Quotes into the land of unicorns free#

The Freddy Krueger arms, the soft hands constantly around the rim, the quick double jumps, the perfect footwork, the reliable 15-footer, the unstoppable one-handers вЂ¦ IвЂ™ve seen it before! They even have a signature body hair quirk: DavisвЂ™s unibrow and McHaleвЂ™s bushy armpits that doubled as the Bird eraвЂ™s victory cigar. Now, it feels goofy to compare McHale and the Brow when Davis is admittedly a better athlete. HeвЂ™s putting up 30 and 11 and shooting somewhere around 50 percent. And if you threw Vintage McHale on any floundering team and bumped his usage, guess what happens. HeвЂ™s putting up 26 and 11 and shooting 60 percent. Stick Davis in a time machine, throw him on the вЂ™87 Celtics as Larry LegendвЂ™s wingman in McHaleвЂ™s place and give him the ball 28 percent less, only heвЂ™s getting significantly better chances on one of the most creative teams of all time. If Player A played for a shitty team and did more of everything, itвЂ™s safe to say heвЂ™d put up Player BвЂ™s numbers, right? (Just nod so we can keep going.) Well, Player A is Kevin McHaleвЂ™s transcendent 1986вЂ“87 season (when he broke his foot near the end of the year) Player B is 2016вЂ“17 Davis. (If you canвЂ™t tell, IвЂ™m still bitter that Sheed wasnвЂ™t better.) But IвЂ™ve seen you before and IвЂ™m probably seeing you again. ThatвЂ™s not a bad thing - unlike Rasheed, you play hard every game, you actually enjoy posting up, youвЂ™re considerably more coachable, and you donвЂ™t react to every unfavorable call like someone tried to tow your car. Sorry, Towns, weвЂ™re bumping you from the Unicorn Nightclub. That brings us to our current under-25 unicorn candidates: Anthony Davis, Karl-Anthony Towns, Kristaps Porzingis, Joel Embiid and Giannis Antempokonokokoakkokookookoko (from now on, Giannis). True unicorns: Kareem (impossibly coordinated/durable + the unicornish sky hook) Earl the Pearl (unlike вЂ¦ anything) Pistol Pete (same) Doctor J (mutant hands and moved like a ballerina) Adrian Dantley (a 6-foot-3 herky-jerky post-up specialist?) Gervin (unreplicable isnвЂ™t a word, but that was the Iceman) Bird (ditto) Magic (6-foot-9 point guard/genius/leader/never-happening-again) McHale (hold this thought) Hakeem (his backstory and how it helped his hoops game simply cannot be re-created) Barkley Manute Bol (read page 340 of my paperback) Dennis Rodman (canвЂ™t be replicated - and maybe the world is safer that way) Durant (McAdoo crossed with Gervin crossed with Spider-Man crossed with Plastic Man with 25-foot range?) and Westbrook (part point guard, part striker, part running back, part Terminator). But I wouldnвЂ™t wager on any of those things happening again.

Quotes into the land of unicorns free#

(Quick explanation: KobeвЂ™s relatively creepy Jordan impersonation opened the door for another MJ someday вЂ¦ I could imagine another 5-foot-11 scoring prodigy like Iverson who doubles as the leagueвЂ™s toughest m.f.вЂ™er вЂ¦ I could imagine another 6-foot-8 super-athlete like LeBron who never gets tired and plays basketball like heвЂ™s the queen on a chessboard вЂ¦ I could imagine another playmaking magician like Curry with 30-foot range вЂ¦ and I could imagine seeing the Sloan Conference lab create another lefty slash-and-kick playmaker like Harden who scores only on 3s, layups and free throws. Tweener unicorns: Jordan, Iverson, LeBron, Curry, and Harden. Traditional unicorns: Russell, Wilt, Thompson, Dominique, Ralph Sampson, Pippen, Spud Webb, Shaq, C-Webb, Penny, Sheed, T-Mac, Dirk, Yao, and young Blake. So maybe there are three versions of an NBA unicorn: the one we had/havenвЂ™t seen before but might be replicable (the traditional unicorn), the one weвЂ™ll probably never see again (the tweener unicorn), and the one weвЂ™ll definitely never see again (the true unicorn).