Tuesday, September 27, 2011

National Basketball Freelancers


As fans, we are naïve; sometimes plain dumb. We paint our chest, buying hundred dollar tickets to sick on wet seats in -10 degree weather and we truly believe that NBA players want to win a championship.

It’s not that they don’t want to win; most of them would do anything to win one. Brian ‘The Custodian” Cardinal (Ever wonder how he got that nickname?) can viably attest to that fact.

This day-in-age they are programmed, like the new NBA Jam, to know that the only true measure of success is how many wins you can get.  But we are only now becoming aware that this is only the case IF there is an NBA season.

Unlike football, David Stern cannot keep them off the court. There are no Coach Carter chains on the doors, and definitely no soliloquies that pronounce the players and owners greed and the calling for a agreement to be made. The players are content to go play in select venues with their buddies.

It’s Bagger Vance meets Space Jam.

And why would they want to stop doing it? The players get to go out and play in games they want to play in. They get paid as much money as people are willing to pay to see them (which is turning out to be lumps of money). There is no pressure on the players to take over an exhibition game. They don’t have to go to towns like Milwaukee and Oklahoma City. Some fans, outside competitors may get the opportunity to get some playing time against their favorite pro. And they get the freedom that most of them probably haven’t felt since they were in elementary school.

Players play to win the game; but that NBA game is becoming more and more overrated. 

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