Does anyone have that one friend whom they love to praise to friends, and are fascinated by them, only they don't actually like to spend any time with them?  Yeah, me neither, but it sounded like a decent analogy at the time.  But more importantly, that's how I've viewed the NBA over the last ten years or so.  Why is this?  Well, the short answer is Bill Simmons, my favorite writer for the last 8 years who makes an average sports fan want to REALLY care about the NBA.  But the real answer is a bit more complicated...

Well, not that complicated.  Basically, the NBA is the anti-NHL.  More specifically, David Stern has done an unbelievably great job marketing his players in a way that hockey can only dream of, even with potentially 3 of the greatest ever NHL players under 23 years old.  Look, I'm going to watch at most 25 game minutes of the NBA finals, maybe more if the series (unexpectedly) goes 6 or 7 games.  But I find myself absolutely caring about whether Dwight Howard can carry a team to great heights vs whether Kobe can truly stake a claim to being one of the 10 greatest players ever.  Not only that, I've even read enough to have a rational and somewhat nuanced opinion on the NBA finals without actually watching much of it.  (Said opinion: the Lakers are probably going to win, but the NBA is mediocre enough that the Lakers still aren't a good team and that Kobe shouldn't be placed into the Pantheon even with a championship, which they will get in 5 or a painless 6.)  There are two main reasons for this: (actually there's probably more, but this is all that I could come up with right now.  Disagree?  The gods of bloguin gave us a comment section for a reason.)

1.GARY BETTMAN SUCKS AS A COMISSIONER AND POSSIBLY AS A HUMAN: THE NBA IS BUILT AROUND INDIVIDUALS WHILE THE NHL IS BUILT AROUND TEAMS

A lot of basketball experts talk about how basketball is the ultimate team game.  I don't know what this means, and they may be right, but that's missing the main point.  Basketball is a team game.  The NBA is built upon stars.  Basketball is built upon 5 guys working together to score and play defense.  The NBA is built upon one guy driving against 5, occasionally passing to a guy wide open for 3, but usually hoping to get two foul shots and an occasional and-1 when his heave to the basket actually goes in.  The NBA is a world in which Dwayne Wade/Kobe Bryant/Lebron James can get a foul call by making eye contact with a ref and the refs oblige in kind.  Think this happens to the NHL stars?  Ask Petr Forsberg's spleen, which has resided in a Denver dumpster for the last 8-10 years.  And yeah, Crosby and Ovechkin may get some calls, but they've taken their share of checks as well without them all ending up with a power play.

And if you don't think the NBA is built around stars, look at it this way: since Michael Jordan became the greatest ever, every championship except for the '04 Pistons has been won by either Jordan, Olajuwon, Duncan, Kobe, Shaq, D Wade, and the KG/Allen/Pierce combo.  In most of those years, you knew either exactly who was going to win or the 2-3 teams that it would come down to.  But who in the NHL knew that the Devils would win in '95?  Or the Canes in '06?  Or the Lightning in '04?  Yes, the NHL Stanley Cup Champs generally include some great players, but the NHL is much more reliant on role players than the NBA.  And also, the NHL isn't fixed by refs with gambling problems.

2. NO FAULT OF BETTMAN: NBA GUYS ARE WAAAYYYY MORE CAMERA FRIENDLY THAN NHLERS

What attracts more viewers: a 6'9 black dude, or a 6'2 russian with a name you can barely pronounce?  Not to mention that NBA players wear shorts and sleeveless shirts while NHL players wear tons of equipment required to withstand the rigors of massive bodychecks.  Oh, and a big orange ball is easier to spot than a small, saucer-size hockey puck.

In summary, some of the reasons that the NBA is so much fun to talk about, even though it sucks to watch, are things that aren't controlled by David Stern.  But 80% is simply due to the fact that Stern is good at his job and Bettman isn't.

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