Love and Basketball: Learning lessons from the love stories we all live in

At the midpoint of every season I conduct a little thought experiment. All-Star Weekend closes the first half of the NBA calendar, and the looming trade deadline provides the catalyst for some of the more exciting and dynamic shifts before the playoffs. I like to think that in these moments when the players and staff are away from the game, the narrative of the season takes root within them. It is a time for mindfulness, trade rumors, reflection, and speculation. I imagine it as a movie montage: Carmelo Anthony sipping a mint tea at a cafe wondering if he can still win a ring in New York; Bucks General Manager John Hammond is out cross country skiing and spots an actual Moose, pondering another makeover in Milwaukee; Jeff Teague throws down a wild-draw-four on the plane ride home from Toronto, hesitating that this might be his last round of Uno. All you need is to overlay a R&B vocal track and you’ve created the milieu of the next great romantic comedy.

And I know what you are saying: romantic comedies are garbage movies stuck in cliches with tropes so overused that no one wants to see them anymore. I personally think you are wrong, but with the way Deadpool and Kung Fu Panda 3 beat How to Be Single at the box office, I may be in the minority. But back to the experiment. It’s not to argue the merits of timeless romcoms, but rather to learn from them. Because just as these narratives take root within each team, the tropes that come with them can offer valuable lessons with what we can expect. Grab the popcorn and Netflix and watch with me for a spell:

Phil’s Shadow

The Los Angeles Lakers are stuck in a loop.

Since the 2011 NBA Lockout they have spiraled away from a World Championship and into the foxhole. Through a series of unfortunate trades, free agency transactions, and coaching hires, the Lakers have become one of the worst teams in the NBA. General Manager Mitch Kupchak pursued Chris Paul in 2011, but the trade was vetoed by the league. Instead, he brought in Steve Nash and Dwight Howard for a failed big three experiment, and now in back-to-back summers, he has struck out on Carmelo Anthony, LaMarcus Aldridge, and Kevin Love. The cycle may only be for a few summers, but that seems like an eternity for the Lakers Bros. And now with Kobe retiring, the shadow of Phil Jackson’s five championships looms larger over the Staples Center.

Mitch Kupchak, a man who is supposed to forecast his team’s future (a weatherman), stuck in a loop for what feels like an eternity, foxholes, (groundhogs). See where I am going? The 1993 classic, Groundhog Day. Phil Connors, a Pittsburgh weatherman, gets trapped in the same day in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. He starts to fall for his producer Rita, but despite trying again and again, he can’t win her over and escape February 2. The movie is hilarious, but asks a serious question: how can we change when it feels like the world is working against us?

I’m not certain in this analogy if the blizzard that traps Phil in Punxsutawney is the 2011 NBA Lockout, or the “basketball reasons” that blocked the Chris Paul Lakers trade, or the three-year $24 million contract that Kobe signed, but together these circumstances have kept Kupchak and the Lakers out of relevancy – much like Phil finds himself trapped in February 2.

In this scenario there is no doubt that head coach Byron Scott is Ned Ryerson. The insurance (agent) the Lakers need to keep their lottery picks. Not much can be done about Ned, he is just kind of there and has to acknowledged. Lakers will be happy to escape him.

BING!

Furthermore, Kupchak can learn a lesson from Phil’s trials on Groundhog Day. In order to escape the cycle and change, the key is sincerity. It has to be real. Phil spent more than 12,000 days in Punxsutawney before making it to February 3. And in each reiteration he tried to change the outcome without changing himself. Kupchak and the Lakers are faking themselves out by trying to tank and striking out with their free agents as a result. The Lakers are in the business of hanging banners, not pulling lottery balls.

And here is where sincerity is key. The Lakers made an honest mistake (if you can call it that) by investing their cap space and draft picks in two aging players and a center with a history of back problems. But trying to win players like Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Love, and LaMarcus Aldridge when the team is stealthily tanking, isn’t the right fit. You have to change yourself before you can win the big free agents. The Lakers can escape the cycle, but they need to change the locker room and roster before they try to sell it to the next free agent class.

The Manic Pixie Dream Team

Okay, now stay with me Warriors fans.

Philip Seymour Hoffman waxes poetic for the corruption of rock and roll. All the while Penny Lane kicks a beer can and pirouettes amongst cocktail napkins and refuse in a empty concert hall in Cleveland. Cue up the Cat Stevens and the feels. Seeing the aberration that is the 2015-16 Golden State Warriors in the role of Almost Famous’s manic pixie dream girl (MPDG), Penny Lane, isn’t that difficult.

Like any MPDG, you love her or you hate her. Ask any Cleveland fan for their all-time top five things they hate about the Warriors and they’ll list the same things other fans enjoy: Golden State’s youthful and joy-filled approach to the game, the way Steph Curry chews his mouthguard, and the ease with which they steal hope from a team’s grasp (and at 30 feet no less).

