When the NBA season ended I'm sure a lot of NBA fans may of thought that, with the number of superstar free agents down, that there wouldn't be as much drama going on into the off-season. Especially none that would rival what basketball fans went through last summer (The Kobe Bryant Trade Situation). Surprisingly this has not been the case and some of the credit for this should go the the media.
The summer began with a number of online and television coverage. Everything from what it was like to be a number one or two overall pick to what the draft prospects did in their spare time and at workouts. Fans knew almost everything there was to know about the top prospects in the draft and the top websites and sports media outlets provided that.
After that we had the Seattle Sonics fans getting their hearts ripped out due to their owner winning the case against the city and gaining the right to move the team to Oklahoma City. That caused many columnists and former NBA players and fans to be in an uproar. Not to mention a lot of people felt sorry for Seattle.
Then the real interesting things began. This off-season is filled with storylines that could rival the professional wrestling and many soap operas. We had a betrayal story with Elton Brand leaving his former team, (LA Clippers) to go to the Philadelphia 76ers. We had the LA Clippers taking Baron Davis from the Warriors and the Warriors retaliating by signing the Clippers guard Corey Maggette. These headlines plus the fact that websites such as ESPN.com and RealGM.com added to their websites a sort of free agent tracker that tracks the movements of the players meant that this off-season was going to be full of news and stories that will get fans talking.
And the off-season events seem to be far from over. We have the US Olympic team playing in August and the storyline surrounding that which depicts the team as the ultimate come-back story since they disgraced themselves four years ago at the Olympics. We also have a new trend to where NBA players, if they feel disrespected by their teams in terms of contract negotiations, are bolting for overseas teams like Greece and Italy.
Who said that this off-season would be boring.
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