With the NBA lockout seemingly looming for an extended amount of time those of us in the NBA media sphere consider the coming months to be daunting considering we may have to cover an entire season of journalism without actually watching a game. It will be any wonder that we will be able to survive through Christmas without starting a section of this website in which a Kobe-depleted Kevin Burke publishes nothing but fake box scores while typing them out in his best Bill Walton voice. Keeping that grim future in mind, I wanted to take a lighthearted view of the pending abyss that is the NBA lockout.
5. Only Absolute Junkies Miss the NBA in July
While I realize this probably alienates 98% of the people reading this article, I mean this in the most healthy way possible. I’m an NBA fan first and pretty much nothing else, but July is the time to get outside and actually go play basketball. Summer is the time to reflect on the season past and what may come.
4. NBATV Will Have to Play More Classic Games
Yesterday was NBA Legends day on NBATV and the two legends were Charles Barkley and Arvydas Sabonis. Could there ever be a more perfect combination? Barkley’s highlight was the 1994 Warriors-Suns game in which he scored 56 points. Although it was a great game, I couldn’t help but shout out “Look out P.J. Carelismo! Latrell Sprewell is on the loose!”
P.J. was safe, though, because he was busy coaching the Trail Blazers in the 1996 playoff game between Portland and the Utah Jazz. Sabonis, in all his glory, was lumbering up and down the court with his wavy, Soviet hair telegraphing every post move. The game was fitting for me given the title of my personal blog, and it inspired me enough to break out my Sabonis jersey to cheer on my hometown team. No, seriously.
3. There’s No Free Agency Drama
I know this may border on the macabre for some of us but now you won’t have to worry about the best player on the free agent market scorning your team and the next five-to-seven years of your franchise running down the tubes because of it. If there’s no free agency period, there’s no disappointment.
Staying in that vein, now your team can’t make awful mid-market signings as a last-ditch effort to come out of the offseason feeling like they’ve improved. No more Channing Frye/Josh Childress/Travis Outlaw contracts for you, no sir!
2. Every Team Remains Undefeated
If you don’t play the games, you can’t win. Of course, if you don’t play the games you can’t lose them either. This is great news for fans in Toronto, Detroit, Sacramento, Charlotte and Cleveland who won’t have to sit through an entire season of futility, player development and finger-crossing come lottery time.
1. The Lockout Will Make a Better NBA
In all seriousness, there’s a very good chance the NBA becomes a much more viable league both in marketing and parity in a post-lockout world. Although fans and media types will have to suffer now it has to be said that it will most likely be worth the wait. Exploding contracts and perennial losers in places like Milwaukee have been the red flags in the NBA the last few years and they desperately need fixing.
The newest edition to The Hoop Doctors writing staff, Dane Carbaugh is the editor and lead writer of the popular new basketball blog A Young Sabonis. Dane is a published research author and also writes for Dime Magazine and Bleacher Reprt. He can be found on Twitter at @DaneCarbaugh