And really, arena rock isn’t that bad of a stand-in for Golden State’s small ball either. A style of play that features the band over the solo act, not to mention the spectacle and showmanship that is almost Globetrotter-esque. The Warriors have been selling out stadiums on the road to a storybook season. At the All-Star break, 48-4, they are the clear favorite to win it all. The small ball lineup of Steph Curry, Klay Thompson, Andre Iguodala, Harrison Barnes, and Draymond Green holds the league’s highest point differential per 100 possessions. And the second best lineup in the league? Just substitute out Iggy for Andrew Bogut.

But here is where the comparison becomes a cautionary tale. Savor the show while it lasts. If the Warriors are the Manic Pixie Dream Team, then in some ways they are just an aberration, one poker game away from being sold to Humble Pie for $50 and a case of beer. The trope of the MPDG is hard to find in the real world, which is what makes the character so appealing and frustrating. They bring you on the adventure but leave you with the disappointment of reality.

Which is not to say that the 2015-16 Warriors won’t go down as one of the greatest teams in history. It is just to point out that when the credits roll on this season, it will be hard to recreate this kind of chemistry, shooting, and coaching on another team anytime soon. General Manager Zach Braff may try to bring Kate Hudson back, but he will ruin rock and roll and strangle everything we love about it.

Stranger Than Jones Fractures

Harold Crick begins his day just like any other, at the bathroom sink counting brushstrokes. And yet something is different this time; it appears his life and innermost thoughts are being narrated by Emma Thompson. Stranger than Fiction explores the question of what happens when you become the victim of your own story? Or, perhaps worse, what happens when the ending of your story has already been written? Harold Crick is an IRS agent who learns he is a character in an unfinished novel by a morbid but critically acclaimed author (played by Thompson). As he struggles to find if he has any control in his life and learns of his imminent death, he uses his last days to pursue his dreams, date an anarchist baker, learn to play guitar, and save a life (even if he has to be flattened by a CTA bus).

Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook aren’t hearing voices in their heads, but with the rate at which their story has been pre-written since the Harden Trade (almost as quickly as it has unfolded), they are understandably frustrated with the tale they find themselves in. The meta-narrative of the Oklahoma City Thunder up to this point may not have as much dramatic irony as Stranger than Fiction, but the tally of unfortunate events have certainly been adding up on the side of tragedy. Since trading away Harden following a loss in the NBA Finals they …

• Lost 4-1 in the second round to the Memphis Grizzlies after Westbrook was sidelined with a knee injury
• Watched Kevin Martin walk away for nothing
• Lost 4-2 to the San Antonio Spurs in the Western Conference Finals, with major injuries to both Westbrook (during the regular season) and Serge Ibaka (during the Conference Finals)
• Traded for Dion Waiters, traded away Reggie Jackson and Jeremy Lamb
• Missed the playoffs in a tie-break with the New Orleans Pelicans after multiple injuries to both Durant (Jones fracture) and Westbrook (hand fracture)
• Fired head coach Scott Brooks
• Signed Enes Kanter to a max contract (in what was largely considered a necessary but not ideal over-pay)

I’ll save you from any further rehashing of the trade. The importance of these parallels to Harold Crick’s story in Stranger than Fiction is to appreciate the world in which Durant and Westbrook live. They are approaching the potential end of the “Post-Harden-Era” Thunder. Kevin Durant will be a free agent this summer and Westbrook in 2017. They’ve only lost to the Warriors once this season, but the Golden State bandwagon is approaching like a CTA bus. And in an irony I’m sure Dustin Hoffman would appreciate, “sources” say Durant could consider joining the Warriors next season.

So what can Durant and Westbrook do?

For one, they may just win, anyways. With as many comparisons as we can draw to fiction, the truth is their story is not yet written. They contested the Warriors closely in an away game earlier this year, and still have two more matchups with Golden State before the playoffs. In fact, the Thunder played the Warriors the closest of any other title contender (see: Spurs or Cavaliers). The Thunder are almost a perfect opponent to Golden State. They have two of the three best players on the court at any time in Durant and Westbrook, which challenges the Warriors’ ability to switch on defense – they aren’t as well-suited for 1-on-1 matchups. And while Kanter is difficult to keep on the court when he can’t protect the rim, the combination of Durant and Ibaka against the Warriors’ pick-and-roll scheme is formidable. Not to mention, for the first time since 2010, the Thunder appear to have their health.

But even if the Thunder don’t win, the lesson to take from a messy and meta-movie like this is the importance of living a story worth telling. Stranger than Fiction asks in some seriously melodramatic terms, if a man is going to die and dies willingly (to save a kid) isn’t he worth keeping around? The Thunder are being written into a tragedy and they know it, but despite this they are a team that has been through a lot together, and those struggles make a really good story. And let’s face it, a Thunder-Warriors series would be a really good story, maybe the best story. I’m sure Westbrook must have a wristwatch, right?