Men’s Basketball in Decline?
From my earliest memories, the game of basketball was the first sport my parents introduced me to in the early to mid-1970s. I can still smell the aroma of popcorn wafting in the air of Scott High School’s gymnasium as the cheerleaders would occasionally perform a routine accompanied by Parliament’s Flash Light in Toledo, Ohio.
While my parents had no connection to the school, I realized later that they likely attended their games in those early years because it provided a semblance of the kind of experience they had from their secondary school experience in Memphis, Tennessee before relocating to Northwest Ohio shortly before I was born. By the time the Pittsburgh Steelers defeated the Los Angeles Rams in Super Bowl XIV, attending games on Friday nights was second nature.
In that era, basketball was in tumult beginning with the National Basketball Association and American Basketball Association merger, the culmination of the Coach John Wooden Era UCLA Bruins, and the negative public relations the NBA had with some sports fans in the United States. Nevertheless, my father attempted to teach me intricate aspects of the game via personal instruction and attending contests from the NCAA to the NBA.
I remember a specific moment when my dad and his coworker drove me to see his former high school teammate play a game for the Cleveland Cavaliers, The man’s name was Robert “Bingo” Smith; he called him Bobby. When I saw him in person, I was amazed at how tall this man was compared to all of us. Perhaps, the large reddish afro may have made him seem more pharaonic to a six or seven-year-old than reality, but I was also surprised at how pleasant he was towards us. Nonetheless, I spent most of my time watching the Detroit Pistons and Julius Erving’s Philadelphia 76ers for the most part.
During the next phase, I probably learned as much about basketball on the blacktop from my neighborhood friends Dwayne, Richard, and Michael than I did from attending traditional basketball camps at the University of Toledo instructed by Bob Nichols, Stan Joplin, and Tim Selgo or Northern Kentucky University during adolescence. Unfortunately, I did not have personal success in basketball, but I was still very fond of the sport.
There were many years when I greatly anticipated the forthcoming basketball season when professional and college football concluded. I followed players in college as they transitioned into the NBA in a natural progression.
Year after year, this tradition worked until the end of the 1990s. Basketball was evolving into something that I did not recognize years prior. It did not help my appreciation of the NBA when I observed my new hometown team the Atlanta Hawks draft Marvin Williams instead of Chris Paul. That selection symbolized the struggling nature of the franchise for relevance in Atlanta for quite some time.
As for men’s basketball, there has been a noticeable lack of elan that I have had for the game over the years. I was not cognizant of this fact until my good friend (Curtis) from Tulsa, Oklahoma inquired about my feelings about the Men’s NCAA Tournament that would be tipping off in a couple of days. Instantly, I retorted, “Man, I wish I had an idea who these guys were because I do not know any of them. I am more familiar with more women playing college basketball than the men.”
While I was probably being a bit facetious about the subject, men’s professional basketball has become a team version of H-O-R-S-E where some players appear to spend more time shooting from the parking lot while waiting for the big man to become a human version of a Golden Retriever to rebound errant shots only to bring the ball back to the shooter for another long-range attempt. Conversely, the collegiate game is an offensive of most players camping out at the three-point line eagerly awaiting the basketball’s arrival so they can launch it as quickly as possible.
In my current vocation, I have access to a plethora of NBA games throughout the regular season, but I have found myself more enamored with football and the forecheck in ice hockey than anything relating to teams marching toward the postseason. The current iteration of the NBA and NCAA Men’s Basketball just does not hold my attention. I believe I was more aware of certain atmospheric conditions and the names of winter storms as opposed to what happened in the basketball world in recent weeks.
I have noticed that things sometimes seem cyclical; men’s basketball just may be one of the things that fits under this category. Certainly, my perspective may be in the minority. Men’s basketball needs another correction because it has lost a lot of momentum in the last 24 years. If my parents were still living, I doubt they would care much about basketball today either.
