How The NBA Offseason Became More Exciting Than The NBA Finals
I think I fell asleep around Game 2, I’ve been wide awake since July 1st and someone please bring me some coffee.
Ultimately, it won’t matter where Gordon Hayward signed (At the time of writing, he is presumably changing his mind for the 15th time. All I’m saying is I wouldn’t ask him, “what do you want on your pizza man?”) because the Golden State Warriors will still remain the actual Power Rangers of our time who will ride on the backs of their enemies into playoff glory. Just like this year’s entirely predictable playoffs, punctuated by possibly one or two sporadic moments. We all knew what was going to happen, which made the whole experience sort of, meh.
You can argue no one knew Golden State would dismantle Cleveland so completely, to which, how dare you lie to me and yourself like that. The second argument in line is hope, but that is also fickle. I can hope that I can beat Michael Jordan one-on-one, given his age, knees and gambling history, all the way up until the actual game happens. After the game, odds are I’ll be embarrassed enough to move to Eastern Europe. We all knew the outcome of the NBA Finals the moment Kevin Durant signed on the dotted line and took his talents to the Bay.
Free agency, on the other hand, has proven to be a wild beast that is hard to tame, throwing audibles left and right and making writers miss sleep due to last-minute revelations. Do you remember the year 2012, the year in which it feels like Chris Paul got traded to the Rockets, in a move that culminated at least two years of Oceans 11 — like planning at the head of NBPA. It’s like that moment when the SWAT team takes off their masks, and you realize there is no SWAT. That’s what Chris Paul did. He did a thing that gamed the entire NBA financial structure. Which is kind of cool, except Kevin Durant did that thing again like three days later, to stay with the Warriors and make sure the Basketball Voltron doesn’t lose its black lion.
The excitement of sport — any sport really — lies in the potential uncertainty of its outcome. The Finals had none of that; the offseason has all of that. At the time of writing (cue later edit), Gordon Hayward can still sign with the Boston Celtics, Miami Heat or Utah Jazz (he signed with Boston). Because utter chaos is the default mode of operation in the NBA offseason. It’s like that scene from Mad Max: Fury Road where there are cars, and everything is on fire, and like three guys are swinging from racing cars and there are explosions. I’m pretty sure I have no idea what is happening in that scene, but every explosion gets me even more excited and I can’t look away.
One can argue the NBA offseason began its ascension to the pantheon of NBA temple of exciting events with the Decision, the original “will he or won’t he” of the basketball world, but Twitter wasn’t quite what it is now. NBA Twitter is its own echo system with its own power players and Superstars (Zach Lowe is basically our LeBron James, netw3rk… definitely J.R.). It’s our Matrix, and we all took the red pill during emoji-gate of yesteryear.
For those who don’t remember, two years ago, DeAndre Jordan sparked a small civil war when he signed with Dallas, prompting an entire Clipper team to travel to Houston and barricade themselves inside the house. We followed it all on Twitter, emoji to emoji, and goddamn will I rewatch the eventual 30 for 30 when it comes out on NBA digital, NBA actual worlds fully merged, and we discovered Paul Pierce may have no idea how to use a phone.
The inherent draw of the NBA offseason is the illusion that we get to be part of the process. When the analysis is done and the ball hits the court, the general public becomes spectators — passive observers able to look, but not touch. When it comes to NBA Twitter, we’re involved, we’ve created our own world and our own league — Truman Show style in which we are equal participants to the players themselves. And that’s what makes the offseason so much more fun.
We can look and wonder whether or not Terry Rozier is actually going to be better than Paul George, or how many Beanie Babies Danny Ainge still has in his basement. We can make bonfires on the ashes of the Eastern Conference — it being the barren wasteland of Earth, where the West is basically Asgard and all its riches. We can make jokes about how the Kings took a good hard look at the Knicks out-Kingsing them, and decided to toss money at two veterans to logjam playing time for their young core, after seemingly making actual, logical decisions. We get to have a lot more fun.
Because once the season starts, for all the analysis… Golden State will probably win another ring.
