As of 12:01 AM EST, July 1st, I like the NBA a lot more than I used to.

To all the NBA fans out there who are most likely going to lose a season, I am truly sorry for your loss.  I don’t wish you any ill, and know what it was like to lose an entire season of NHL hockey.  I had the luxury of spending most of the lockout in Boston, where hockey was still in full force, form the minors to college.

But in my own little world, right now, I’m dancing with my happy feet.

I’ve been fed up with the NBA ever since I started watching hockey, and it took time away from the NHL coverage.  I don’t care for the sport at all.  Shooting baskets is fun, but turn it into what we watch on TV, and I dislike it with all my burgundy-and-blue heart.

I hate the sound of basketball.  The constant squeaking of the shoes drives me nuts.  You know what sounds cool?  A hockey stop.  Skates on ice sound cool.

Sweat wipers?  Give me a break.  Could there be a less awesome gig?  If you need to wipe the sweat up from your playing surface, you need a better playing surface.  In hockey, if you sweat a little, it freezes when it hits the ice.  You skate over it, and you keep going.

March Madness can kiss my back side.  I hate March Madness.  This last year’s NCAA tournament was the most bearable yet, for some reason.  I hardly noticed it happened, and I don’t even know why.  But it can F off.  I hate it. HATE. IT.

And the basketball fights.  Or I should say, the “fights.”  It amazes me how a bunch of tall, built men can get into a scrap, and it looks like a slap-fest.  If you’re going to fight, do it.  I don’t need to make a comparison to hockey here.

The NBA has had a soft salary cap (basically, a luxury tax) for a long time, and the owners now want a hard cap.  They want more of the share of the pie.  The players say that won’t happen.  I have three letters for the NBA players. N-H-L.  It’s going to happen.

And when you consider this, from Michael Wilbon of ESPN:

The NBA, meanwhile, has teams losing real money. The league says 22 of 30 are operating in the negative; the players association would surely say it’s fewer than that. Either way, it’s reasonable — if not downright inescapable — to conclude there are NBA teams awash in red ink. It costs less for those owners to keep their arenas closed than to stage the games.

There isn’t much else to be done.  Also, will there ever be another reason for me to quote Wilbon again?  I hope not

So the NBA is locked out, the NFL is locked out (kind of, and the people paying attention think it won’t cost the season), and the NHL…

Well, they are just getting started.  And Versus just got a lot more popular.

See you for free agency.  It’s going to be fun.

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And that concludes the Dead Blog Challenge.  I’ll do a wrap up post on July 2nd, but overall, I had a good time.  Totally worth it, and I discovered a few things about my blogging as well.

Congratulations to Greg D’Avis for doing the entire 30 days of the challenge with me.  It was hard for both of us, and for the others who took it on, but it’s called a challenge for a reason.

Comments are back on, so you can tell me what an idiot I am again.