The BBQ MVPs: NBA Edition

What NBA Superstar Would Be the Best Addition To Your Cookout

Once upon a time, I received a special resume from an acquaintance of mine. It contained a list of qualities and strengths he possessed and believed were necessary in order join my squad. An application for squadship. It was a bit wack, but, in fairness, it was sixth grade. It was genuine, and kinda dope. But yeah, it was also wack. The squad had never requested nor received a resume before. I responded that the application was not necessary, and said acquaintance need not to worry about it. I wasn’t really sure what to say. I don’t really know what anyone would be expected to say in that situation. On top of it all, I don’t even remember what I did say. Nevertheless, when the dust settled, we remained acquaintances.

After having called upon this memory, I began to hypothesize what it would be like if such specifications did exist. That, say, to enter a squad you did need to go through some sort of application process. Not hazing. Just an application. Maybe similar to the one I had recieved many years ago. There would be some pretty cool resumes. Because NBA players are cool as ****. Believe it or not, NBA players are a lot cooler than you are. This is a fact. Feeling defensive? Here’s a survey for you:

Have you hung out with a celebrity before: Y/N

Can you dunk a basketball: Y/N

Have you donated thousands of dollars to charity: Y/N

Is the average yearly income at your position > $7,031,933: Y/N

Has your name been mentioned been in a rap song (SoundCloud does not count): Y/N

Tangent: If you’re on an NBA roster, you’re almost guaranteed to get name-dropped in a rap song as well. It’s probably built into a player’s contract. And it is not just the stars, like LeBron, who are referenced. (Though being a star can help boost one’s hip-hop status.) (LeBron has been referenced 423 times, according to RapGenius. Four Hundred and Twenty-Three times. That is a lot of references. I’m still not sure if I believe this.)

Almost any player can get name-dropped by a hip-hop artist. The likes of Danillo Gallinari and J.J. Reddick have had bars dedicated to their namesakes. Jimmer Fredette has his very own bar courtesy of Lil Wayne himself (Fredette once dropped 73 in the Chinese Basketball Association). Kendrick Lamar even has an entire verse dedicated Aaron freaking Afflalo (Afflalo has averaged 11 points per game throughout his NBA career.)

Still not impressed? Here is a quiz for you. Guess which of the following players have been named in a song:

Shelvin Mack: T/F

Markieff Morris: T/F

Luc Mbah A Moute: T/F

Eddie House: T/F

OJ Mayo: T/F

Charlie Villanueva: T/F

If you answered yes to all of those, congratulations. You would be right. In fact, they were all featured in the same song: “Sports” by Lil Dicky. The point is, being an NBA player is really dope. It would be really dope to knew an NBA player. But who would be the most dope NBA player to have in your squad?

It’s easy to take players outside of the top 25 because it’s obviously a larger pool of picks. Joel Embiid immediately comes to mind. Hassan Whiteside is also a very fun person. As is Dion Waiters. As is JR Smith. But there is a certain unquantifiable aura that surrounds the top players in the league. Those are the guys that could really prove to be squad-changers.

An ideal example from History is David Robinson. He was a NBA superstar renowned for being a great guy. More importantly, he passes all of the soon to be mentioned criteria for being a worthy squad member (save one social media category). From r/NBA, here is a description of one person’s encounter with The Admiral:

Just passed David Robinson on the beach while on my honeymoon. I was walking passed David while he was waiting for towels. I asked if he was David Robinson and he smiled and said “I sure am, what is your name?” as he walked up to me and my wife and stuck out his hand to shake mine. We joked about me being from Dallas and a Mavs fan which makes us rivals, and proceeded to talk about 30 seconds until we were on our way.

For this exercise, we’re going to narrow the list of candidates down to the Top 25 players, because there are almost 400 Players in the NBA (too many). We will use the top 25 players according to Bleacher Report. Not every squad has perfect fits (looking at you, Kyrie) so we have to very careful with our selection. Let’s meet our 25 promising stars.

Players Left: LeBron James, Russell Westbrook, James Harden, Kawhi Leonard, Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Chris Paul, Jimmy Butler, Draymond Green, Kyle Lowry, Rudy Gobert, Isaiah Thomas, Anthony Davis, Paul George, Nikola Jokic, DeMarcus Cousins, John Wall, Marc Gasol, Karl Anthony Towns, Deandre Jordan, Mike Conley, Blake Griffin, Damian Lillard, Paul Millsap.