At the halfway point of the season, I put together a best of The D.A.Y., revisiting old writing and it spiraled wildly out of control to an unreadable 8,000 words or something like that. I learn from my mistakes. If you have been following the D.A.Y. this season, you’ve already read the material. This is just a refresher course. The quickest recap of the NBA season you will read anywhere. One thing I have tried to do with the D.A.Y., was make the title a reference to the big game story of the night. Now, I remove the repetitive phrase “The D.A.Y. of” and what you are left with is a summary of the NBA season that you can briefly breeze through and be all caught up for the playoffs. Here it goes, with headlines that don’t make any sense removed, from the opener to today:
The tech
Philly and Atlanta on top
Nellie got his revenge
The Hawks looked like a playoff team
The Mavs finally won and Hornets lost
Vince fell in love with the new ball
Peja went back in time
The Bobcats grew up
The Rockets held on
J.R. Smith outscored Melo
Nash beat Nellie and Nate blocked Yao
Nugget revenge
Orlando and Golden State
Utah and Jersey got Ws and Stephen Jackson got lucky
Kobe’s knee was better
Iverson vs. KG and other depressing events
The Mavs finally lost
Steve Nash dished out 20
The Titantic division sunk even lower
The game of the year (Phoenix at Jersey)
Phoenix copied Dallas again
The Lakers lost Lamar
Bargnani surpassed Darko
Baron vs. Yao
Reflecting on the MSG brawlers
The Knicks and Nuggets responded
Games were played after the A.I. trade
Dirk’s pain
Ron Artest had old man knees
Saved by Foye
Dallas and Phoenix playoff intensity
The return of the new old ball
Iverson lost to Philly
Gilbert from 32 feet at the buzzer
Kobe passed for Barkley and Marv
Sasha Vujacic was better than the best
The Bucks played without Michael Redd
Dallas Mavillainy
Rockets and Wizards supporting casts
Jason Kidd was NOT distracted (by his marital status of course)
T-Mac, LeBron, and Dwight Howard couldn’t do it all
Kobe over the Spurs
Dallas Revenge
The Dallas-Miami Finals rematch
Iverson and Carmelo together
Phoenix West over Phoenix East
Chicago stepped up for Dallas
Michael Finley borrowed Robert Horry’s powers
The Suns ran into KG
The Eric Snow era ended
Jazz without Booze
Separating the Dwyane from the LeBron
Tyronn Lue on Super Bowl Sunday
Nashless Phoenix over Iversonless Denver
The Boston streak hit 15
Giving up on Denver (that was stupid)
41 boards by Tyson Chandler and David West
Gilbert Arenas’s ego wrote checks his body couldn’t cash
The Celtics re-joined the NBA
LeBron over Kobe
We came back from Vegas
Nash made the Suns rise again
The Basketball Gods turned on Pat Riley (and he would in turn respond like a champion)
Ben Wallace was worth the money
Chris Webber ruined Ben Wallace’s return
$hamrock and Celtic upsets (shenanigans?)
Jason Kidd and the sharpshooting Nets
Philly ended the Phoenix reign of terror in the East
Ben Gordon vs. Michael Redd
Yao’s return
Stephon Marbury’s heartbreak
LeBronimance
San Antonio in the never lose club
T.J. Ford and those frontrunning Raptors
The Golden State Warriors ruined everything
Steve Nash won his third straight MVP
The NCAA tourney
Kobe’s 115 points of weekend
Clyde Drexler Danced with the Stars
Gilbert’s roundabout revenge on the state of Washington
60 more from Kobe
Mike Bibby shooting and Ron Artest not retiring
Rasheed’s 60 footer and Dukies dominating the NBA
Grizzly revenge
60 wins already for Dallas
The Golden State Warriors monthly upset
The Pacers beat the Spurs. Whaaaat?
Marcus Camby was king of the class of ’96
The Wizards died
The return of Dwyane Wade
Washington’s anti-climactic clinching
The Clippers refused to die
Playoff clinching and Joey Crawford bigger than the game
T-Mac and Yao won the Big One
And we are caught up. If you feel the need to go back and re-live the regular season excitement, you can always go to the archive and hit previous until you find what you want. Looking back, it seems that I have an unhealthy fixation on the word “revenge.” I blame God of War for that. It is a pretty tight summary of the season, if you were willing to look past anything that happened on Friday or Saturday nights – with the exception of the brawl at MSG. I barely mentioned Portland or Seattle in the headlines.
Aaaaaah! I feel like I had the whole NBA season flash before my eyes. Don’t you?
