LAS VEGAS — Doc Rivers stopped himself from launching into a full-on speech — part Baptist preacher, part exasperated coach — talking about the simplicity of basketball, the simplicity of this NBA Cup.
“I’m not going to get in the stands,” Rivers said Saturday. “But I just think, and they will (blame this) generation, but I try not to do that, but to accept the challenge. We often run away from challenges.
The Milwaukee Bucks coach wasn’t talking specifically about his team with “We,” but about basketball culture as a whole. In many ways, gamers have become too cool to try, and something as physically and emotionally draining as exposing yourself is seen as a black mark, a reason to ridicule gamers. “Trying hard” is ridiculed in certain spaces, perhaps in small but noisy corners of basketball discussions.
This is why the Milwaukee Bucks overtook the Atlanta Hawks in the NBA Cup Finals, which take place Tuesday night in Las Vegas, and perhaps even why Warriors coach Steve Kerr was so dismayed by the ridiculous call at the end of his team’s loss in the round of 16 against the Houston Rockets on Wednesday.
Both coaches haven’t been afraid to say it, even though it’s not a playoff series or playoff game, and it can easily be forgotten by the All-Star break when the regular season really settles into its usual froth, but it’s high-competition stakes worth investing in.
“Let’s put our name out there publicly,” Rivers said. “We will try to win it. If we don’t win it, we don’t win it, but… there’s nothing wrong with saying you want to win something, and if you win it, great, and you don’t have it Well, at least you went there. .”
It’s an attitude that permeates the playoffs and must-win games, but not on a Tuesday night in December, when the playing field isn’t a monstrosity and is just a regular old logo.
Yahoo Sports caught up with Rivers shortly after he finished his press conference Saturday night to ask him to expand on those comments.
“I thought last year a lot of teams were saying, ‘Yeah, I don’t know (about the Cup.)’ This year I like it because more and more teams are saying: ‘We want to win it.’ If you lose, you say, ‘Well (it doesn’t matter)’ I don’t want that problem.
This feels like a fear of failure, which seems to go against every way players are wired before reaching that level. But it exists.
“Yeah, absolutely. If you don’t say it and it doesn’t happen, no one says anything,” Rivers continued. “I just think competition, you can’t surprise it, you have to accept it, accept it and want it. And if you do that, you have a chance to win.
The teams that meet those standards are the ones that end up winning, he said. When the word “responsibility” was mentioned, Rivers was seething.
“That’s the word,” Rivers said. “When you do that, accountability comes into play, and that’s a good thing.”
This is what the NBA needed for this four-day getaway. More than they needed from Steph or LeBron — although finding LeBron seems harder than finding Waldo or Carmen Sandiego at this point — because the NBA has no shortage of star power.
We know who the players are, and in some cases they are overexposed simply by the way modern media works. And sure, the NBA has to have a contingency plan for the day LeBron retires or Steph leaves maybe not far behind him, but that’s not why the NBA Cup exists.
The star power here helps, but all four teams made it to Vegas because they prioritized winning and made ruthless competitiveness part of their DNA. Rockets coach Ime Udoka is giving no quarters or no effs, and that message is echoed by Dillon Brooks, Amen Thompson and Tari Eason as well as the entire roster. The Oklahoma City Thunder, even when they were losing a lot of games, were still a team where you couldn’t just show up for an easy night.
The Atlanta Hawks and Bucks put together an entertaining and competitive 48 minutes in the first semifinal, and the NBA world needed to see it. Giannis Antetokounmpo was diving on the floor looking for loose balls, and it felt like the stakes were higher.
The Bucks have needed that competitive fire for a while now, and after a year of struggles due to coaching changes and a rough start to the season, they are now in much better shape. Bobby Portis is the face of that fire.
“We welcome constructive criticism, not only from our coaches, but we monitor ourselves,” Portis told Yahoo Sports. “I think that’s the biggest turnaround of our season, man, is coming together and watching each other. As a player, you know when you’re not doing well. You know, when you don’t make that extra effort, like, “Hey, bro, come on. Hold each other accountable and play happily.
That’s Portis’ fuel, and he’s learned when to harness it and when to unleash it. Even though his skills evolved until his 10th grade, he knows he’s in the league because of that extra thing he brings to the locker room.
He was never too cool to compete, too cool to care.
“It’s a little tricky, because I’ve always been a kind-hearted guy,” Portis said. “I never really let the failures affect my efforts. I always make an effort. You can be a giver or a taker of energy, and I always give to the team.
This permeates and allows you to challenge your teammates when this effort is not reciprocated. Like him calling his team last year when Adrian Griffin was coach, and he pleaded for more.
He had the capital to do it, and it took him a few years to realize he could do it. And while it was received as is on the outside, it was clear that a level of truth was needed in the locker room.
The NBA doesn’t really have a competition problem, but rather a perception problem. The perception that it takes a tournament to bring out more than just the usual moves, the perception that players don’t care as much as players of past eras.
Fighting cool is probably the simplest answer.
