Hey Jackass: There's Nothing Wrong with the NBA

Typical NBA Critic

Well, that's not quite true. I'd be lying if I claimed that the NBA isn't as flawed as any other corporate monstrosity: from terrible (and, at times, corrupt) officiating to an untenable financial system, David Stern certainly has his hands full trying to remedy the myriad number of issues facing the league. And unlike his counterparts, Roger Goodell and Bud Selig, Stern doesn't possess the luxury of being able to count upon the largesse of a traditionally supportive and forgiving public to lessen the impact of negative publicity; indeed, the NBA's margin of error is undeniably lower than that of the NFL or MLB, which became quite evident during the aftermath of the Nuggets-Knicks "brawl" in December of 2006. While such a scuffle in baseball or football would have been, at worst, regarded as laughable, the media treated the "fight" as if the league had been dealt an indelible blow by Carmelo Anthony's slap-and-run.

This double-standard becomes especially evident when scrutinizing the host of false assertions and accusations that are frequently hurled at the league by angry, bitter "fans," whose rage is undoubtely fueled by the absence of a Great White Hope in basketball to rally around. Because I've grown weary of these baseless criticisms, and (more importantly) because I have nothing better to do, I've taken it upon myself to debunk and dismiss the most prominent allegations.

"NBA Players Can't/Don't Play Defense!"

Bullshit. Anyone who's watched even a minute of professional basketball over the last fifteen years can attest to the fact that there've been moments when the game has been stifled by too much defense. If someone ever repeats this claim to you, smack them upside the head, spit in their eye, and kick them in the shins. After they've recovered from the shock of being assaulted, direct them to the "League Index" on Basketball-Reference.com, and specifically the 1990 Season Summary, where you'll force them at gunpoint to observe the league-wide offensive statistics of said season:

107 ppg (!), 47.6 FG%, 98.3 Pace Factor (a measure of a "team's possessions per 48 minutes")

These numbers were posted in the midst of the NBA's "Golden Age," when (supposedly) both players and teams possessed the proper basketball "fundamentals" (more on this later) and executed at a level on both sides of the floor that had rarely been seen in league history. And yet, arguably the best defensive team of this specific year and era (the Pistons) gave up 98 points-per-game (first in the league). To give our imaginary NBA critic some perspective, force him or her to click back to the "League Index" page and select the 2004 Season Summary (the last season before hand-checking was outlawed), where (if they're not crippled by fear) they'll undoubtedly become aware of a noticeable dip in offensive numbers in the fourteen-year interval:

93.4 ppg, 43.9 FG%, 90.1 Pace Factor

While some would claim that the precipitous decline of scoring averages and field-goal percentages was the result of a parallel decline in offensive talent, the more plausible explanation is that a league-wide embrace of the defensive philosophy pioneered by the Pistons of the late 80's and early 90's led to a slowing down of the game and a subsequent need for defensive specialists who may not have been as successful if they had played in the higher-paced 80's and early 90's (I'm looking at you, Eric Snow). The numbers (as well as the tape) simply do not support the assertion that there was a greater emphasis on defense before the late 1990's and 2000's; in fact, the opposite is true. Defenses were so good, and so effective, that fans fled in droves, all the while complaining about the lack of defensive effort. Of course.

"NBA Players Lack Fundamentals!"

What the hell does this even mean? Are we talking about dribbling? Passing? Shooting? Rebounding? Since no one has ever taken the time to explain this criticism to me, I'll just assume that those who make it are more concerned with skin pigmentation than anything else (yeah, I said it).

"The League is Fixed!"

David Aldridge debunked this pretty conclusively last season, but since I'm one who loves to belabor the point, I'll reiterate how truly stupid this argument is:

If the NBA was fixed, the Spurs and Pistons wouldn't have won five combined titles in a nine-year span. If the NBA was fixed, the Suns, Kings, and Mavericks (arguably the most entertaining teams of the 2000s) would've made more than one combined Finals appearance between the three of them. If the NBA was fixed, the Pacers wouldn't have beat the Knicks in the Eastern Conference Finals in 2000 and prevented a Knicks-Lakers Finals matchup. If the NBA was fixed, the Nets wouldn't have beaten the Celtics in the ECF in 2002 and prevented a Celtics-Lakers Finals matchup. If the NBA was fixed, the Magic wouldn't have beaten the Cavs in last year's postseason and prevented a LeBron James-Kobe Bryant Finals matchup.

