"Friday" by Rebecca Black is Actually Alright

Listen, I know as well as anyone that this is a basketball blog where we make dark, semi-literary vignettes about Richard Jefferson. Right now we're in the middle of documenting - to the possession - what happened to the Spurs against the Grizzlies, a complex, winding tour through marginal athletic advantage and its sometimes gigantic consequences in the legacy of professional athletics. I know all that.

But I just wanted to say that "Friday" by Rebecca Black is an alright song. It gets tons of bile towards it - somewhat justifiably, considering it's one of the simplest, most banal songs ever written, and doesn't say much of anything. It's entertainment at best. On the other hand, when did it pretend to be anything different? It's a melody, some lyrics, and a little bit of flashy image for teenagers. That's all it is, and if you're looking for more, then you're not going to find it.

Spurs-Grizzlies Game 2 - Part 2

Today we finish up the first rotation of the game. Everyone is still in the same place they were yesterday. Same exact players. Zach Randolph is no wider; Tim Duncan no thinner. Richard Jefferson no taller; Manu no less tenacious.

9:02 4-6

I was watching the Spurs-Knicks series a few weeks ago, and there were a couple hilarious Spurs possessions where no one was doing anything on offense, so much so that the announcers were vocally complaining before the possession was over. And then, with just seconds left on the shot clock, Tim Duncan still managed to drive to the basket or hit a high-arcing shot over his defender. It was really funny until I remembered this series, in which Zach Randolph did the exact same thing over and over. And his defender - usually that pinnacle of class (and legitimately skilled as a man defender) Antonio McDyess - could do nothing.

Spurs-Grizzlies Game 2 - Part 1

Introduction

As part of Pearls of Mystery's ongoing commitment to "stretch the game out; etch your [own] name out," we're going to be deconstructing the heck out of the Spurs-Grizzlies series.  The goals here are several, most of them federal:

1. Improve my ability to analyze basketball on a strategic level
2. Improve my knowledge of various star players and their actual contributions to basketball games, and 
3. Improve my communication and research apparatus of the above

So we're going to do look at every single possession of Game 2.  Some of these are going to be forgettable, especially in garbage time (after one rotation I eminently understand how the old saw "right way to play the game" has quite a bit of evidence), but even when a possession itself is broken or boring, oftentimes a string of possessions will be interesting and coherent.  So part of the challenge for me is to break it up into "possessions" at some times and "flows" at other times.  Will it drag on?  Yes, but after the first game or two like this, I'm going to switch this mode of analysis into 3-8 minute sequences deconstructing incredible runs or incredible breakdowns, or just basketball at its starkest and most stylistically interesting (for example, the Miami collapse in Game 2).

12:00, First Quarter, 0-0

The first possession of Game 2 is a startlingly elegant set play by the Spurs. Sebastian Pruiti shows perfectly a more extreme (and decisive) example of this play, but this more workaday possession is still a beaut.

After Duncan wins the tip, the Spurs and Grizzlies start with an insultingly simple defensive and offensive set-up reminiscent of a tic-tac-toe game gone wrong. I am insulted by this simplicity, Tim! Antonio McDyess stands in the high post (guarded by Zach Randolph) while Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Richard Jefferson, and Manu Ginobili stand around the perimeter. This is straightforward in every sense except that Tim Duncan has the ball.

The Grand Plan

Here's the plan: I'm starting a new NBA blog with a friend - a rather smart fellow, I might add - slated for the beginning of October, and being that he is quite literally a statistician out east and I am trained mostly in mathematics, it will be more statistically-inclined and prone to player descriptions and my (actually quite competent) book reviews. We've been wanting to do this for a long time: even *shudder* devoting an entire blog to his alma mater's sports, Duke, as a longform test run.

What does this mean for your old pals at Pearls of Mystery? Statistically, nothing, unless you are me. What does this mean for Pearls of Mystery? Well, to put it bluntly it will probably skew towards the longer end of character sketches, like before, but more so. About two-fifths of what I write about basketball receives the intensive editing of a post I really develop, and three-fourths of that actually ends up being reworked and posted here. So you're getting 30% of what I write now; in the future you might be getting 20%: the longer two-thirds of what remains. The good news - from my perspective - is that I have an extra 20% (in addition to the 30% I post here) which really doesn't belong here in general - basketball book reviews belong so much more on this other site that I have deliberately held back on them. Links posts on Pearls of Mystery, you ask? Don't make me laugh. Because this suggestion itself has done it to me.

Tim Duncan Player Description - The Crowning

A friend of mine on a certain private forum has for some months been taking on the absurd task of describing in great detail every single substantial player in the NBA, from rotation players to superstars. He has a bit more experience with many of these players than I do. But today he's covering Tim Duncan, our mutual favorite player. And, being that this is a basketball blog which has had at its emotional center The Big Fundamental, I think I should do the same here on Pearls of Mystery. And for the last week I've been trying to think of what to say, even writing a secondary post to bolster the argument in favor of Tim Duncan's era (and by extension, in favor of Duncan himself). So, for a few absurdly long posts, I'm going to talk about Tim Duncan: his playing style, his personality, and today, his simple, raw success.

