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| The Jordan brand "Rise Above" truck parked outside of Greater NC Pro-Am |
1. It’s the
Rucker of the South: You can sit at
home and watch the NBA Summer League games all day and you might catch one or two highlights worthy of recording to your DVR
box. For every game being played at NC
Pro-Am, there’s more than a dozen highlights. For every NBA Summer League game
there’s a a few dozen yawns. It’s boring.
The Thomas & Mack Center and the COX Pavilion are probably two of the best
places this summer to take a nap. Inside
N.C. Central’s McLendon-McDougald gymnasium, on the other hand, there’s so many
highlights happening back-to-back, that if you glance at your IPhone for one
second, you might miss one of NC Pro-Am’s most unbelievable plays.
2. There’s
better music at NC Pro-Am. It’s no secret
that a lot of NBA teams have their own well-known, resident DJs for regular-season
home games. But during the NBA Summer League, there’s probably an amateur DJ who got the gig as an internship to earn some
summer credits at UNLV. Or no DJ at
all. This summer, NC Pro-Am has been
jamming to the sounds of K97.5’s Wade Banner and Brian Dawson, as well as DJ Bobby Drake and it’s resident DJ Coke. The
music stays on during the games and people actually DANCE in the stands. The players dance too. Now, how fun is that?
3. SHEED
(Rasheed Wallace). Because nothing
is more entertaining than watching four-time NBA All Star and Tarheel legend, Rasheed
Wallace run over to the scorer’s table and yell at everyone about how there
should be a shot clock and how much the referees suck. His basketball shoes are gigantic, green and
glossy and he refuses to talk to reporters.
He still plays passionately, catches mean alley-oops, and can still hit
a three-pointer from anywhere on the court.
There are no SHEEDS in the NBA Summer League. There are no SHEEDS anywhere on earth, except
for at NC Pro-Am.
4.
Las Vegas
is overrated. Durham has character. Everyone knows, or at least thinks that Las
Vegas is a fun city, but I’ve never met anyone who’s ever actually wanted to
live there or stay there for the whole summer.
There might be a lot of distractions here at NC Pro-Am (music, food,
women, adorable children) but it’s nothing compared to whatever might be happening
in the gambling capitol of the world at the same time as an NBA Summer League
game. Why would you attend one of those games when you and your friends could
go out on the town and recreate any scene from the movie The Hangover? Maybe this
explains why Las Vegas still doesn’t have a professional sports team. There are too many other fun things to spend
your money on in that city. As the saying goes, “Whatever happens in Vegas
stays in Vegas.” As far as we’re concerned, NBA Summer League basketball can
stay there too.
5. N. C.
Central University—Not since the Jerry Tarkanian era has anyone really
wanted to play basketball at UNLV. Sure,
the Runnin’ Rebels handed the Tarheels an early season loss last year, but that
doesn’t mean that all of a sudden it’s a basketball haven again. It definitely doesn’t mean that people are
dying to go there like it’s Rupp Arena. The NBA Summer League could have picked
better venues. The point is that a
couple of thousand people getting together in the off-season to watch a bunch
of talented collegiate and pro basketball players in a gym on the campus of a
historically black campus holds more sporting and cultural significance than a
bunch of overpaid ballers hoopin’ in the middle of the dessert. You could
consider NC Pro-Am to be a community basketball festival. Sometimes it’s a party, sometimes it’s a
family reunion, but most of the time, it’s a showcase of raw basketball ability
in a gymnasium with more history than the Thomas & Mack Center and the COX
Pavilion combined. Plus, there’s a lot
of people (including black folks) who admit to never have stepped foot on an
HBCU’s campus. NC Pro-Am brings people
of all races to McClendon-McDougald Gymnasium and changes all of that.
6. Michael
Deloach, J.P. Tokoto, Quinn Cook, Jon Hart, Alex Johnson, P.J. Hairston, Marcus
Fisher, Chris Lightner, and Jon Hart.
You might recognize some of those names, but all of those guys have racked
up multiple, jaw-dropping plays at this summer’s NC Pro-Am. Sometimes it’s better to watch up-and-coming
college players and under-the-radar hoopers in freakish, streetball mode rather
than sit through game-after-game of the stuffy, over-disciplined basketball
that the NBA Summer League offers.
7. The
hecklers. At NC Pro-Am, fans have the
right to yell at, harass and tease (within reason) any player they choose. For example, this summer there’s been a crew
of three or four boisterous Duke fans who sit courtside and make it their duty to
try to frustrate UNC’s P.J. Hairston and N.C. State’s C.J. Leslie with whatever
trash talk they can come up with. It’s
NC Pro-Am, so of course, Hairston and Leslie take the opportunity to respond
with their own trash-talking, but their polished, collegiate game and competitiveness usually speaks for itself
when either of them end up dominating the game.
Everyone has fun and the rivalries continue. If you tried this at an NBA Summer League
game, you might get kicked out or thrown in jail.
8. NC Pro-Am
is a free event. Courtside seats at
an NBA Summer League game are nearly $150.00.
They even have the nerve to charge “Juniors” $12. For a
summer league game; at UNLV. This
would be like if any one of this area’s universities (UNC, Duke, N.C. State,
N.C. Central) charged an admission fee to watch their basketball team shoot
around at the YMCA.
1. Our P.A.
announcer, Bill Murphy. If you’ve
been to an NC Pro-Am game, then you’ve heard Bill’s signature lines like pointing
out the “Euro step”, shouting “all out ballin!”, and my favorite, “grown man
ball”. He calls out airballs, bad
free-throw shooting and he takes no prisoners.
Along with the players, he’s the life of the party and he stays
enthusiastic up until the final buzzer of the last game. Not that the NBA Summer League would ever
hire an in-game announcer, but they’d have to hire Charles Barkley for anyone
to care.
