Written by Basketball is in the spotlight right now, but it is having a rough go of it. The USA Olympic team is far from a “Dream Team,” the long-awaited Space Jam 2 is getting terrible reviews, and nobody is watching the NBA Finals.
Team USA historically dominates the Olympic basketball competition. Their reign may be in jeopardy this year. The roster lacks many big-name stars from the NBA, as Steph Curry, LeBron James, James Harden, Anthony Davis, and Donovan Mitchell chose not to play. Furthermore, three other big NBA stars, Luka Doncic, Nikola Jokic, and Rudy Gobert, play for other teams. A fourth international star and probably the biggest NBA star, Giannis Antetokounmpo, would have played had Greece been able to qualify without him.
If this week is any indication, they are going to have a tough go of it. Team USA lost its first two exhibition games to Nigeria and Australia. Before this year, they had lost a combined total of two exhibition games. After beating Argentina, its next game had to be canceled due to “an abundance of caution” after Bradley Beal had to leave the team due to health and safety protocols.
Kevin Durant and Damian Lillard are on the team, and Devin Booker, Kris Middleton, and Jrue Hamilton will join the team once the NBA Finals are over. Team USA will be fine, and we should see a more exciting tournament this time around due to the abundance of global talent.
I have always gotten a kick out of the debate over whether Michael Jordan or LeBron James is the best basketball player of all time. It’s a silly argument, as they are both excellent. Wilt Chamberlain may have been better than both of them. Nobody is ever going to score 100 points in a game or average 50 points a game again. It’s impossible to compare players from different generations, but most polls have Jordan as #1.
If their Space Jam movies are any indication, it looks like Jordan will stay on top. It’s hard to have worse reviews than the ones than Space Jam: A New Legacy. Critics are describing it as an “abomination” and an “apocalyptic horror.” That isn’t good. I will probably skip it, but a lot of people have gone to see it anyway.
A lot of fans have been skipping the NBA Finals, too. That’s too bad because it has been a good series so far. I have enjoyed the entire playoffs more than I ever have. As a Rockets fan, I usually watch all of their games until they are eliminated and ignore the rest because I am mad. This year, fate has made me a free agent, and I have watched the games through a different lens. I have been happy with what I have seen.
Ratings likely are down because of an absence of big stars from big-city teams. More so than the other sports, the NBA is a league dominated by its superstars. Beginning with LeBron “taking his talents” to Miami in 2010, we have watched superteams with multiple stars win multiple championships. Ratings were good, but the product was boring. Either Curry and the Warriors or LeBron and whoever he played for were big favorites going into the playoffs. And they were usually the champions at the end.
This year, we have two scrappy teams from smaller markets fighting it out in the finals. There is no shortage of stars, with Chris Paul playing for the Phoenix Suns and Antetokounmpo on the Milwaukee Bucks. Booker, for the Suns, and Middleton, for the Bucks, have been their team’s primary scorers. Both teams have deep rosters with a mix of players they drafted alongside veterans acquired to fill in the gaps.
In particular, Milwaukee has done a great job of building its team. Antetokounmpo and Middleton arrived eight years ago and have grown up in the league together. The Bucks constructed a roster around them and a fantastic new arena to showcase their talent. The devotion of their fans has been on full display as they pack the “Deer District” outside of the Fiserv Forum during home and away playoff games. His connection to the fans convinced Giannis to sign a long-term deal to stay in Milwaukee, his new home.
Phoenix has followed a similar model. They drafted Booker in 2015 and big man Deandre Ayton as the #1 overall pick in 2018, passing up Doncic and Trae Young. They added pieces around the duo and brought in Chris Paul to be their leader. After being absent from the playoffs for ten years and one of the worst teams in the league just two years ago, they are on the brink of giving their rabid fans their first championship trophy.
Several other teams have adopted this model with success—Utah with Mitchel, Atlanta with Young, Dallas with Doncic, Denver with Jokic, etc. With my Rockets having the #2 pick in this year’s and a stockpile of other selections in the next few years after trading away Harden and Paul, I’m looking forward to watching them build a team that can compete with the others. Watching them try and fail to create a superteam around Harden was exhausting. Hopefully, the failures of the Nets, Lakers, and Clippers this year mark a transition away from the “taking my talents” model.
It seems basketball is going through a reckoning similar to what we all are as the pandemic winds down. We are eager to re-establish a sense of normalcy, but the quiet time we had during our time “in the bubble” allowed us to take stock of our situations, identify what is important to us, and correct our course. Some things that made sense only a couple of years ago no longer make sense, like daily two-hour commutes and making another Space Jam movie.
Maybe building teams connected to their cities and structured to endure is better than idolizing self-indulgent stars and number-crunching organizations who pay more attention to TV ratings than any sense of values or established norms. Attract global talent, foster a competitive balance, and focus on fundamentals instead of gaming the system. Live where we should live rather than where we think we have to live to chase down our career goals. Care about others.
Or, maybe I’m just dreaming.