3 August takeaways and 3 September predictions for the NBA playoffs
I like to make the takeaways and predictions articles about just what is on the court, and I will. But before I get to that I want to use the introduction to talk about the players’ boycott last week. So if you want to skip to the actual basketball portion, that’s fine, but writing a recap of August in the NBA without mentioning a historic moment in league history would be disingenuous.
Unraveling the events that led up to the player’s walkout in a couple of paragraphs wouldn’t be doing it justice, so I won’t do it. But regardless of what you think about what the players did, it was history. It’s the first NBA walkout since 1961 when Bill Russell and several teammates refused to play in an exhibition game after the Celtics’ black players were denied admission to several establishments in Lexington, Kentucky.
Today’s cause is different from 1961, but the actions are similar. Today’s players, just like Bill Russell and his teammates, were willing to risk their financial security and the health of the game to take action for a cause that was more important than the game itself. Regardless of where you stand on the reasons for the boycott, a willingness to make those sacrifices for a cause should warrant everyone’s respect.
And honestly, at this point in 2020, wouldn’t it be more surprising if we went a few months without something unprecedented happening? This is par for the course this year.
On the court, the bubble has already provided some of the most memorable performances in recent playoff memory, so let’s dive in and recap what we saw in August before making some predictions about what September will bring.