The comedian Hannibal Buress has a standup bit where he talks about the segment “Bold Predictions,” where a bunch of guys just make up stuff and aren’t accountable for anything they say.
It’s one of my favorite comedy bits ever, so naturally, there’s no clip of it on the internet to share with you.
But we’re going to borrow from Buress for this issue.
Here are 10 bold predictions for the season, which starts TOMORROW. If 10 of them happen, I’m a wizard and quite possibly a genius.
If none of them happen…well, hopefully, you won’t remember them by the time the season ends.
1. “Russell Westbrook” and “trade” will be uttered a minimum of 1,243 times by sports media analysts.
The Lakers have three players making roughly $784 million this year. Westbrook is one of them, and you know we’re all gonna milk that until something gives.
2. The shorts of at least two players will fall down during a game.
We have options for how this can happen. A player can be going up for a shot and have a defender reach in and accidentally slide his opponent’s shorts down. OR, we can have a player forget they’re in front of 20,000 people (plus millions more on TV) and drop trou to readjust some things, like Lucas Nogueira did in this glorious moment.
3. More than a dozen fans PER GAME will knock over a child trying to catch a t-shirt.
I get this one. Have you seen the prices at the merch shop?! Better yet, use your height over children and catch a parashirt like I did.
4. Twitter will overreact to something dumb every four hours.
Okay, this one’s not bold. It’s just a normal day on Twitter.
5. Brian Windhorst will take 18 minutes to essentially say, “Look out, something is going to happen.”
He came close with his “Why Is That?” monologue about the pending Utah Jazz implosion. I think he can get there this season.
6. We’ll see a minimum of five occasions where one player tries to take a charge on another player, and both players flop.
It’s like “Ring Around the Rosie” in that we all fall down, except basketball isn’t nearly as creepy as the song.
7. One rapper (let’s guess Wale) will make a song that features a pretty obscure NBA player reference (let’s guess Derrick Jones, Jr.).
I guess I don’t really have to explain this one. Make us proud, Wale!
8. Kendrick Perkins will mispronounce a third of the league’s name.
Kendrick Perkins gets a lot of air-time for ESPN, but he also is generally bad at saying names. They don’t even have to be difficult names! Here he is trying to say “Moses Moody” during the NBA Draft. It’s wild.
9. We’re getting to 50 regular-season wedgies, baby!
This is a stat the fine gents at No Dunks keep track of. A wedgie is when the ball gets stuck between the rim and the backboard (because it’s wedged in there, you see). Fifty of them doesn’t seem like a lot, perhaps. But we usually don’t get that many.
10. We’ll get to 300 issues of Crisp Bounce Pass before the season is over.
I just have to continue having Internet access and creative ideas for, like, 37 more weeks. We can do this!
It’s like Young Jeezy once said: “I already got a job, and that’s stayin’ alive.”
What do you think? Do you agree with these NBA season predictions? Do you have some wacky ones of your own? Enjoy all the action!