An Ode to Cowards
coward
cow·ard | \ ˈkau̇(-ə)rd \
one who shows disgraceful fear or timidity
// a coward who deserted his troops
With it being opening day of the NBA season, I wanted to bring light to some of the most notable, most visible, most gutless cowards in the NBA (yes I’m doing another list of people shut up I promise I’ll write an actual narrative piece at some point, or maybe I won’t! You’ll just have to read everything I write to find out if it’s a list or not!).
1. Eric Bledsoe
Feigning ignorance about an opposing player you just beat is an effective method of talking trash. It communicates that not only did you destroy the other team in a game, but the player that was guarding you didn’t even make enough of an impression on you that you remember his name. That’s why Eric Bled- oh wait one minute, I’m receiving word that Eric Bledsoe did not, in fact, beat the Celtics in the playoffs, and was in fact embarrassed in games 1 AND 2 by the very opponent he seemed to not remember the name of, Terry Rozier.
Look, NBA players are smart. They do extensive scouting (especially in the playoffs!) of opposing teams and players in order to craft a winning gameplan. Terry had been the starting point guard for the Celtics since the injuries to both Kyrie Irving and Marcus Smart.
After game 1, Terry had “mistakenly” referred to Bledsoe as Drew Bledsoe, the name of the former New England Patriots quarterback (whether it was actually a mistake or not we will never know). In the game, Terry hit the (potentially) game-winning shot over Bledsoe on a play in which Bledsoe seemed to give up with over a second left on the clock. Even further than that, the Bucks went on to lose game 2, putting them down 0–2 in the best of 7 series! So, for Bledsoe to ask “who?… I don’t even know who the [expletive] that is” after getting embarrassed on the court in Bucks-Celtics game 1 is a cowardly maneuver.
Let’s look at some statistics, shall we?
Through 2 games of the series (so the games just prior to Bledsoe’s trash talk attempt):
Terry Rozier: 46 points, 7 rebounds, 11 assists, 2 steals, 0 turnovers, 47%-50% shooting splits (oh, and he won both games)
Eric Bledsoe: 21 points, 11 rebounds, 8 assists, 1 steal, 6 turnovers, 36%-33% shooting splits
Did I mention they were each other’s primary assignments for those games? Seems uh not good for Bledsoe.
This one has run a little longer than I wanted to, so I’m going to move to the next one now, but I’ll leave you with this:
2. Lonzo Ball
Hi guys, Brad here to write about this one. Lonzo Ball is a coward’s coward. While Liangelo is brave enough to risk spending life in prison overseas, his brother avoids De’Aaron Fox like Ben Simmons avoids shooting threes. Lonzo stays up late at night having nightmares about facing his superior rival on the Kings. De’Aaron creeps over him at night like Freddy Krueger’s likeness in the wall above a victim’s bed.
No one knows just why Lonzo is afraid to play De’Aaron Fox, but he has now ducked multiple games at Summer League, during the preseason, and during the regular season — citing everything from the fact that he shoots like one of those flaily armed inflatable things that sells used cars, and the fact tha this three point shooting percentage would barely pass as a batting average.
Lonzo Ball is a coward. He was born a coward. He eats cowardice for breakfast. In the shower, he suds himself up with cowardise, and then rinses, lathers, and repeats in the most cowardly way imaginable. If he were a terrible sports personality on FS1 his name would be Colin Coward. This coward is such a coward that other cowards look at him with their cowardly little faces and say, “Damn, what a coward.”
Noted De’Aaron Fox scholar Greg Wissinger (@gwiss on twitter, who’s use of the term “coward” regarding Lonzo Ball predates that of Ben Simmons by 2 days):
In the classic Looney Tunes cartoons, Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck would argue about whether it was duck season or rabbit season, but when Lonzo is around, even Daffy will agree that it is ALWAYS duck season.
3. Ben Simmons
Hi, Jack again, here to write about the OG. The caliph of cowardice. The founder of fearfulness. The tycoon of being terrified. The governor of gutlessness. The mogul of mousiness. The list goes on and on. Some people would have you believe that Ben Simmons not taking threes is not bad, actually. Well, I’m here to tell you that it is bad. Why won’t he just shoot a three???
