NBA Recap: Euphoria
Wassup y’all! Ya boy (it me, ya boy) is back with another recap. The first round of the NBA playoffs are complete, and the Association has eliminated half the teams. Here is where the real contenders are revealed. And here is where some team’s season goes from good to very good and promising, while others still will have underachieved despite winning a postseason series. But while all of that is true, I would like to discuss a season-long arrival that appears to be culminating with a superstar entrance in these playoffs.
Minnesota Timberwolves All-Star guard Anthony Edwards has more than announced himself as ready to ascend to the top of today’s NBA. Earlier in the year, he was already ordained to take, “The Leap,” which is that jump from good young talent to potential All-NBA perennial selection. With an infectious smile atop a relentless aggression has a lot of the basketball world rooting for his success. The Ant Man is embracing the role of being the destroyer of worlds, invoking (very unnecessary) comparisons to all-time great shooting guards of yesteryear.
While those comparisons are a setup for disappointment if Ant’s career doesn’t include enough winning to whatever our subjective expectations are, the reason why the comparisons are made is because of Ant’s relentlessness. For those of us at a certain age, Edwards restores the feeling of an NBA that enchanted us as youth. Part of the nostalgia rests in us as have being able to feel the competitive drive coming off the star players. As Bomani Jones puts it, “We need to know who wants it.” Anthony Edwards wants every responsibility that comes with being at the top of the game. The viciousness needed to forcibly dethroning those at the top, the respect of working hard to improve and hone his natural talents, the moxie needed to be marketable and visible to casual fans, and the arrogance of knowing his time is now even if he isn’t the best player yet are all things Ant embraces. His swagger comes from the understanding that he is still ascending. That is how he’s able to trash talk living legend Kevin Durant, who is Ant’s favorite player as he was helping sweep Durant’s Suns in the first round. Edwards has that feel good it factor—the kind that uplifts an entire franchise, and thus, league. Though only 22 years old, he is clearly the vocal leader and the team goes as he does. Veteran Mike Conley Jr might be his confidant and wise counsel, but Ant is the don on the Timberwolves.
As the Wolves take a commanding 2-0 series lead over the Nuggets as the series shifts to Minnesota, Edwards’ arrival is being canonized by his postseason performances. Currently averaging over 30 points per game and bringing that ferocity on both offense and defense, the Ant Man has fast-tracked Minnesota’s timeline to contention. We no longer view the Rudy Gobert trade as a mistake, as Wolves President Tim Connelly apparently made the move knowing what the Denver Nuggets would eventually be since he was their GM for nearly a decade. But it all connects with Edwards’ and his meteoric rise. Without it, the Timberwolves are a middling team, maybe contending but mostly riding the wave of “what if” that then has fans ambivalent to how their seasons go. Now, more eyes will be on Edwards to see if he fully reaches what our anticipatory excitement desires him to become. Hopefully on our end, we let him become the first Anthony Edwards and not the next “almost-made-it” of a previous legend. Comparisons are sometimes fine as reminders, but we must remember that those comparisons can rob us of this joy and euphoria we feel whenever we watch Ant play.
It’s time for some Till Takes!
The Pacers lost the game, but forward Obi Toppin pulling off an Eastbay dunk, in game, against his former team that didn’t want him, is an incredible moment for him. Though I have technically chosen a side in this series, I hope every game is as electric as Game 1.
We have had one Game 7 so far, and it was the series that I would guess garnered the least excitement: Orlando and Cleveland. Cleveland rallied from a double-digit first half deficit and prevailed behind 39 points from Donovan Mitchell and unfortunate shooting from Orlando’s Franz Wagner. It was their first playoff series win without LeBron James in over 30 years. They now match up the top seed Boston Celtics, where the consensus is that it’ll be a short series for Boston. Hopefully we are wrong and get as much entertaining basketball as possible.
As much as the NBA allowing coaches to challenge a couple plays in a game was a necessary addition to the game, the officials being excellent is just as necessary. The reason why is because no coach wants to waste a timeout, right or wrong to challenge the call, if said call was obvious. That places more pressure on the coaches to pay attention and less pressure on the refs to be excellent more often. Everyone makes mistakes, and excellence does not require perfection. But the officials are most responsible for maintaining the structure of the game, and that includes being better without using the challenge system as a crutch.
That’s it for this recap. The WNBA season is so close and we’ll definitely have words on that next time.