almost certainly not benefiting from sheer random chance alone in these numbers. You have to wonder what Mark Cuban's staff and crew is up to, and this is another piece of weird evidence in their favor. Also, check out Denver. Somehow, in 5 total games they managed to lose in 5.5 decisive quarters and win in 1 more. Again, mathematically this is possible. But it's spooky. That was a freaky series.

Anyway, using my definition of "excitement" from above, I created an "Objective Excitement Index" for each team. The meaning? Well, for every 100 points on a team's OEI, there's (on average) an extra decisive quarter per game on which the margin of victory hinges. For a 100 OEI team, there's a good chance that a random quarter you're watching of them is decisive to the game; for a 50 OEI team, there's only going to be (even one) decisive quarter about half the time. The highest theoretical value is 300, for a team that always wins (or loses) one quarter out of four, but manages to lose (win) the game in the other three quarters, in such a way that all three of the losing (winning) quarters are decisive. This happens, for example, if a team loses a game by 1 by losing each of the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th quarters by 7 (net: -21), even though it wins the first quarter by 20. This has to happen in every game, win or lose, for a team to have an OEI of 300. The average OEI for teams in the playoffs was about 80. In the 2011 playoffs, Denver had an OEI of 130, averaging 1.3 decisive quarters per game. This is really spooky. Possibly stranger is the Thunder having a 120 OEI in 17 games. I also did a "Clutch" version weighted as above (1,2,3,6 for each quarter). But enough talk; let's look at the chart:

Conclusions

Not too many bombshell surprises here. But definitely some nice charts. Especially unsurprising is how many games seemed to hinge on the clutch quarters (22.5 games actually hinged on the fourth quarter compared with 14, 18, and 7 for the other three). I think that's a major reason the playoffs seemed so good this season. For the most part, you never felt like a game was going to be bad going in (at least ignoring the two Hawks series), and even if your favorite team got killed by a transition masterpiece in the third quarter of Game 4, you still knew the execution in the fourth quarter was going to get better, and that your team would still have a chance next game. The end of regulation for the Spurs against the Grizzlies in Game 5 is one of the great sequences of offensive execution in the history of basketball (sorry, bias creeping in there, but really, 4 different San Antonio baskets in 40 seconds, damn!), and despite being brilliant and enigmatic, that type of execution was characteristic of the West playoffs.

It would really be nice to get a larger sample size for a real analysis of these numbers that couldn't be explained away by sheer random chance (except for Dallas and Miami, really, who both produced incredible, qualitatively clutch performances on their respective paths to the Finals before the Mavs took the decisive upper hand in Games 2 and 4), but this is mostly a curiosity anyway. A fun one, but a curiosity all the same.

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Chauncey Billups: the Memoirs of a Cancer

A story of Chauncey Billups' amnesty demands, told (almost) firsthand.

Chauncey Billups in George Karl's office, trying to convince Karl to pick up his option.

Chauncey Billups: You know, George, I once turned the Nuggets inside out, just to see if I could. I'm bad news. I'm a bad dude. Don't take me on waivers unless you're willing to deal with hell on Earth.

George Karl: No, Chauncey, that was Carmelo. You were the guiding force that we fucked over to make our trade balance work. On the one hand, we'd love to have you back. We have a starter-quality point in Andre Miller and a promising young guard in Ty Lawson, but with Miller aging, and the compressed season, it could work out quite well, actually...

CB: You know what, wow, that makes perfect sense. In that case, I would--

GK: It's too bad we're not even interested in you.

CB: Wait, but --

GK: Chauncey, I have to ask you to leave. We're really short on players, and I've been really busy getting everyone ready.

CB: Wait, I could be one of those players! That would be great!

GK: Do you really want it?

CB: Yes, actually. I'm a veteran presence, and my leadership would be perfe --

GK: Tell me what you want Chauncey, and I'll do my best.

CB: I just want a vet min contract, a stable place to stay and raise my family, and no hassles caused by goddamn superstars that think they're above the goddamn system. That's all I want.

GK: Absolutely not. Get out of my office. Try the Clippers. I'm sure they'll never trade you.

CB: Damnit!

• • •

CB: Hello, Robert Sarver.

Robert Sarver: Hello, Chauncey.

CB: So I was wondering... maybe you could NOT pick me up, if you had any such intentions.

RS: I did not, in fact, have any such intentions.

CB: Oh. Well, why not?

RS: Tell me what you earned last year.

CB: Well, it was right around $15 million.

