Friday, June 21st, 2019

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Written while listening to Average White Band's Pick up the Pieces

 What the draft needed: More #Ads    

Last night, almost every top pick at the 2019 #NBADraft played part in making their own #DreamComeTrue: getting paid to tweet.One … after … another … sent out slightly varying tweets, after getting drafted at the #NBADraft, from #PaniniInstant, apparently a basketball card #brand.

  Just so you know, folks:

Zion, to the Pelicans: “Can’t wait to get started.”Ja Morant, to the Grizzlies: “Dream come true!”RJ Barrett, to the Knicks: “NYC let’s get it!”De’Andre Hunter, to the Hawks: “Let’s get to work”Jarrett Culver, to the Suns: “Dream come true!”Coby White, to the Bulls: “Chi-Town let’s gooo!”Rui Hachimura, to the Wizards: “Hyped to join the #DCFamily”Cam Reddish, to the Hawks: “What a special night. Such a dream come true.”

  That about rounds out the top-10, with:

Five: emojisThree: dream-come-truesThree: let’s-go variationsOne: player who’s #hyped, and…One: player who just #cantwait to #getitgoing in New OrleansThe only two skipped in the top-10 were Darius Garland and Jaxson Hayes, who must not be #hyped! to promote their very own #NBADraft rookie cards.(#PaniniInstant)So, #let’sgetit! And write those two’s #PaniniInstant tweets for them.Garland, to the Cavs: “Headed to the Land!”Hayes, to the Hawks: “What’s up A-Town!”We realize #SponCon is as old as the influential athlete, but what kind of synchronized, cookie-cutter hell are we entering? (At least they didn’t mess up the copy and paste, like the last two No. 1 picks.)Anyways, let us know #WhoWillYouCollect!

Six non-sarcastic things from draft night 

1. Rui Hachimura, drafted ninth overall by the Wizards, is the first Japanese-born player drafted in the first round. It was also a bit of a surprise. He had never met with anyone from the Wizards. Here’s a nice story on his journey from Japan to the U.S.2. Ja Morant’s dad, AKA Ja Morant’s first hater, came dressed like a 1950s jazz musician. Also, this video of his teammates celebrating Morant getting drafted is wholesome fun.3. UNC’s three draftees had an interesting night: Coby White, ranked 27th in his class last year, went seventh to the Bulls. Nassir Little, ranked third in the same class, went 25th to the Trail Blazers. Cam Johnson, a graduate transfer who wasn’t considered an NBA prospect before his only year in Chapel Hill, went 11th to the Suns. (He’s older than Devin Booker.) White stole the show, losing it when Johnson got drafted and shouting out Roy Williams: “Tell him I daggum did it.” He was fun to watch in college, and he’ll be a bright spot for the Bulls.4. Bol Bol, a mid-first rounder in some mock drafts, ended up going 44th to the Miami Heat, who shuffled him over to Denver in a trade. Bol, Manute’s son, has immense talent and potential but his stringy and injury prone 7-foot-3 frame is likely why he slid.5. Led by RJ Barrett, six players from Canada got drafted last night, the most-ever for our northern brothers and sisters.6. There was an absurd amount of draft picks flying around last night in last-minute trades, most notably New Orleans’ No. 4 pick, acquired in the Anthony Davis trade, which went to the Hawks for the No. 8 and No. 17 pick, plus the salary dump of Solomon Hill. All this led to a few players wearing hats of NBA teams they would never actually play for, which is not a big deal. UNLESS: You’re looking for clicks, like these guys. 

Our savior, Reddit’s NBAStreams

Some people actually pay for a thing called NBA League Pass, which purports to give you access to every game every night for a large annual fee, though it hardly ever works and blacks you out if you want to watch, say, the Celtics while you’re in Boston.To buy that service, for so many years, was laughable, because us NBA hipsters knew about something else: reddit.com/r/nbastreams.It was a massive group with a select few heroes who provided links to HD streams of every game, every night, for free.Sure, sometimes you got ad overlays; frozen streams during the most important moments; creepy x-rated games on the bottom; Women In Your Area Who Want To Meet Up; and other problems, but it was, in almost every way, perfect.Earlier this week, it got shut down. Likely for good, for violating Reddit and the NBA’s something or other.But, in some form, reddit.com/r/nbastreams will be back. Like the Michael Scott Paper Company, the human spirit will not be downed by corporate enterprise. Another, and another, and another, niche NBA streaming community will rise from the ashes.We’ll be the first to tell you when it does.

 Quick Hits

• Marvin Bagley and Damian Lillard are rap beefing, which makes no sense and so much sense at the same time. Here’s Bagley’s response, called Checkmate, to Lillard’s diss, called MARVINNNNNN???

• Does it surprise you that Rob Pelinka is learning the salary cap rules as he goes along?

• Kawhi Leonard was at the Blue Jays game yesterday, which obviously means he’s staying with the Raptors.

• Actually, he fell asleep at the game, which means he’s obviously leaving.

• This nice throwback of Fred VanVleet announcing that he didn’t get drafted to all of his friends and family at his draft night watch party.

 Concrete Reads 

• All your assets belong to the Pelicans now [Deadspin]

• What the Knicks need is out there, but the Nets can snatch it away [New York Times]

• The Pelicans are giving Zion Williamson the future Anthony Davis never had [The Ringer]

 Podcast Pick

NBA draft reactions, Pelicans Party, and the worst NBA owner [The Bill Simmons Podcast]