FreeDarko's Guide to Liberated Fandom

The NBA blog FreeDarko was created in 2005, its title derived from the authoring collective’s plea for more playing time for Darko Milicic, then a forlorn, 18-year-old Serbian transplant condemned to ride the pine by his hardass coach, Larry Brown. But Milicic was just an excuse to extrapolate from the league a series of grand, florid narratives that have made FreeDarko an institution of the hoop blogosphere. (One member of that institution, Bethlehem Shoals, is now a Seattleite.)

It’s a unique brand of sportswriting, light on numbers and heavy on sociopolitical musings, absurdist metaphors, and tragic figures. Peripheral semi-star Lamar Odom labors under biblical burdens. Favorite son Josh Howard sets Shoals soul-searching with another adolescent misstep. And playful, preening Gilbert Arenas helps inspire the hoop genus “Uncanny Peacocks” and an examination of the term “swag.” In FreeDarko’s revolution of “liberated fandom,” wins and losses yield to the new twin primacies of individuality and style.

FreeDarko Presents...The Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac: Styles, Stats, and Stars in Today’s Game is the collective’s attempt to do its thing in book form. Like the blog, it begins with a manifesto. (Actually, it begins with a few words from Gilbert Arenas, if you count the foreword.) There are chapters on 19 prominent players, each with his own spirit animal, conveying his essence, and style guide, breaking down his moves. For example, in “Kevin Garnett: The Schism That Bridges”, we read how the aging star was scarred by his early ascent and learn that his spirit animal is a Snakehead. Garnett, you’ll note, is among the genus “Master Builders: For Whom Dominance Has Become a Truism.”

The chapters are broken up by a dadaistic assortment of guides, mythologies, taxonomies, and games. If you’ve ever wondered what NBA jersey to wear to your Bar Mitzvah, look no further. Learn which NBA players stats say are most cancerous to their teams. Take a glance at J.R. Rider’s application to be a Starbuck’s barista. Play a game of Marbury Parcheesi when you’re done. And I’ll bet you didn’t know that Tim Duncan’s average stat line mirrors the Fibonacci sequence. Illustrator Big Baby Belafonte supplements all of the above with bright, light-hearted visuals—mock-dramatic, angular caricatures, and style guide action strips in which players’ heads are replaced by objects to which their moves are analogized.

Lest the examples of whimsy give the wrong impression, be assured that the book contains genuine insight on basketball and its culture. The Player analyses are spot-on, and the prose is illuminating. For example, on the hyperbole and hysteria surrounding the scouting of talented draftees: “It takes a sharp man to pick out the best sofa in the room, but discovering that it also talks and flies is how men get religion.”

It’s not for everyone; those looking for Xs and Os insights may find the book of only occasional interest. And the sharp-edged pages are a paper cut hazard. But The Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac is an excellent guide for enjoying the grace and drama of the NBA seasons that occupy two-thirds of our days.

FreeDarko Presents...The Macrophenomenal Pro Basketball Almanac: Styles, Stats, and Stars in Today’s Game, Bloomsbury Press, $23

Topics: Books & Authors

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