Come late September or early October, LeBron or Giannis or Kawhi or, wouldn’t this be wild, Pascal Siakam could be lifting the Larry O’Brien trophy in the mostly empty, air-conditioned Wide World of Sports gym.
If anyone wins an NBA title this year, and no one gets sick, or worse, dies in pursuit, it will mark a happy ending to what has been the worst confluence of catastrophes in the league’s 74-year history.
“There have been seasons when the product on the court wasn’t great, like the early 2000s,” says The Athletic’s resident NBA expert, David Aldridge. “Kobe and Shaq were great, and the Lakers were dominant, but there weren’t that many really great teams or memorable playoff series. (I was bored out of my mind during the Spurs-Nets Finals in ’03.) Allen Iverson and the Sixers making the Finals was a great story, but let’s be honest: Philly was a terrible offensive team that season, led by an…
