A traditional sports documentary goes something like this: Find a championship team. Round up as many of the former players and coaches as you can from that team. Interview them all. Splice in some spectacular highlights. Set them to swelling music. Voilà! You’re done.
And then there’s a guy named Jon Bois, who makes bizarre sports documentaries with basically the opposite formula. He and his colleagues’ latest film — now available for free on YouTube — concerns the Charlotte Bobcats’ 7-59 season of 2011-12.
“The People You’re Paying to be in Shorts” is its unwieldy title, taken from a Michael Jordan quote about how the Charlotte NBA franchise owner now has to live vicariously through his players rather than putting on a pair of shorts himself and laying waste to the opposition.