Part of the reason I’m watching the NBA Finals is that, as much as I dislike today’s ‘can’t touch me’ NBA, I’m starved for sports right now. Another reason is that I’d like to see the Raptors beat the Warriors. Not because I like the Raptors or dislike the Warriors, but knowing that LeBron James has to sit home and watch another team beat the Warriors and win the NBA championship.

I guess going to the Lakers wasn’t such a great choice for King James.

A couple years ago, the big NBA debate was if LeBron is the greatest of all time. Now the debate seems to have shifted to whether LeBron is better than Bird. (Spoilers: He’s not.)

It’s refreshing to see that people haven’t forgotten Larry Bird, and it’s also refreshing to see people that know and remember Bird putting LeBron in his place. LeBron is great, but he’s probably not even the best to play his position, let alone the greatest of all time. Those of us that remember Larry Bird know that he and Michael Jordan would run wild in today’s soft NBA.

Modern NBA games are three-point contests disguised as basketball. I would love to be able to watch today’s NBA the way I watch the NFL – to know the league I grew up watching and loving hasn’t changed over time. I can’t do that because the NBA I grew up watching is gone, and it’s probably not coming back. At least not any time soon. Maybe I’ll feel differently if my Sonics come back to Seattle.

It pains me to see how far the NBA has fallen – a league I used to be in love with that I can barely stomach anymore. When I complain about it, it makes me sound old, but that doesn’t mean I’m wrong. Today’s NBA has regressed the game of basketball, not progressed it.