RS: And are you, say, a tragically undertalented player of a D-League caliber that I will overpay heavily while passing on legitimately solid free agents despite a stated commitment to frugality?

CB: No.

RS: Aww...

CB: I mean, I'm a little bit older, but I play just fine. On the other hand, it would be tragic to acquire me for that kind of money when you already have Steve Nash to start, who is still a franchise player, even though you have no intentions of trading him. You'd make no one happy, and spend the same amount of money as your rivals.

RS: Oh. That's a good point. I'll think about it.

CB: Wait, what?

• • •

CB: Daryl... Daryl Morey?

Daryl Morey: Welcome to D.A.R.Y.L., the automated GM supercomputer.

CB: Man, that's some weird humor you have going on there. Every time I meet with you it's always this weird, isn't it?

DM: Humor, of course. Improves riditory capacity by 14% while diminishing AT Fields by 15%. I am familiar.

CB: Right. What's an AT Field?

DM: The barrier between souls that no one should cross, once merely but a thought experiment from psychology, now manifest in all our models. Have I shown you our models?

CB: I'm good, thanks. so I've heard you guys are into advanced statistics, and I wanted to tell you not to acquire me. I'm bad news.

DM: Want is, but an illusion... of weaker minds. So desu ne~

CB: ... Anyway I, uh, take a lot of bullshit contested threes, and I thought you might want to hear it from me before you think about signing me on waivers. Watch FIBA from last year. It's all in the tape.

DM: "Before"? Ha. Did you really think I hadn't calculated your utility using multiple metrics? Did you think I didn't see the amnesty provision months, nay, years before it happened? Do you really expect me to think that these contested threes were anything more than an elaborate (albeit wily) ruse hatched against my very interest in you?

CB (crying): I'm...just not a very good player, man. I'm sorry. I know you've done all your analytics and made your conclusions, and I respect your intelligence. But I have such a gimpy knee, and I'm not as tough as I like to project. I'm really a soft guy at heart, and I'm sick of competing every night and getting traded around. Please, just don't pick me up.

DM: Alright, gosh. I mean, don't lie to me but yeah, I was just kidding. I wasn't really interested in you in the first place. Some players I can absolutely slay with that mecha-Morey routine, though. Too bad.

CB: Like who?

DM: Actually, it's just Shane Battier. And Ron Artest. They love that shit. Anyway, do you want to know where you'll end up?

CB: No, in some ways, I don't want to know. Your all-seeing, all-knowing gift is one that such as I-

DM: You're going to the Clippers, Chauncey. Haha. Ha. ... Hah.

CB: You're a weird guy, Daryl.

• • •

Donald Sterling (smoking a gigantic cigar): Frankly, Chauncey, I don't think you can be a cancer. Not really. Relatively speaking, of course. But I'd like to see you try.

CB: I... what the hell?

DS: Chauncey, Chauncey, Chauncey, what's your last name?

CB: Sir, it's...

DS: I know what your last name is, Chauncey. But look at how destructive that is. "Sir?" Look at how easily I did that. Look at that. Do you think you're ever going to compete with me? I'm the O.C. -- original cancer. You've got nothing on me.

CB: I don't want to compete with you. I just don't want to go to the Clippers.

DS: I might just pick you up just for saying that.

CB: Oh, please God, no. I can be a cancer. Just watch.

DS: By the way, did you know that whole economic crisis? With the mortgages?

CB: Yeah, of course.

DS: Let's just say that was my idea.

CB: Please don't pick me up.

DS: Well, I guess your little "I'm a cancer" stunt backfired on you, didn't it?

CB: I've learned my lesson, that's for sure. Please don't pick me up, sir.

• • •

Chauncey Billups has ordered a pizza from a local chain. He receives a call.

David Kahn: Why hello, Chauncey.

CB: Uh... hi. Do you have my pizza? Where are you?

DK (in a childish cackle): Oh, Chauncey. I'm more of a state of mind than a person per se, Chauncey. Say, have you seen Ricky Rubio?

CB: Um... yes, I've seen him. Listen, who is this? Where are you?

DK: I've decided to invent a new form of the Triangle Offense called the Tiny Quintuple Post, and I think your talents might be germane. Get this: Five point guards, each of their skillsets mapped to the traditional five positions, playing the Triangle Offense. You will be our Center, facing off against giants such as Tim Duncan and Pau Gasol every night, speeding past the aging trunks with the wistfulness of an owl at night. I've seen microfilms of you at the local library and I think you're quite ready for a turning point in your career, as a Center.

CB: ... Jesus Christ, I ordered a pizza, not a fanfiction. Where are you? I'm hungry.