And so on and so forth.

"Only the Best Team with the Best Record Wins the Championship!"
                                            and
"The Regular Season is Meaningless!"

These two criticisms are, paradoxically, tied together. When you hear one, the other is not far behind, and despite all the evidence you may use to disprove these inherently contradictory suppositions the critics in question will fail to see that these claims cancel each other out. If the best team with the best record wins the title every year (which is patently false, but I digress), then the regular season must mean something because it is the barometer by which a team proves its superiority; likewise, if the regular season is meaningless and has no bearing on the playoffs, then the best team with the best record should not, theoretically, win the title every year.

What's especially frustrating about the latter argument is that it's deemed a positive when applied to MLB and the NFL (though doubts have arisen over the competitiveness of the latter in light of last season). If a team with a middling record gets hot and goes on a deep playoff run in either of those leagues, it's a testament to parity and the inherent drama of the postseason; if it happens in the NBA (as was the case with the Celtics this past year), then it's proof of the pointlessness of the regular season and a slap in the face of the teams that finished with better records.

Speaking of parity . . .

"There's No Parity in the NBA!"

This argument is hard to refute considering the fact that the Celtics and Lakers have won thirty-three titles in sixty-four years, or that the Spurs and Lakers have combined to win nine out of the last twelve championships (and, except for 2006, have appeared in every Finals since Jordan retired). If there was a single picture which could aptly sum up the history of the league, this would be it. Arguably more than any other sport, the NBA is marked by dynasties, which for some is an indication of inherent uncompetitiveness.

Yet at the same time, there's evidence that the league is far more competitive than its detractors give it credit for. Indeed, the conference ironically criticized for being "weak" during the 2000s (i.e. the East) was a paragon of parity; after all, seven teams represented the East in the Finals during those ten years, with only the Nets and the Pistons reaching that round more than once. And despite the stranglehold the Lakers and Spurs have had on the West, the Mavericks, Suns, Kings, Jazz, and Blazers were at least able to offer some resistance and make the proceeding seem less perfunctory.

"NBA Players Are Thugz! LOL!"

Yeah, and the other sports leagues are populated by saints.

This accusation, like the one concerning "fundamentals," probably has more to do with skin pigmentation than anything else.

Where Exorcising Your Demons Happens

Back in those dismal days of the 2006-2007 season, when my beloved Celtics were irrelevant and seemingly without direction, I adopted the Phoenix Suns as a sort of "second favorite" in an attempt to remind myself that the hopelessness of my true favorite's situation was not shared by every team in the league. With the return of Amare Stoudemire from injury, they appeared to be a squad which, if all the right pieces fell into place, could dethrone the Spurs and Mavs in the West, and prove once and for all that a fast-paced brand of basketball could lead a team to a title. Though they got off to a rocky start, they finished with a 61-21 record (second-best in the league to Dallas), and at one point were winners of 33 out of 35 games (with individual winning streaks of 15 and 17 games constituting the bulk of this run); their dispatching of the Lakers in the First Round set them up with a rematch with their rivals, the Spurs, who had defeated the Suns in the Conference Finals two seasons prior. If the Suns were going to win a championship that season, the seemingly most appropriate way in which they could do so would be to vanquish a team whose style of play was completely antithetical to that of "Seven Seconds or Less," and whose philosophy was of an era in which a run-and-gun mentality had been made impossible to act upon.

What followed has been well-documented and analyzed endlessly over the last three years. The Steve Nash nose injury in Game 1 and the Robert Horry-incident in Game 4 gave the Spurs enough of an advantage to finish off Phoenix, and subsequently proceed to win their third championship of the decade; the Suns bounced back with a successful regular season in 2008, though the addition of Shaq and the heartbreaking Game 1 loss to San Antonio in that season's First Round seemingly extinguished the vitality which had been such a large feature of the team in the seasons which that followed Nash's return to the desert in the summer of 2004. Although the Celtics had, by that point, added KG and Ray Allen and were making a run at a title, I still rooted for Phoenix; their trials and tribulations were the stuff of (basketball) tragedy, and were emblamatic of the seemingly inevitable (and, in my eyes, unfortunate) triumph of the "Right Way" philosophy over the more revolutionary (and fun) brand of basketball pushed by the Suns and their imitators.

