Don't get us wrong: We'd rather be manhandled by a homicidal chimp than forced to sit through a regular-season NBA snoozefest. Bored millionaires. Bored fans. Whirling shot clock.
So imagine our surprise when we we're sitting at a friends house with the All-Star Game and found ourselves watching it. Make no mistake, there was even less on the line than ninth-best in the East vs. 11th best in the West in December. The players cared seemed to care even less than usual.
But freed of the constraints of plodding toward an eventual victory, everybody had a good time. Shaq did some weird mime crap with a dance troupe, then passed through somebody's legs. Wild improvisational passes flying toward the basket, out of bounds.
It had the feel of a college blowout, when the better team puts its scrubs in the game for mop-up, and the starters on the bench whirl towels and slap hands and hoot anytime one of them manages to score (we like those games, because our alma mater is usually on the good side of that equation). Except in this game, everybody was a starter, and there was no Florida A&M on the other side.
We've seen NBA All-Star Games. We remember the Magic Johnson lovefest. We know what they're like. But this time around, at least, it hit the right note. Is it something we can build on in our eternal pursuit of a purer state of fandom? Sure. Maybe we should go buy some Globetrotters tickets.
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