In sports, the bare facts aren't so meaningful without context - the name Bill Russell next to that freakish number of titles, the video game numbers from Wilt's great 1962 campaign, Jordan's clipped parabola six-peat, and 72-10? They show a great deal of historical imbalance in favor of those players and teams, sure, but I could probably win 11 of 13 championships against third-graders, and so could you. By myself. No, we have to ask: were these players conquering historically great times or stealing titles from historically weak times? This is relevant because how you see the last decade in the NBA should naturally determine (to great extent) just how you choose to view Tim Duncan's four titles. I mean, it's a good question: are these four titles mere low-hanging fruit - transitional years in a transitional era - or are they representative of a historically great player conquering historically great opponents?

Everyone Needs To Know About This One Joke Tom Lehrer Made in 1959

Quite apart from basketball, I have a lot of different interests. I have a tendency to wear my mind up my sleeve. I have a history of losing my shirt. It's been one week since I blogged at you. I like music a great deal, is what I'm trying to say. I like jass bands, rappers, rock-'n'-rollers, and vaudevillians. I especially like Tin Pan Alley and Broadway. I'd give a pretty penny for the tenor at the Met; I'd give a quarter for a Cole Porter lyric and three for a melody by Strauss. "It's smooth! It's smart! It's Rodgers! It's Hart!"

On the lighter side of music is outright parody: Weird Al, that band that recorded "No Pigeons" in response to TLC's "No Scrubs": Yes, the list goes on of bands I don't listen to, not even a little. But parody - when mixed with a real capacity for ironic distance and a sincere musicality - has the chance to transcend its object. Tom Lehrer is one such parodist. You may remember his hilarious "New Math" but he took on any number of odd intellectual and political subjects in his few songs: folk music* ("Folk Song Army"), an optimistic interpretation of nuclear holocaust ("We Will All Go Together When We Go"), and even overzealous songwriting ("Clementine"). This latter is what I'd like to talk about.

*Probably his most scathing pronouncement was that "Little Boxes" was the most sanctimonious song ever written. Heh.

Tim Duncan Contemplates a 2003 Nets Fast Break

It's the Spurs-Nets Finals. Manu catches and shoots a three without moving his head or legs. Long story short, Richard Jefferson, Jason Kidd, and Kenyon Martin are on the break against only one player - Tim Duncan. Kidd has the ball.

Heh. I wish David Robinson were in the game. It's always fun smothering an offensive possession with the Admiral. I wonder if that's what the Navy is like, all just sailing to other countries and stopping them from becoming too offensively powerful. I wish I knew more about politics.

Well, I guess I'm back on defense. I wish someone else were here to help. I guess I'll have to handle it myself. Hmm, I'm in pretty much the right position, being on the corner of the paint. I wish I knew what this spot was called after all these years. Maybe it's the elbow. It has some kind of a name. I'll find out later. After all, my concentration is the only thing that stands between Richard Jefferson and a basket.

Confession Time

I'd like to make a few confessions on behalf of Pearls of Mystery. In the course of writing a blog post, numerous sins of the writer tempt me at every turn. Like, there was this one time I convinced my alcohol-neophyte friends to mix Dr. Pepper and Irish Cream*. Still other times I have had to break someone's leg. I dont remember why or if it had anything to do with writing a blog.

*actually quite tasty, though the tasteless slurry on the bottom would make it unsuitable for a general drink.

But the worst thing I've ever done is definitely that time I tried to break someone's leg. Wait, no, that wasn't me. And even if it was, I don't think that had anything to do with the blog.

In fact, I've never really done anything bad on this blog. But I haven't done anything good, either. Now my task is simple: I just have to do something good without doing anything bad, and I will be tied for the best blogger in the world according to efficiency metrics. Then I just have to keep writing neutral and good things, so that I climb steadily up the usage chart.

Onward!

Still Crazy After All These Two Years

Walk on, walk on, with hope in your heart
And you'll never walk alone

~"You'll Never Walk Alone," from Carousel

I'm afraid they have made the play far too sad. I doubt whether anyone will pay $6 for tickets to have their hearts completely broken.

~Lawrence Langner, on Carousel


As Paul Simon might say, we at Pearls of Mystery (okay, it's just me) are "Feelin' Groovy" and not just because we're kickin' down the cobblestones and looking for fun. You see, it's been two years since the Inception of this blog. I can hardly believe it.

