66 Games* The Case Against Counting The 2011-2012 NBA Season

Whenever an accomplishment is attained under highly favorable, questionable or different-from-ordinary circumstances, it’s not readily recognized as being valid.

These extenuating circumstances are usually marked with an asterisk.

There is circumstance no more extenuating than when the entire season of a sport has been affected.

So here we are with a 66-game 2011-2012 NBA season (insert asterisk here).

What are we to make of this very rushed, soon to be 30-team free for all? How valid will the accomplishments of each player and team be? Will the record books of this year stand as any other season, or will they always be talked about on the condition that the abbreviated schedule be simultaneously mentioned?

Fans and analysts alike have talked about the loss of credibility that the NBA suffered due to this past summer’s lengthy collective bargaining process. If that view still holds true now that the season is underway, then the achievements associated with this season will also carry less weight with them.

There is no doubt that an MVP will be chosen and a champion will be crowned, but how will they measure up to winners past?

Let’s say that the MVP race is a close one. Wouldn’t the winner stand to be a little more confident in his selection if those lost games were available to cement his season’s legacy? Wouldn’t fans and voters be a little more accepting if all 82 games played out?

And what about those NBA teams with reputations of starting hot and losing steam down the stretch? What if this shortened season minimized their late-year faltering and allowed them to win an NBA title? Are we really ready to recognize the basketball world champions Memphis Grizzlies or Atlanta Hawks?

Maybe the NBA should start a blitzing advertising campaign to try and stem the fallout that’s going to come with this short season. Stern and company should start trying to convince basketball fans to lower their expectations, really lower them.

The truth is, despite what goes down over the course of this year, it is always be treated like the 1998-1999 lockout year (that actually didn’t start until 1999). Nothing will ever be mentioned about it without first qualifying that it was a season that was interrupted by a drawn-out CBA negotiating that led to one of the most pointless lockouts in sports history.

There is no arguing that the players on each team will come out and play to their utmost (hopefully). But those same players will know that everything they are doing has already been diminished. By season’s end, they will accept it with a grain of uncertainty knowing that they didn’t have every possible opportunity to prove their mettle.

Boston’s “Big Three” have already gone on record as saying everything about this season post-lockout feels rushed and out of rhythm. Surely these are sentiments shared by other players all over league.

Fans should get ready to take a mulligan on this NBA season. Nothing about it will hold much validity when placed in the scope of the entire basketball canon.

Get ready to append every statement made about every result with the phrase, “…in a season shortened by lockout.”