Boo-hoo.
When Rudy Gobert scored in the final seconds of the Timberwolves’ already-in-the-bag win over the Jazz on Friday night, Malik Beasley confronted the former Jazz center and gave him the what-for.
When Zion Williamson threw down a monster — no, a kill-the-monster-with-a-hatchet — 360-windmill dunk in the last seconds of the Pelicans’ wrapped-up victory over Phoenix, Chris Paul, among other Suns, reacted with great indignation, including some pushing and shoving between players and reps from both sides, although nobody appeared to walk up on Williamson himself to challenge the biggest of big men.
What the hell’s going on in the NBA these days?
Has the fraternity gotten so chummy that one team or one player can’t rough up the feelings of another player, another team? Ooh, that’s against the unwritten rules?
Puh-leeeze.
An unwritten rule for real is, don’t undercut an opponent when he’s soaring through the air to the rim. That you don’t do. Perhaps that is written somewhere.
Either way, what Gobert and Williamson did is no big deal.
This isn’t the NBA I remember from the good old days — days when you — everyone — wanted some Cholula thrown into the mix of competition, regularly reminding fans that this wasn’t war, nor was violence to be championed or tolerated — unless Bill Laimbeer was on the receiving end, but it was a basketball battle. A struggle. A heated encounter. Especially when it involved two quality teams.
There was nothing wrong with one side throwing fire at another. If respect and friendship were to be built, it came over time, not automatically. Those guys way back when didn’t act after games as though they were all headed over to Larry Bird’s place for a backyard barbecue.
Nope. It was that #%@*&$-ing Larry Bird can take a flying leap, only add in more colorfully descriptive language.
The old-time competition and the rivalries were … what’s the word, fierce? Whatever’s more fierce than fierce.
That was basketball.
When Williamson spun with bad intentions to punctuate the Pels’ win, the announcers reacted with disapproval.
One said: “The Phoenix Suns felt it was totally unnecessary.”
The other said: “This is how rivalries start, though.”
Both were correct.
It was unnecessary, just like Gobert’s basket would not affect the outcome.
But rivalries are good. They are part of what makes sports so enjoyable.
These folks aren’t just players, they’re characters in a play. And the more authentic the play is, the more compelling it becomes.
Nothing wrong with sportsmanship. But when that sportsmanship becomes too polite, too nice, too fretted over, then basketball can turn into a freaking cotillion, and who wants that? Nobody.
Pardon me, would you happen to have any Grey Poupon?
Pppfffwwww.
NBA players make a whole lot of money, more money than most fans, dudes and dudettes who go out into a cold, cruel world every day to earn enough to make ends meet, could even begin to imagine. Fine. They’re the best in the world at what they do.
But when players from different teams get too cordial and congenial, it can send the wrong message to fans, a message that screams, or could scream, “Hey, it’s all good here. No matter who wins this game, we’re all making a bajillion dollars, so what happens between these lines doesn’t really matter. We’ve got what we want. The joke is on the idiots who are paying $200 for a ticket, 15 bucks for a beer, seven bucks for a pretzel, and 30 bucks for a place to park.”
That ruins the game, the integrity of it.
Wait a minute. After further review, maybe it’s a positive that opposing players get mad at the other guys for throwing down an unnecessary dunk. At least there’s some emotion in that.
And the best way to manage the whole thing is to remember it and to take some future competitive revenge.
Rivalries, hurt feelings, to the left, rivalries, hurt feelings, to the right, stand up, sit down, fight, fight, fight.
Disrespect, imagined or otherwise, usually leads to more effort, more ferocity, more of what people want and more of what they pay to see. And typically, it’s the healthy, no-harm kind. We have enough damaging animosity in areas of politics and religion.
This is just basketball, where players on both teams smash into one another while trying to flip a ball into a basket, and the fans scream their guts out over every call. A little force and barbarity, ruthlessness even, are welcome there — on the floor, not in the stands.
Enough with the chumminess, already.
Sure, these people are opponents, not enemies, but go ahead and get after it, it’s OK. And if that calls for a kill-the-monster-with-a-hatchet, 360-windmill dunk with two seconds left in a 10-point game, all right, all right, all right.
Pass the Cholula.
It’ll make the burn that much better the next time around.
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