Blah blah blah has been going on in basketball but I have made the splurge into TikTok this week and it’s been taking my focus away from working on my novel, which can’t be a good sign but I’m trying and I’m failing, and I hope that I make it before I die? If that kind of thinking sounds familiar to you to then you’ve got more in common than you think with the 2023 NBA champion Denver Nuggets.
First, a word on the Nuggets (that’s their coach 👆🏻 getting tatted after they won). Someone on the NBA Facebook board i participate in called the Denver Nuggets a Big Market Team the other day. This surprised me because the Denver Nuggets themselves don’t think of themselves that way. As a Lakers die-hard, I’m used to being clowned outside of Los Angeles for this kind of thing. Like B. in New Orleans, who clowns me relentlessly for rooting for the Lakers. God bless him, but B. has a special place of morbid disgust he reserves in his heart for Big Market teams, but especially the whale of Big Market Teams — my greedy and unscrupulous Los Angeles Lakers.
But the Denver Nuggets?! A big market?! Do you know how often the Denver Nuggets themselves complain about big short shifted by all of the other teams bigger than them? Their coach practically spent all playoffs shooting fireballs at reporters for giving an unfair amount of media attention to every other team they played during this year’s playoffs, from Big Ass Markets. The Denver Nuggets wore the Small Market Team label like a badge of honor to motivate them throughout their entire championship run, and now some Jack was telling me on Faceboook that the NBA is lame because they only allow Big Market Teams, like the Nuggets of Denver, to win the championship. I don’t know where my friend Jack on Facebook lives? Milwaukee? A snake hole? Perspective, that’s all it is…
When people say the championship race is “wide open” I’m going to start telling them they’re blind. What they’re usually referring to when they say that is that there is no clear front-runner to bet on, aka “best team,” as their wasn’t this past NBA basketball season.
When we say “the field is wide open,” it’s another way of saying anyone can win — but what if we have it wrong?
What if when we say the championship race is “wide open” what we’re really saying is the exact opposite, that there is a “best team,” we just don’t know who it is because we can’t tell. What if in reality there is a clear “best team” lurking in the shadows, but we’re just too blind to see it?
Something tells me that’s a lot harder to admit. Especially for an NBA media-machine that typically makes their bread from speaking in the language of absolutism.
We say it’s “wide open” because the Golden State Warriors aren’t the clear favorites or the Brooklyn Nets are dysfunctional, or the Boston Celtics fired their coach, for having sex, doing something — abusive? They won’t tell us.
Here’s what I’m saying: Next time someone in the media tells you the championship race is “wide open” in the NBA, tell them no it’s not we just can’t tell who the best team is yet.
What made this Denver Nuggets championship so special is the fact that they were the best team in the NBA — all season — with the best player, and most of us couldn’t see it because we never see anything until it happens. Then, once it does, once someone wins, we retroactively celebrate them, and chuckle ironically that we should’ve seen it all along. They’re here, we say! How did we miss it?
In life, this shit happens all of the time too. No one is going anywhere in life until they are. No you can’t be a writer because you haven’t written anything yet. No you shouldn’t become a pastry chef because only your family and friends eat your cupcakes.
Before the Denver Nuggets are successful, they’re not quick enough to stop Steph Curry behind the arc, or their best player is too chubby & has never done it before, you know, win it all, so how can we trust he will do it in the biggest moments?
I kinda get it. It’s hard to get someone to believe in you until you prove yourself. Go ask every influencer on social media right now and they’ll be the first to talk your ear off about their hopes and dreams and how when they make it BIG someone will seeeeee — so there’s reason, more reason than ever, to roll our eyes like this fool:
Nowadays it’s harder than ever to believe that something you haven’t seen before is going to come true. We’ve all become pretty cynical, pretty lost in our realities. But the softest of us, the ones who can still believe, despite all of the noise, they’re the ones who should really be celebrated. Well, them, and the Denver Nuggets.
One last thing: this morning the sad news stormed in that ESPN had fired some of its employees. A lot of talent got the cold boot, and they’re all deserving of a little love, but for me the one who really gave me a lot of goosebumps over the years was Jeff Van Gundy. From his basketball commentary to his nebbish Larry-David-like quips, his was the voice that I listened to when Lebron made that classic chase down block on Andre Iguodala in the 2016 Finals against the Warriors, or on Zach Lowe’s podcast when he’s breaking games down, taking me through the ins-and-outs of basketball poetry in a way I’ll never understand without him. Van Gundy has been a huge part of my basketball coming of age, and therefore of this project, so a big BB&F thank you to you JVG. We ❤️ u. Can’t wait to see what you do next.