OK Fine I Guess These Playoffs Are Getting Kinda Good
Before the lottery, AU acknowledges that maybe the rest of the basketball world is still worth keeping one eye after all.
As I've repeatedly stated on this blog, going into the NBA postseason I had about as much interest in these playoffs as I do in, like, the new iPhone or Lord of the Rings spin-off series. I figured at most, I'd end up treating them the way I do professional wrestling or RuPaul's Drag Race -- someone else who cares more than I do can tell me what happened and I'll decide if any of it sounds intriguing enough to catch up on my own.
And through the first round, as far as I could tell, it was basically so far so boring: a bunch of non-competitive series, some dispiriting injuries, one pretty good showdown I tuned in for a couple quarters of but couldn't really root for either team because my friends were being annoying about one of them and Tobias Harris was on the other. Satisfying to watch James Harden no-show an elimination game for a non-Sixers team? Sure, but we already saw that movie last year (and pretty much every other year before 2022). If that's the best drama your postseason has to offer, maybe you don't deserve to be on TNT after all.
But fuck, man, I am kinda enjoying this second round. Like maybe a lot.
Of course, it's a good start to have Donovan Mitchell and Jayson Tatum both going down 0-2 at home after coughing up a pair of big leads each. There are few quicker ways to my heart than giving me 47 minutes of a brilliant Mitchell performance being totally undone by a catastrophic final 60 seconds, or two games of Tatum bricking so goddamn much that he's since been officially added to the lineup of the now-Ben Folds Six. I assumed that any capability I had to feel basketball-related joy had long since expired this season, but it turns out that pettiness is a force stronger than death, because I was positively goddamn giddy after each of those four come-from-ahead L's.
Not that I really believed at any point that they would actually lead to series upsets. Well, Pacers-Cavs could maybe happen -- the Cavs are probably better but it always seemed pretty unlikely that the gap between them was as wide as the regular season suggested -- but even if the Knicks went up 3-0 yesterday I probably still wouldn't have taken them to advance. The Knicks have some matchup advantages (or at least some matchup non-crushing-deficits) and they do have maybe the best closer in Jalen Brunson, but New York basically needs to have the kings of the They Just Made Every Fucking Shot Game do the exact opposite at least four times in seven games to have a chance in this series. That's fine, though; I don't need Boston or Cleveland to lose their respective series to thoroughly appreciate them face-flopping to start. Twice! At home!! Against teams everyone assumed they would steamroll!!! It's some real Vince McMahon reaction meme shit.
(And for anyone aghast I'm celebrating the Knicks' success, spare me. The Knicks are playing the Celtics and the Celtics are the Celtics. Yes I know the Knicks all but finished off this Sixers era last postseason (I remember it well) and that their fans can be the worst (I encounter them daily). They've also basically never been good at the same time as the Sixers and 2024 was the first time we've played them in the playoffs in 35 years. Our historical feuding with them is about as profound as our rivalry with the Washington Wizards. Meanwhile, four of our last eight playoff runs were ended by the Celtics. A bunch of the dudes responsible for the last three are still on the team. Get the fuck outta here thinking I should root for them against any opponent, let alone the friggin' Knicks.)
Anyway, it's not just schadenfreude powering my enjoyment of this second round -- a lot of the basketball has actually been really good! I'd forgotten how satisfying basketball can be when it actually looks hard; when there are not just 48 minutes of offensive fireworks where the scoring looks so easy that no one seems all that impressive for being a part of it. That Denver-OKC game three was one of the best playoff games I've ever seen where the two best players both roundly stunk; it was cool to see a game where Jokic and SGA really had to work for their shit and couldn't just magic their way to their usual 30-10-8s or whatever. I've even found myself rooting for a Golden State team with Jimmy Butler and maybe my all-time least-favorite player in Draymond Green just because I want to see them ugly up that series enough to survive long enough for Steph Curry to get back from injury. Meanwhile, cheap grudges aside, it's heartening to see Boston and Cleveland -- two teams who seemed to have practically solved offensive basketball in the regular season with their spacing and shooting -- learn that the math doesn't always translate to the postseason quite so neatly. Basketball seems sorta interesting again. It's been a minute.
I don't know if it'll last beyond this round. Boston and Cleveland both seemed to get back on track in their game three wins and will probably soon face off in the most charmless Conference Finals imaginable; the West matchup could be more exciting but Thunder-Wolves seems most likely now and I dunno how much natural gas there is to that series. But regardless, it's fun to find out that there is still some life for my NBA fandom beyond the Sixers, fun to be reminded of all the things I used to enjoy about this shit -- the twists, the unexpected subplots, the weird rooting interests you don't even realize you have until you suddenly feel yourself living and dying with every single shot -- and fun to watch basketball being difficult and unpredictable. And if the Celtics wanna finish their title defense by losing twice more in the next four games, I will certainly have the absolute grandest of old times with that, too.
Andrew Unterberger writes for The Rights To Ricky Sanchez, as part of the 'If Not, Pick Will Convey as Two Second-Rounders' section of the site. You can follow Andrew on Twitter @AUGetoffmygold and can also read him at Billboard.
Yeah! Fuck the Celtics