DK: Look up. That's it, look straight up. Come to Kahn.

Chauncey looks up. David Kahn is taped to his ceiling, tied down with microfilm.

CB: Ahh!!! How the fuck did you get in my house, David?

DK: Owls, Chauncey. Owls brought me here.

CB: Uh... the Clippers already got me. You can't sign me.

DK: Is that a lie? Are you intimidated by my owls and my stoop on your chandelier?

CB: Uh... no, it's just that they claimed me on waivers, and now no one else can.

DK: That sounds like a lie.

CB: Listen, I'm banking on you not understanding the waiver rules, here. And I also would prefer the Clippers to your team.

DK: Welp. I resent it, but I can't deny it.

CB: If it's any consolation, you could probably sign J.J. Barea as your power forward. He's agile.

DK: That's so dumb. You can't build a championship team around J.J. Barea at the 4. I thought you knew basketball, Chauncey.

CB: Small forward, then?

DK: Huh. Okay, what should I pay him?

CB: Uh... like, don't go any lower than six million a year. There's no way I would play there for less than six million dollars a year. I would be insulted. I'm practically insulted by this waivers thing to be honest. Pretty bush league, Kahn.

DK: Okay.

CB: Better make it seven with taxes. Make sure you have no more room to sign marquee points, either.

DK: Why would I do that?

CB: So J.J. doesn't get jealous! God! Look at what's going on with LeBron. Hell, look at Darko.

DK: He seemed displeased.

CB: Okay, here's the important part: Sign him for about 4 years.

DK: Why?

CB: Because that will guarantee that I'll never have to... watch you guys and know that you could have done better? Yeah.

DK: Okay.

CB: One more thing.

DK: Yeah?

CB: I want you to ask Kevin Garnett to request a trade to the Wolves. He can be your center for the foreseeable future, or rather, your double center for the Quintuple Post.

DK: Oh, but I had no idea he wanted back on the Wolves.

CB: Of course he does! Uh...he's a tough sell though, you know how people are, they don't know what it is they really want, so you have to show them that you have a commitment to their well being.

DK: Of course. That makes perfect sense to me.

CB: You have to ask him tonight though. Full moon and all, wolves, that whole thing.

DK: Oh, yeah, naturally. I better leave right now.

CB: Bring your owls, of course. And close the damn front door, please.

DK: Okay. David Kahn, exeunt left!

For the first time in years, Chauncey Billups smiles.

• • •

The next day, Billups arrives at Sterling's office in a Christmas sweater with a Clippers hat.

Donald Sterling: Well, there's the finishing touch, Chauncey. I guess you'll be competing against Mo Williams at the point. How does that make you feel?

CB: Alright, I guess. Not so bad.

DS: Excuse me? What's the matter with you? Don't you understand? I own you, Chauncey. Doesn't that stir some ancestral hatred in you? I own you, like I'm running some sort of a plant--

CB: Hey, you read the recent free agent signings?

DS: Of course, Chauncey. What about them?

CB: What did JJ Barea get with the Wolves?

DS: There's nothing about that in my reports. Why?

Assistant (from next room): Mister Sterling?

DS: Yes?

Assistant: Barea got signed just now with the T'Wolves.

CB: Nine o' clock on the dot.

DS: But how could you have possibly known that, Chauncey?

CB: Let me guess, 4 years, $20 million?

DS: What are the terms of Barea's contract, just out of curiosity, Jessica?

Assistant: Oh, I think it was 4 years, $19 million. It's pretty hilarious, I think. What agent could possibly have convinced Kahn to make a hilariously misguided move like that?

CB: Let's just say I won't be playing for the Wolves anytime soon, Donald.

DS: Huh... interesting. Good work, Billups. Say, I heard you were interested in front office work back in Denver...

CB: Yes, very much so, Mr. Sterling.

DS: How would you like to work... for me? We'll go through the country and cause mayhem wherever there is prosperity or fraternity... except against me and mine. We'll be villains in arms. A Mark Knopfler song from hell.

CB: Thanks, that sounds like fun, but for the time being can I just finish out my contract playing basketball?

DS: Ah...what the hell? Sure. Basketball. Whatever.

• • •

Weeks later, a ragged and furious Kevin Garnett is banging on Chauncey Billups' door. He is covered in owl bites.

Kevin Garnett: Chauncey, open up, man, I just want to shoot the breeze.

• • •

And so it came to pass that Sam Cassell didn't join the T'Wolves, Suns, Rockets, or Nuggets. Fin.

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