With the completion of their sweep of the Spurs tonight, the Suns have washed away much of the pain of the last few years, and have subsequently transformed themselves from a historical perspective. Even if they lose to the Lakers in the next round, their decisive defeat of their arch-rivals will forever stand as proof that an up-tempo, fast-breaking team is capable of getting down and dirty, and hanging tough with a team of a supposedly more physical disposition. Two or three years ago Steve Nash's eye injury, or George Hill's four-point play, would have been enough to derail Phoenix; but this specific team is a different animal from past versions of the Suns, and has proven that it can withstand almost anything. Though the benefits of the additions of Grant Hill, Jared Dudley, Goran Dragic, Channing Frye, Robin Lopez, and Louis Admundson may not have been initially apparent, what these players collectively brought to the table may have been what Steve Nash (and, to a lesser extent, Amare Stoudemire) needed all along: teammates who were willing to go to war, and who would be adamant in their refusal to be intimidated by anyone, regardless of history and popular opinion.

True Grit or: Your Home Court Means Nothing

Ever since their Game 4 loss to Oklahoma City in the First Round, the Lakers have been on a tear. While their margins of victory over the Thunder and the Jazz have been relatively unimpressive (except for their Game 5 blowout of OKC), the toughness they've exhibited since that aforementioned humiliating defeat at the hands of Kevin Durant and company has quieted some of the talk regarding their focus and chemistry issues. The narrow victory they eked out against the Jazz tonight in Salt Lake City, despite the brillant play of Deron Williams and Kyle Korver and the return of Andrei Kirilenko, is further confirmation of the fact that the Lakers, no matter how unlikable and passionless they may some times appear to be, are champions in the truest sense of the word. They could have at any point given up, and taken comfort in the fact that they would have retained home-court advantage regardless of the outcome; instead, they refused to wither in a physical game in front of a hostile crowd, and stole a one-point victory against a team with its back against the wall.

Despite his hesitancy to pass in the first quarter, Kobe played a magnificent game (35 points on 13-24 shooting, 7 assists, and several cluch plays in the final minutes of the fourth), as did Ron Artest (!) and Derek Fisher (!), both of whom provided L.A. a spark with their outside shooting (!!!). While they shouldn't expect the latter two to play as well as they did going forward (indeed, Fisher's performance was akin to Lazarus rising from the dead), the Lakers have to be encouraged that they were able to pull out a road win, despite the apparent inability of their bench players to play well anymore (really, 8-24 from the field, guys?). A sweep is, at this point, not out of the question considering the disheartening way in which the Jazz lost (poor, poor Wes Matthews), though one shouldn't be surprised if the Lakers are unable to stifle the desire to finish up the series at home.

Also: the less that's said about the Orlando-Atlanta series, the better. However, I find it remarkable that the lower seeds in each conference are having such a hard time defending their home court. Atlanta and Boston were hammered by their visiting opponents, and the Jazz and Spurs lost tight, physical games in front of crowds who traditionally have swung more than a few games in their favor. Strange times, folks.

The Odd Couple: LeBron the Revelator and Goran Dragic

LeBron James and Goran Dragic: while no one was surprised to see the former single-handedly decimate the will of another team, the latter's flurry of points in the second half of last night's game was undoubtedly a shock to many (including the Spurs). What's even more amazing than the fact that these two explosive performances occurred on the same night is the contrasting ways in which each player went about dominating their opponents; while LeBron was methodical and deliberate in the unleashing of his destructive powers upon the hapless Celtics, Dragic was spontaneous and freewheeling, extracting his points out of the anarchic flow of a game which saw the Spurs take a commanding lead early. If Phoenix goes on to win this series (which, despite the 3-0 lead, is anything but a certainty, considering the history between these two teams), Dragic's (random) second-half heroics will be remembered as the turning point in a bout which appeared to be San Antonio's to lose after their dismantling of the Mavs in round 1.

As for LeBron: we've seen this sort of thing from him before. His 48 points against Detroit in Game 5 of the '07 Conference Finals, his duel with Paul Pierce in Game 7 of the '08 Semis, his entire oeuvre in last year's postseason; his ability to take over at the highest level should come as no surprise to anyone at this point. However, the steely-eyed determination with which he has approached this year's playoffs is something new to my eyes, and could be a terrifying glimpse of what the future holds for the rest of the league. If he's serious about being serious, and has dropped the goofy antics, then we could be seeing a player whose career, despite already being of legendary quality, is entering the territory of the transcendent.