I realize this blog entry is going to be a bit pretentious, but I put a lot of work into this blog and it feels like a good time to write a reflective "legacy" post, as unreadable as this will be for most of you readers. It's been 2 years, and I've written 75 things, and most of them are pretty long (and which very rarely had unjustified noise, for all my fixation on random bullshit). In fact, in the aggregate, I've written the equivalent of a long novella or a short novel (quite a bit more than 50000 words, probably closer to 60000 to be precise). And you know what? That's kind of how I actually see this blog: as some sort of perpetually-evolving, timestamped log of my personal development from this part of my life. A novel, told through its author's vignettes, of narratives yet unknown to me. A semi-fictional autobiography with no knowledge of the ending.

Synecdoche: 2001 All-Star Game and Relative Conference Strength

I’ve always found the relative strength of conferences and divisions to be such an interesting topic. The separation between "conferences" is starkest in baseball: There are two basically independent leagues with rare regular season offerings between them. We also get an All-Star Game and the World Series between the two leagues. For this reason, the World Series - for all the wonderful sabermetric tools - seems to me somewhat mysterious going in, the term "mysterious" going well beyond "unknown".

In NBA basketball, on the other hand, both Finals teams have generally played one another twice, and against the other team's conference fully 30 times. A lot of games (generally 450) are played between the conferences in the NBA. Because of this, strength-of-schedule ranking methods have a solid chance at giving us info about the relative strengths of conferences. While we might not know what to expect, we can make empirically plausible predictions in an extremely direct and simple way. "This team is 6-23 against the West, I'm pretty sure they'll lose in the Finals by an average of 5.4 points against the best team in the West right now, based on this graph here." If you're wrong, there's probably going to be some good reason for it, either an overestimate or an underestimate of someone's efficiency or shot volume or a certain play-call. Then again, few picked Dirk from the first round onward, so maybe our speculation is not so reasonable.

Ideal Job Offer

John: So, I can write whatever I want about basketball, sir?

Interviewer: Yes, John. We think this is going to be a great collaboration, and we’re pretty sure we want you. I just have a few more questions for you, before we hand this job offer to you.

J: Okay. Can we go over the salary terms again, sir?

I: Of course. With a broad brush, we will be paying you one hundred thousand dollars per year to write whatever you want about basketball, in any quantity, for the next five years. It’s a guaranteed contract with options to leave after every six months without any penalty, and with marginal penalty otherwise. You have to write for our company, but you can write for other companies while you are writing for us, so long as you aren’t reproducing material between publications. You can work from home, and have any hours. All we ask is that when we are promoting your work, you attend promotional events specifically for your work. We’ll handle food, transportation, and so on to get you there, and we’ll give you at least two weeks' notice before any such event. There is a monthly video-conference that of course can be attended from home. You will also receive a 20 percent royalty on ad revenue to your blog and published works that are sold under your name.

J: I know this is a bad negotiating move, but I am extremely satisfied with all of that, sir. This is a dream job.

I: Call me Dave, John. Yes, it is very generous, which is why we’re confident you’ll accept. I would just like to ask you a few questions before we offer this.

Where the Wind Comes Sweeping Down the Plain

1. The Move

The fortunes of the Spurs ownership sort of collapsed in 2012, not into dire straits but into a place where owning a team was suddenly an unaffordable luxury. So, even as their team arrested time for an improbable fifth championship, their owners could talk privately only about what the title would do for the selling price. The celebration was outfitted with the second-best champagnes and rings of 80% gold. And they announced, a couple months after the Riverwalk title strut, that Tim Duncan would not be resigned. Gregg Popovich, still regarded as an elite coach, left with him. The other expiring contracts left as well, leaving the Spurs more or less depleted, at once in rebuilding mode. Most of us thought Tim was going to retire, and the TV networks in the area devoted considerable space to tributes for a few days. Then he and Popovich signed absurd 5-year contracts with the Oklahoma Thunder. It was a period of sadness, but no one in San Antonio could really complain about their lot. It was just something that happened, albeit something strange and unfortunate. So everyone was on good terms when the airship of Duncan and Popovich sailed the Texas land-sea up to Oklahoma on gossamer wings in the clouds. From the windows the two saw banners at the airport they'd left behind, thanking them for all the memories and titles. Of course, they wouldn't see my car until they had landed.

See, at this point I'd been a mop-boy for the Spurs since 2009. Alas, the Spurs were downsizing and mop-boys were as a rule not retained: In a revolution, the mop-boys are always the first to be destroyed. Once I'd heard about Duncan and Popovich, though, I decided immediately that I would follow them to Oklahoma and see if I could parlay my experiences with the Spurs to get a mopping job with the Thunder. So for a solid hour I packed my things into my car and I was off. I was an adult for the first time, so I could and would make my own choices from now on, according to my family. Thus debriefed, I immediately chose the route that seemed most familiar to where I had just been, because that wasn't so bad. That was what I was looking for in the Thunder job. Also, as a basketball journalist, Tim's northern migration was the most interesting story in basketball, and I wanted to be on the ground level for the exclusive story. All the tape recorders and notebooks took up almost my entire car. All my lap was filled with food and toiletries and I went to Oklahoma.