When I first started following the NBA seriously at 12, I was still in the brief season between the end of childhood and the onset of adolescence. Some things were new and beyond the scope of my headspace. All the social rules and hierarchies from elementary school had apparently been abolished without anyone ever telling me. In seventh grade I’d pass people I’d been friends with or friendly with the year before in elementary school and the look in their eyes made it clear: the past was dead, the here was now, they were looking for a respectable new social circle to settle into and I should, too.
Nets 110, Knicks 107: “Y’all know who I am”
