College Basketball Sucks

            Born in the Valley and raised in the trees

Of Western Kentucky on wobbly knees

With Mama beside you to help you along 

And it's run for the roses as fast as you can

Your fate is delivered, your moment at hand

It’s a chance of a lifetime, in a lifetime chance

And it's high time you joined in the dance

                           Dan Fogelberg 1981

This all started in 1995. And you can blame Kevin Garnett if you want.  He jumped straight from high school to the NBA, and although a few had done it before him, he started a stampede.  Any kid with serious talent made the move.  Although the NBA in 2005 instituted a rule that effectively made high school players go to college for a year, the damage was done.  The quality of play at the college level collapsed, to the point that I found it unwatchable. 

          Every so often, if the national championship game has a particularly interesting storyline, like Duke-Butler, I’ll try to watch it.  This lasts about 10 minutes.  Part of my boredom stems from the fact that as the college game has gotten weaker, the pros have kept getting better and better.  I’m an NBA addict; I could probably name every player in the league.  The skill level is off the charts.  They are athletic freaks, generally regarded as the world’s greatest athletes. 

          The huge majority of starting college players never play a minute in the NBA.  Even the All-Americans are usually mediocre or worse pros.  Most of the rookies struggle in the league.  Look at a typical NBA roster.  No one good stayed in college.  The NBA game is beautifully complex.  This is why all the college coaches who try to coach in the pros get crushed and come running back to college (By the way, this is what happened to Pitino.  Hey genius, you can’t run a full court press in the pros.  You know why?  The players are too damn good.)

Which brings me to the UK-UL national semifinal game this weekend.  I grew up in Louisville, so this one for me brings back good memories.  I love the city, and often go back with my family.  For some strange reason I was the only one of my friends who grew up rooting for UK.  Until 1993.  That's the year I went with some buddies to New Orleans for the final 4.  Kentucky lost in the semifinals, and I have never seen more adults openly crying.  It was embarrassing.  All the pretty girls that weekend seemed to be from the University of Kansas.  We told them we were from Kansas.

But I digress.  Here’s my advice.  Watch the game.  Then watch an NBA game the next week.  You will see things in the first 3 minutes that you will never see in a college game.  Trust me. 

          Am I a basketball snob?  Of course.  I’m not an opera snob, or a ballet snob, or a wine tasting snob, because I know nothing about them.  It wouldn’t matter much if you had me watch the Metropolitan opera or Louisville opera (actually, does Louisville have an opera?), because I probably couldn’t tell the difference.  But like a lot people in the US, I grew up watching basketball.  Anyone who’s watched more than 10 games in their life can spot the drastic difference between the kids and the pros.  It’s like the classic line from Rounders: “If you can't spot the sucker in the first half hour at the table, then you are the sucker”. 

          Look, life's too short to waste time on anything, whether bad sports, entertainment, food etc. Watching college instead of the NBA is like loading up on Spam when you can have filet mignon for the same price, or driving the Chevy instead of the Benz.  There's no laws against it, but why would you?

          Have a good night everyone.

JR