Being from Boston, my primary interest in sports is presently through the Red Sox. However, this was not always so. My earliest sports memories come not from Fenway Park, but from the old Boston Garden, a historic but run-down arena that was not particularly safe, but which contained the sort of character lacking in virtually every modern arena. From the balcony, I saw the tail end of Larry Bird's career (there's a T-shirt from Larry Bird Night filled with holes sitting in my closet somewhere at home) and the beginning of the end of the Celtic dynasty.
Thankfully, the past few years have seen my return to NBA fandom. If, like me, the NBA bored you to death with progressively smothering (some might say thuggish) defense and offenses overly reliant on isolation, then there's good news: The NBA is back. Teams have remembered that pushing the tempo and off-the-ball movement aren't just fun, but that these tactics can overcome other deficiencies and help them win. Steve Nash has won two MVPs running the show on a finely-tuned offensive juggernaut, and the Warriors are up 3-1 on the Mavericks running a similar style to the "Run TMC" offense Don Nelson used the first time he coached the Warriors.
The explanation for basketball's renaissance comes from a complex assortment of sources. First and foremost, there must be credit given to coaches willing to loosen the reins on their players and simply let them play the most natural style of basketball they can. Perhaps the greatest reason that American football has not caught on elsewhere in the world while soccer remains king is that our version of football is about as scripted as it can be, while their version is fluid and built on improvisation. However, a method like that forces coaches to be nuanced, since there are no plays called, but only strategies designed. Mike D'Antoni of the Sun and Don Nelson of the Warriors (and formerly the Mavericks) challenge their teams to push the tempo, cut to get open and play fluidly.
We can also look at the rise of international players as a reason for the NBA's renaissance. Whether it is Steve Nash and Boris Diaw in Phoenix, Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker in San Antonio (Tim Duncan is from the U.S. Virgin Islands, but that doesn't count in my book), Dirk Nowitzki and DeSagana Diop in Dallas, the rosters of the NBA's best teams are full of foreign names and games. Many of these players manage to shirk the traditional definitions of positional basketball, playing the type of fluid basketball which 10 years ago you would find only on the local blacktop. It might just be my weakness for 7-foot European basketball players, but the NBA is becoming the world's second international game.
I am and always will be a Celtics fan first and a basketball fan second, but the two are much closer together than my feelings for either baseball or football. About half of the teams in the NBA are worth watching on a night-in, night-out basis, which is more than you can say for most professional sports. This season has brought us the continued development of Gilbert "Hibachi/Agent Zero" Arenas, a new level of selfishness out of Kobe Bryant, and the thrill of watching Carmelo Anthony and Allen Iverson share a basketball. Unfortunately, this has caused the spotlight to neglect both Tony Parker replacing Rick Fox as the "NBA player you would least expect to have a celebrity wife who overshadows him," and Mr. Parker's rap video.
Even the Celtics, in all of their current mediocrity, have not been left behind by this basketball renaissance. They may have had the second-worst record in all of the NBA this season, but at least they did it in style. My father, a season ticket holder for just about 30 years, has even had his faith renewed by this season, and the Celtics lost 18 straight games at one point. All that is left to do is wait and pray for the arrival of either Greg Oden or Kevin Durant into my fair city this coming fall (to give you an idea of how excited this makes me, my family is getting a dog this summer, and I am insisting that it either be named Oden or Durant). Now if you'll excuse me, I need to stop watching basketball and do some work. The NBA's renaissance is killing my work habits.
