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For most of my life, I’ve liked watching a number of different sports and generally haven’t had a strong preference for any one of them over the other. But this year my emotions have titled in the direction of the NBA. It’s become the best sport to watch and follow and it’s not even close. Here’s why.
There isn’t a half-baked, uninteresting LIV Golf Tour trying to steal players away from the NBA. The best players in the world come to America and play in America. The NBA doesn’t have to grapple with the ethical issues of whether it’s right for these American players to play for the Saudi Arabian-financed LIV Tour, taking blood money. Watching the NBA we don’t have to listen to Dustin Johnson, kind of an inarticulate guy, tell us, when asked how he feels about criticisms he’s taking blood money, say “I don’t care.”
Right back at you, DJ. I don’t care about you and will never watch your bootleg LIV golf bore-fests.
Better than college hoops
The NBA is also far more appealing than college basketball, which with the chaotic transfer portal has become an AAU-style high school basketball meat market with no allegiances or loyalty to anything except money and self-interest.
NBA players chase the money also, but at least we get to know who they are and they often stay in the league long enough for us to get to know and understand their skills and flaws.
The NBA offers continuity; college hoops offer chaos.
From year to year now we don’t know where college basketball players will end up next year, what our team’s roster will be. It’s all just one big question mark. In the NBA there are more year-to-year player storylines to track, and that’s compelling. LeBron’s been in the league for some 20 years. We care about him, either to win or lose. But we care. It’s hard to care about a new college basketball team every year with guys you don’t know anything about, and at season’s end will leave your team; not all do but enough to make us feel disconnected and disrupted.
More appealing than NFL
The NBA also is more appealing than the NFL. The football league’s instant replays are much longer than NBA replays. It’s amazing to me how long I sit around not watching football but rather referees on the sideline staring into a TV monitor and watching replays dozens of times. Often I don’t watch because the games lack flow; NBA action is more continuous and less herky-jerky.
Everything about the NFL is overdone: commercials, Super Bowl Week, year-round soap opera coverage, the Draft. The NBA is hyped plenty but it doesn’t feel as if we’re being overfed.
Plus the NBA analysts are more entertaining than any other sports, almost as fun to watch as the games. I’m specifically referring to the NBA on TNT with Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley, Shaq, and Kenny The Jet Smith.
Those guys don’t take anything too seriously but when they do they’re thought-provoking. They make you smile. Mark Jackson and Jeff Van Gundy play off one another like close friends; much more interesting than Jim Nance and Tony Romo calling NFL games. Analysts in other sports just aren’t as funny and charismatic as NBA broadcast talent.
Better than hockey? Duh
It’s hardly worth including hockey in this analysis but just for the record, viewing and tracking the NBA is more pleasurable than the NHL. Everyone understands the basic rules of basketball. Most people still don’t get what icing is in hockey. It’s not as fun watching a sport when they call icing and you don’t know what happened nor why it matters. Fans don’t want to be asking questions and feeling ignorant watching a sport. Hockey makes us feel that way.
Hockey also moves too fast. The puck gets whacked so hard you can blink and miss the goal. In the NBA a shot goes up and you have time to watch it in flight and tickle the net. Even the net tickle in basketball caused by a Steph Curry three looks more sensual than a puck hitting the back of the net. Sensuality sells.
Plus I’m not Canadian. So there’s that.
Race car driving isn’t a sport
Then there’s NASCAR or Formula 1 and all those other events where a person gets in a car and drives and we call it a sport even though millions of non-athletes do that every day on highways and streets. Race car drivers don’t jump high, or move their feet quickly, or run fast. They push a pedal and steer. Plus they don’t even race in the rain.
Far from finished
If you thought I was finished making the case for the NBA being superior to all other sports, settle in. I’m just getting started.
The MVP race in the NBA this year has had everything: statistical marvels put down by three superstars: Nikola Jokic, Greek Freak, and Joel Embiid.