Here’s a little history lesson of Ben Simmons’ cowardice. During the rising stars game, in which Simmons was a participant, he was in near the end of the game, with Team World comfortably leading. Now, the rising stars game could be considered an “all star environment,” in that the players aren’t necessarily putting forth 100% of their effort for 100% of the game. Thinking back to all star games of the past, Shaq, noted non-shooter, took threes in the all star game. Hakeem Olajuwon took threes in the all star game. So my question was, Ben Simmons, why will you not take a three in a similar environment with the game seemingly out of reach in your team’s favor?
Let’s do a deep dive into some data here. Here we see a 76ers possession from a preseason game on September 28th.
You might be thinking, what’s the problem with this play? Ben Simmons for all intents and purposes makes an amazing play, tossing it off the backboard for a touch pass to noted non-coward Markelle Fultz. Amazing play it may be, but where you see an inventive way to make an assist, I see perhaps the most creative way to not shoot a three ever attempted by an NBA player.
Next, defense. Ben Simmons said that he would like to be on the all-defense first team for the upcoming 2018–2019 NBA season.
Looking back to a few years ago, who made the phrase “first team all-defense” famous? Tony Allen. What was Tony Allen infamous for? Not shooting threes. What can Ben Simmons not do? Shoot threes. This is simple deductive reasoning here folks.
Couple more data points I’d like to review so folks please bear with me here.
Next, from the Celtics-76ers playoff series:
As Trevor notes here (and the answer is the second B), Ben decided to not even shoot a wide open mid range shot! Observe the distance between Simmons and a closing out Al Horford. Yes obviously angles will distort it and of course the players were all moving, but that seems pretty far, doesn’t it?
One full Al Horford! Yes, some liberties were taken as Al is slightly crouched, but the angle also makes it look shorter than it actually is.
Last piece of evidence here, from game 2 of that same playoff series. If you thought one Al Horford of distance is bad,,, buddy I have some news for you.
Here we have Al Horford guarding Ben Simmons again. Now, in this situation, what would you want your team’s point guard to do? Al is not closing out, he’s just waiting to play some beautiful help defense with his beautiful eyes. A deeper look, though, reveals more….
TWO AL HORFORDS OF DISTANCE! This piece really was just a means to an end of me posting this picture, I didn’t want it to come off as a character assassination of Ben Simmons, so I digress:
Now, you might be thinking to yourself, “self, why is Jack so invested in Ben Simmons not shooting threes?” And to that I would respond “well, actually, I would love it if Ben Simmons started to shoot threes, even if he started to hit them! It would for sure make the Sixers a better team, which in turn would make the top of the Eastern Conference more competitive, leading to better playoff series.” After all, at the end of the day, I just want to watch some good basketball. Wouldn’t everyone else be on board with that? Wouldn’t it be great if Ben Simmons started letting it fly? Shooting is presumably the only thing that Ben Simmons doesn’t do at a good to great level!!
Unfortunately for us, Ben does not seem interested in even attempting threes this year:
Now, Ben is a great player. No one is disputing that. BUT: He is mad online.
To be fair, in the clip he’s probably referring to the gentleman who he called out on twitter for his bad facial hair, but the point stands.
So yeah, that’s pretty much it for the cowards. This went longer than I had initially thought, and for that I apologize, but I just had a lot of thoughts on this, you know? It’s a subject near and dear to my heart. Thank you Brad (smh) for the Lonzo section.
My last piece of advice is: this (click the link and skip to 1:42, if you click only one link in this article or only read one sentence, make it this one) (wow, really smart to put the one sentence you definitely want people to read at the end of the article Jack, great writing!!).
Editor’s (Brad’s) Note: Jack was too afraid to add Kevin Durant to this list, but we all know he belongs here. So Kevin Durant is the 4th coward on the list, and Jack is the 5th coward on the list.
Writer’s Note Responding to the Editor’s Note: Brad give Jack Michael journalistic freedom to write what he wants you coward
