’16 Warriors or ’96 Bulls? Breaking Down The Major Time Travel Issues
Could the 73-win 2015–16 Warriors beat the 72-win 1995–96 Bulls? It’s one of the biggest and most fun debates of the year.
And really, there’s really only one way to settle this: time travel.
However, there’s one problem with that: namely, that there are like a million problems with it. Most notably, a problem known as The Kerr Konondrum.
Okay, let’s just say, for the sake of argument, that we had a time machine the size of a large bus, and we could use it to safely transport today’s Warriors and their coaching staff back to the 1990s to play the Chicago Bulls. It’s a crazy thought experiment, but let’s just say we were able to accomplish this.
We think that this random group of dudes would be able to just roll up to the United Center and challenge the most famous group of basketball players on the planet to a seven-game series? Security guards wouldn’t even let them near the building.
Furthermore, we also think that, once they explained they were from 20 years in the future, when society had decided that settling a dumb basketblogger narrative (and taking the time to explain what a blog is, of course) was the best use of time travel technology, MJ, Scottie and company would just accept this and take two weeks off from their season to play these randos? I don’t think so.
But let’s say — again, just for the sake of argument — that they did agree to play, that’s when we arrive at what most time travel scientists are now calling The Kerr Konondrum.
Steve Kerr, the coach of the modern-day Warriors, would see his 30-year old self taking jumpers as a slight-framed backup guard on the ’96 Bulls. At this point, because of the concepts of single timeline uniformity and temporal paradoxes, the older Kerr would have remembered this time-bending basketball series from his youth.
In essence, if the ’16 Warriors were ever to travel back in time to play the ’96 Bulls, then that match would have already happened 20 years prior to us making it happen. Ergo, there’s no reason to ever pit the teams against each other, because the outcome (regardless of what it would be) would not be in doubt and thus not worth playing for.
And even if — once again, just for the sake of argument — they did decide not to play: Well, then poor Steve Kerr’s life would diverge into multiple timelines: one in which the modern Warriors played against the 90s Bulls, and one in which they didn’t. In the Warriors-didn’t-play-the-Bulls timeline (Timeline 1), Kerr would grow up and eventually become the coach of the Warriors and we’d be right back where we started, with no clear answer to whether or not the ’16 Warriors could beat the ’96 Bulls.
But in the Warriors-did-play-the-Bulls timeline (Timeline 2), we would get two further divergent timelines: the Warriors-beat-the-Bulls timeline (Timeline 2A), and the Warriors-lose-to-the-Bulls timeline (Timeline 2B). In Timeline 2B, it’s very possible that Kerr retires after playing basketball, knowing definitively that no team in his lifetime will be worth coaching, as it will never eclipse the talent of his beloved ’96 Bulls.
But in Timeline 2A, Kerr and the notoriously competitive Michael Jordan would clearly ask for a re-match against the ’16 Warriors in a Neutral Decade. At this point, several even more problematic elements arise.
First, I don’t know if this time machine is large enough to accommodate the ’16 Warriors and the ’96 Bulls and all of their coaches. It was built to transport the Warriors back to 1996; nothing more.
Second, what the hell happens when both 30-year old Steve Kerr and 50-year old Steve Kerr are chatting with each other on what might be, for all we know, a long-ass bus ride? Does the older Kerr give the younger Kerr wisdom upon which the latter eventually acts, thus changing the course of Kerr’s life to the point that he never makes it to age 50 or decides not to become an NBA coach? These are the important questions.
Third — and this point cannot be overstated — modern time does not stop. Regardless of the outcome of the Bulls/Warriors matchup, adults in 2016 are now slowly recalling rumors from their youth of a basketball team coming back from the future in order to beat or lose to a mid-90s team. This then disrupts the very notion of whether or not the ’16 Warriors can even be considered the ’16 Warriors any longer. They are now some hybrid new/old team that is both playing in the modern era, but is remembered as having played in the ’90s.
Finally, the 2016 Warriors will at some point want to return home to their families. But by the time they return, they will have created a butterfly effect shockwave throughout all of society, particularly in the basketball community, to the point that some of their parents might have chosen different spouses and some of the ’16 Warriors were never actually born, thus once again negating the very fabric of what it means to comprise the ’16 Warriors, and further negating the very matchup we orchestrated this time travel scenario to create.
However, if we could send the Warriors back to 1986 to play the Larry Bird Celtics, well, that’s something we should do. Because there’s NO WAY IN HELL they could take down a team that had Bill Walton as its sixth man. No way in hell, dude.
