The ongoing negotiations between NBA players and team owners is killing the basketball season. Why can’t they hash out their differences on the court? At least that’d give fans something to watch. While we anxiously wait for LeBron James to punch his timecard again, here are things you can do to keep your basketball excitement high during these dark days:
1. Watch basketball game reruns on ESPN Classic. After all, if you didn’t actually see the 1992 match between the USA Basketball “Dream Team” and Lithuania, you couldn’t possibly guess how it ended. Perhaps Michael Jordan, Larry Bird and Charles Barkley all had a simultaneous off-night. That would have left just Magic Johnson, Patrick Ewing and Karl Malone to defend a somewhat less invulnerable United States!
2. Play the classic video game NBA Jam. In a real basketball game, you don’t get to control the action and players never set the ball on fire, except when Dennis Rodman did that in 1996 to promote his MTV talk show. You also can’t unlock President Clinton and Al Gore while watching a real basketball game. Of course, real basketball has the benefit of being real, which is always gonna be hard to top, but there you go.
3. Install a mini-basketball hoop in your bedroom or office. Who needs the pros with their lifetime of acquired skills and fantastic physical abilities? Have your own hoop dreams for just $15 at Walgreens. You’ll pack-in a couple minutes of solid fun before getting extremely bored. Then get upset when a friend or coworker dunks the ball and breaks the f***ing thing – just like you’d be upset if your favorite team lost in real basketball!
4. Enjoy a delicious basketball shaped cake. Slam a sweet treat into your mouth-hoop to fill the hole in your heart. You can get a basketball cake at your local grocery store and sweatpants to expand into at your local Target or K-Mart. For a more healthy meal, try drawing basketball lines onto an orange. Then peel the skin off the decorated orange and eat the orange. Life is meaningless.
5. Sit in a corner, get drunk and mutter to yourself until the goddamn lockout ends. This has been a very popular option among b-ball fans. Just don’t let it devolve into full-fledged crying.
Whatever you do, refrain from watching other sports.
Geoffrey Golden is Editor in Chief of The Devastator, “The Quarterly Comedy Magazine For Humans,” in comic book stores across the country. Header via, 2.
