Basketball Blasphemy 2.0: Why The NBA Is Better Than College Basketball

Last year during the NCAA tournament, I committed what some of my compadres called "basketball blasphemy," and said that the NBA is better than College basketball.  I made the case of that a legitimate contingency of NBA royalty (Lebron, Wade, Kobe, and Dwight Howard), the one year in college rule, and a diluted college talent pool allowed the NBA to usurp the college game as the top form of hoops.

This isn’t an indictment of college basketball, by the way.  This year's NCAA Tournament was the most exciting one in recent memory.  Think of the NBA and College Basketball as my two kids.  I love them both but someone must drive the #1 SON Lebaron.  Like I said last year, when Michael Jordan retired from the Bulls after the 1998 season, the NBA lacked star power.  Couple that with a lockout in 1999, some ugly and brutal to watch Knicks-Heat literal slugfests, non-compelling NBA champions like the Spurs, playoff refereeing conspiracy theories (Lakers/Kings, Heat/Mavericks), the Jailblazers, and lack of legitimate rivalries made the NBA seem boring and perpetuated certain myths that College Basketball fans love to use as fact.

The tides began to turn in 2007 however, when Lebron James took a 5^th grade girls CYO team to the finals.  By the way, Lebron was the fifth highest paid player on the Cavs that year.  Who was Number one?  Former Warrior and star of Larry Hughes Headband Night at the Oakland Coliseum, Larry Hughes.  You could tangibly feel Lebron single handedly getting people sucked into the League.  (Footnote, to help direct the sports spotlight towards the NBA and ultimately Lebron during the playoffs, the Golden State Warriors pulled of the greatest upset in playoff history becoming the only eight seed to ever beat a number one seed in a seven game series.)

In 2008, the NBA fixed its lack of a marketable rivalry question by pitting the greatest NBA rivals, Celtics and Lakers, against each other in the Finals.  The series didn’t disappoint either.  The Celtics staged the greatest Finals comeback in Game 4 coming back from 24 points down, five of the six games were decided by ten points or less, Paul Pierce completed the first ever NBA Championship Gatorade dump, and Kevin Garnett did this.

In addition to all of this, the aforementioned NBA royalty joined forces in the Olympics and proved that American professional basketball players do care about winning the Gold for their country.  Team USA went undefeated in the tournament and through their unselfish, tough, and team style of play, the NBA stars of Team USA not only redeemed the faith of America in our national team but proved once and for all that yes, NBA players play hard.

The good will carried on into a 2009 NBA season that provided one of the best playoffs start to finish since 1997.  Just in case you forgot, the Bull/Celtics series went to seven games in Round One (four of which went to OT, OT, 2OT, and 3OT), so did the Hawks and Heat, the scrappy Rockets took Kobe and the Kobetrotters to seven games in Round Two, the broken down Celtics defended their title like champions before losing in seven games to the Magic, Lebron made on of the greatest playoff shots ever, and Kobe finally proved that he could win without Shaq.

But the NBA…

Myth: Doesn’t play hard.

Fact: If you watch an NBA game, yes, there are some teams that don’t play hard night in and night out.  Those teams are the Clippers, Warriors, Nets, Timberwolves, Pacers, and Wizards of the league.  If you watch the Lakers, Cavs, Magic, Nuggets, Hawks, Spurs, Celtics, Mavs, and Rockets you will see teams that play hard.  Casual fans make the mistake of assuming that if the Lakers are blowing out the Nets, neither team is playing hard.  The fact of the matter is, during the first half, the Lakers were playing hard and therefore building a huge lead which enabled them to coast in the second half.  Don’t mistake strategy over the course of an 82 game season versus mailing it in.

In the NBA, teams that don’t play hard don’t go to the playoffs.  The same is true for college basketball.  North Carolina, UCONN, and UCLA are all sitting at home this post season (no the NIT doesn’t count) not because they don’t have the talent but because they could not sustain playing hard during games.  At some point, the resulting losses, affected their over all play and became a theme of their season.

Myth: College players care more.

Fact: While I do respect the crying player shot during One Shining Moment, that doesn’t prove that they care more.  NBA players have to produce to keep a job.  NBA player have to care because if they don’t they wouldn’t be in the league.  The NBA is a business.  Like any other business, they want to optimize their product.  If a team can sign a guy who will do things to improve their on court product, they would choose that guy over a guy who simply cares a lot.  Comparing the types of caring (college=basketball is fun vs. NBA=basketball is a way that I can get paid to have fun) just doesn’t compare.  Plus, they have the NBA Cares program.  Ok, forget I said that.

Myth: People if they had to choose, would rather watch the college basketball over the NBA any day.

Fact: The logic behind the myth is flawed.  The myth asserts that all college in all its forms is better than the NBA.  The NCAA tournament is one of the greatest sporting events of the year, no doubt.  I would rather watch rounds one and two of the NCAA tournament over something like regular season NBA game between the Bucks and Clippers.  However, I would rather watch a Sunday Lakers/Celtics game this year than a Kansas/Kansas State Big 12 Conference game.  You can't tell me that a Northwestern/Illinios Big Ten Conference game is more exciting than a regular season match-up between the Heat and the Bulls.  If you want to compare apples to apples, then ask yourself would you rather watch the National Championship Game of the NCAA Tournament or Game 7 of the NBA Finals?  For my money, the better game is the NBA Finals.

Myth: College basketball is better basketball than the NBA.

Fact: Take the College Gameday game at K-State this year.  It was a great game, fun to watch, had a good crowd, and lived up to the Gameday hype.  The problem I had with the game was the amateur mistakes made during the game that “added to the drama.”  At the end of the game, three bonehead turnovers by Kansas let K-State get back into the game.  Kansas took the ball out of the hands of their senior All-American point guard Sherron Collins.  The results, K-State sending the game into OT.  While watching the game and having no rooting interest, I couldn’t help but be frustrated by lack of basketball IQ shown by Kansas in the last two minutes. 

College offenses also lack the sophistication on NBA offenses.  Yes, everyone appreciate the Princton backdoor offense that teams like Georgetown play but that doesn't mean they are effective.  How did that offense work in the first round?  I would rather have a player that can get to his spot anytime, like Kevin Durant, and work him the ball in a more free flowing offense.

On the flipside, take the Lakers/Celtics game the following day.  The winning shot by Kobe Bryant exemplified exactly why the NBA is better basketball.  With seconds left in the game, the Lakers called timeout and drew up a play to win the game.  They inbounded the ball to Bryant, their best chance of winning, and he started to make his move.  The Celtics countered with Ray Allen guarding Kobe.  Allen was playing good defense on the ball and the Celtics were actively ready with help if needed.  Kobe maked his move, pump faked, and Allen doesn’t go for the fake.  Allen played text book defense, stayed in his stance, had a hand in the face, but Kobe still drilled the shot.  The result, the best form of basketball, when the best betters the near best.  From a fans perspective, you can’t ask for either Kobe or Allen to play harder, the post shot reaction from both players illustrates their obvious level of care, and there is no way that skill level displayed during that NBA game was inferior to the college version.

I will always love March Madness, always.  I will watch as many NCAA Tournament games as I can each year.  I will always tune into a Duke/UNC game or the Gameday Game but overall give me the best the NBA has to offer over the best College Basketball has to offer, any time, even in March.