How Bothered Would Spike Be?

Rating the theoretical irksomeness of the three potential championship outcomes left.

May 29, 2026

With the Sixers out of it (as usual), I have really two choices for the remainder of the NBA playoffs (as usual). Those two choices are either barely pay attention (which I do sometimes), or decide which outcomes will bother me the most (which I’m doing this year).

There usually no positive outcomes once the Sixers are eliminated, only which are the least negative. So with the Knicks already in the Finals, and the the Thunder and Spurs heading to a Game 7, I figured I’d give a little insight into how horrible each of these outcomes could be.

To be clear, these are very personal, I’m not saying these should be your rankings as well. I’ll scale them from 1 (Won’t Bother Me At All) to 10 (Catastrophic).

The Knicks Win the NBA Finals - 10

Knicks fans are currently the worst sports fans in the United States. They first want you to acknowledge them as some sort of a sad sack, “it never works out for us, we’ve been waiting for so long,” dedicated and deserving group, but then immediately insist you bow down the superiority of the team and the City That Never Sleeps. They simultaneously insist that you know that they haven’t won in so long that you should be happy for them, but also celebrate them for winning even though they haven’t won anything yet.

They also live very close to us, will never shut the fuck up, and are generally distasteful.

They’ve also got an insane number of annoying famous fans, who all act like their dream is to be Knicks bloggers or something, just your rag tag bunch of millionaires who date super models and just happen to find themselves courtside. Ben Stiller, Marty Supreme, Turtle from his basement in Ohio, they can all go fuck themselves.

The team themselves don’t particularly bother me, except for Brunson’s weird celebration where he smells his thumb (??)

I know there will be someone who is like “oh duhhhh you’re a Knicks fan!” And I know Mike likes to bring it up with his bullshit little smile that he doesn’t know what he’s doing as well. Dude, I was 16. I’m 49. If we’re all the same at those two ages, I’m happy to page through your old photos as well. I promise you, the fact that I loved John Starks (still do) has very little to do with how much I hate these current fuckers.

We’ll have to resort to reminding them that their team leadership (Rose, Wes) are both Philly guys.

The Spurs Win the NBA Finals - 7

I can’t take the Wemby stuff man. I just can’t do it. In this case, both the fans and the player himself are super irritating.

The group of NBA Twitter dorks who spent three years slobbering over Jokic and insisting his defense was “actually good,” have quietly ignored his recent failures and just moved over to glazing The Alien. Every time the guy dunks we’ve got to act like we’ve never seen a tall person before, and the fact that a person who can dunk without even jumping actually dunked is such a sight to behold.

And Wemby himself, just the fraud of all frauds. Everything about him is a put on. The false competitive Kobe guy Wemby, the thoughtful guy Wemby, the tough guy Wemby, the monk guy Wemby. I just can’t, man. I’m sure there will be a time where he “owns the league” or whatever, but I don’t feel like dealing with Mr. French Ethical Hoops just yet.

Plus, if he really cared about winning, wouldn’t he just learn how to do a sky hook and score 80 points a game?

The Thunder Win the NBA Finals - 1

The Thunder don’t bother me at all. I love Jared McCain. I find SGA actually far more fun to watch than most people seem to, and I don’t think they flop any more than any other team.