All-time seasons, non-stop debates among pundits as to who deserves it most, and yes, a racial component. Jokic is white and Freak and Embiid are black. With a race this close, it’s brought out racial biases among many and that’s been interesting, revealing, juicy and self-reflective. It’s raising an important question: Should a white guy win the MVP or a black guy? Should skin color matter in this decision? That’s provocative and emotionally charged.
The pressure is enormous on Jokic to carry his Denver Nuggets team to the Larry O Trophy, or everybody will say he’s a great regular season stat stuffer but not a true great. Fair point. Play on. I can see Jokic pulling a big Joke on all of them and shutting them all up. This is tantalizing theatre. Racial emotions will be stirred whether he wins or loses.
Better ballbusting
The NBA also knows how to do brawls better than other sports. These guys rack each other in the balls. That’s entertaining. None of the other sports have as much outright ball-busting going on – at least not that viewers can see.
Plus when NBA guys fight it’s with bare knuckles and no helmets or masks. It’s more MMA-like. Football and hockey players often fight with helmets on. You can’t even see the fear on their faces.
Swishy shooters
Then there are the NBA players so many of whom have become compelling human beings to watch play and listen to speak. None more so than Jimmy Jeffrey Buckets Butler, who against the Milwaukee Bucks reminded us of those playoff games in the 1990s when Michael Jordan would raise himself far higher than everyone on the court to completely alter the outcomes.
What JBuckets did in leading the Heat to the massive upset of the Buckets – pummeling them with 56 and 42 points in the two final games – captivated our country. And in his post-game presser, he was serious, non-self-congratulatory, lauding his teammates, saying he just did what he had to do to help his team win. Score 40 or 50 or none, as long as he helped his team win he would be satisfied, he said. I can’t think of a more intriguing person in sports than Jimmy Butler.
There’s also this. The sight of a basketball soaring through a stadium and falling through a net for a swish is more aesthetically pleasing than anything else in sports. Yes, it’s fun to see a quarterback hit his receiver for an 80-yard bomb in stride for a bomb TD, but there’s no swish at the end of that. It’s the net dancing that makes us feel like dancing. This brings to mind this song by Leo Sayer:
Now in the playoffs, you can watch a gaggle of shooters who can make the net dance as well as some of the very best who have ever shot a basketball. Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, Kevin Durant, Devin Booker; and there are plenty of other net splashers namely Jason Tatum, Jimmy Buckets, Duncan Robinson, and De’Aaron Fox.
There are great shooters galore all around the NBA playoffs right now. In college basketball, my biggest complaint is too many of those guys can’t shoot well from the outside. Clanks off the rim don’t soothe my senses; they feel like clanks inside my head. It also makes me suspicious those brick masons don’t practice shooting, which is if you’re a serious basketball player inexcusable. Practice.
Cool coaches
Then there are the NBA coaches. It’s so easy to root for Mike Brown with the Kings, Steve Kerr leading the Warriors, and Erik Spoelstra directing the Heat. Smart guys, personal men, not attention grabbers – all three are good people all three. Love me some coach Tibs of the Knicks, too.
This wasn’t planned
In the past few months it wasn’t as if I set out to figure out which of the sports we watch is the best for viewing pleasure. It’s not a question I tend to ask myself. Yet I’ve had an unexpected epiphany. It’s become evident that this NBA season, the players, and storylines have been genuinely captivating. Year after year plenty of people deride the NBA for being all about money and that the players don’t try hard enough and don’t care about the fans.
I’m seeing and feeling something different. A bunch of guys are playing basketball with ferocity and elegance, passing deftly, determined to win, practicing hard between games, and searching for the elusive championship. And I care how these guys perform and I know who they are and often have come to know them over several years.
It matters to me who wins and loses.
Can’t say that about the LIV Golf Tour, that’s for sure.
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Sammy Sportface, a sports blogger, galvanizes, inspires, and amuses The Baby Boomer Brotherhood. And you can learn about his vision and join this group's Facebook page here:
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