Is "Coolness" a Real NBA Skill? Part 1
Let's go on a journey.
It’s currently 3:03 (tell your boyfriend that if he’s got beef) AM on a Friday morning, and moments ago I was extremely close to entering Honk-Shoo City when suddenly a thought seed started to sprout in the creases of my brain. I went to check on it, but it grew legs and ran away from me. I chased after it, down into my temporal lobe, cerebellum, then back up into my occipital lobe where I finally caught it.
I examined the thought, assuming it would be something like “Patrick Star AI Yeat Covers” (that’s what most of my thoughts are like when I’m falling asleep) but was instead shocked by what I found. The thought was this:
WHAT IF BEING COOL IS AN ACTUAL SKILL IN THE NBA?
I stared in disbelief, then I exited my brain and ran to my laptop. I’m writing this to determine whether I actually believe this wandering thought or not. I don’t know who planted the seed of this idea in my brain, but it wasn’t me. Maybe it was Josh Smith. He was cool as hell, but not actually that good of a basketball player. I think Josh Smith Inception’d me.
If I do, in the end, believe this to be true—that being cool is a tangible NBA skill— it will be far and away my most pro-hooper opinion. And if you don’t know what that means… you will never understand how much I envy you.
I am going to ask you four questions.
Question #1: Is momentum real in a basketball game?
If you answered yes, then keep reading. If you answered no… please also keep reading. I’m trying my best to grow this Substack and the market is very crowded so I need all the support you can give even if you don’t always agree with me.
Ahem. Sorry.
Question #2: Can a big momentum shift actually change the outcome of a game?
You still with me? I don’t think we’re too radical yet.
Question #3: Momentum has to start somewhere, right?
That one is veering off into the abstract a bit, but still… not too crazy.
Question #4: Does how momentum starts greatly impact the level of influence momentum can have on a game?
Ultimately, our entire investigation might hinge on our answer to question four.
I hope you took a second to let those questions percolate in your brain a bit. Now, I’m going to present you with two scenarios.
Scenario A: You’re at an NBA basketball game (nice, congrats.) The home team is down by 11 points with nine minutes remaining in the fourth quarter. The home team’s star player (we’ll call him Player A) is a blazing quick young point guard who takes some questionable shots but always gives maximum effort. He just missed a 19-foot jump shot. The next time down the floor, he misses a three. The next time down the floor, he turns the ball over. Then, after three disastrous possessions, he slows down his dribble at the top of the key before releasing a lightning-quick first step to his left and beating his defender by half a step. When the defender recovers, Player A rips off a crossover, completely breaking off the defender, sending him flying past the baseline. Player A then hits a midrange jumper (a requirement after an ankle-breaker) and the crowd is sent into a frenzy. Everyone forgets about the misses and the turnover. The home team is now down by nine.
Scenario B: You’re at an NBA basketball game (nice, congrats.) The home team is down by 11 points with nine minutes remaining in the fourth quarter. The home team’s star player (who we’ll call Player B) is a methodical veteran who is never flashy and always makes the right decision. He just missed a 19-foot jump shot. The next time down the floor, he hits a 16-footer from the elbow. The home team is now down nine. The next time down the floor, Player B drops off a great pass to the team’s center who lays the ball in. The crowd is excited— not delirious, but excited nonetheless. The home team is down seven points.
Which player would you rather have on your team?
If you’re picking Player A, you are of the mind that coolness is a real NBA skill.
Here’s the thing; Player B is undoubtedly making better plays; on three possessions, he goes 1/2 with an assist. Player A, meanwhile, our flashy young guard, went 1/3 with a turnover on four possessions. Plus, Player B’s team is down just seven, while Player A’s is still down nine.
And still… I won’t blame you if you’d rather have Player A on your team!
Okay, now let’s think back to question four.
If we believe that how momentum is established greatly impacts the influence that said momentum has on a game, then Player A might even be an obvious pick. He established momentum with a jaw-dropping, highlight-reel play, no matter that his three prior possessions were fruitless. Thus, if we think that the cooler a play is, the more momentum a team gains, and more momentum = better chance of victory… then we’d probably want someone like Player A on our team.
Choosing Player A is intentionally picking a worse player because his coolness, theoretically, gave his team a better chance to ultimately succeed, even though it comes with serious baggage along the way. We’d be arguing that because Player A made a cool play and swung the momentum of a game rapidly and with explosiveness, he has thus helped his team out more by changing the feeling of a game than Player B did by actually producing more plays with a physical, tangible, positive outcome.
But that’s crazy, right? Choosing an erratic player over a more reliable player for the sake of some metaphysical idea?
Maybe!
Let’s look at the other side, then. Player B didn’t do anything flashy in his scenario, but he was objectively more productive. If you don’t think how momentum starts is important to the outcome of a game, then you’re probably aghast that anyone could choose Player A. If you’re pro-Player B, you’re a basketball materialist. You think nothing exists outside of the actual on-court events a player is involved in, and that how and where things “start” is irrelevant.
Phew. We’ve kind of gone off the rails here.
Here’s what I think: momentum is hard to measure. But at the end of the day, isn’t a single cool play that kickstarts momentum more meaningful than a series of plays that slowly turn the tides of a game? Wouldn’t that series of plays feel like they were building towards something, while the single, incredible play is the thing being built towards? Wouldn’t you just rather have that, immediately? Or could you even call it immediate if, like in our scenarios, we had to endure multiple missed shots and a turnover before we got there?
Truthfully, I don’t know the answer to those questions.
At the moment, I’m leaning towards the fun, erratic, explosive player. I know that every statistic will probably try to convince me otherwise, but… I can’t help it! We’re here to have fun, right?
To be continued…
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