Who are the Basketball Gods?
I have heard, the term "The basketball gods," many times without thinking about it. However, I recently heard it in a postgame interview and suddenly wondered exactly what they meant. What entities is this referencing? Who are the basketball gods? I decided to investigate this question. Surprisingly, I was relatively quickly able to identify a number of entities that have been referenced individually by multiple people knowledgeable in the area or that I could derive by analysis.
These did not all turn out to be gods. While considerable uncertainty existed in some cases, they appear to fall into the categories of gods, demons, and spirits including genies and Ability Spirts. [http://www.soltakss.com/spirit5.html] The names I gave them reflect my attempt to provide phonetic spelling of names I have heard people use. I will start with some major gods that to many, I suspect, are well known and obvious even if names for each one may vary among even knowledgeable people. When I was in doubt, I usually choose the earliest name I knew, often Greek.
Please skip any parts that are boring to you. I would be offended – though the skipped gods may. Use your judgment
Ran Dom – god of captiousness. Often dominates game’s outcome and therefore the "Dom" part of the name. References to it often include, "50-50…" Also, oten includes scattering experiments centering around the ball hitting basket rim or support, and backboard but can involve result of a block, tip, deflection or other events. Often hard to differentiate this god’s effects from the god, Trickster, discussed below. [I rejected Hermes for the name as he was associated with many other things as well]
Area – god of conflict and competition. I could have called this god competition as that is a term often used related to it/him. However, Ares recognized both competitive and cooperative aspects of conflicts, e.g. cooperation within a side and conflict with the other side. An example is, "He was carried away by his competitiveness," and, "We want players possessed by a competitive spirit."
Trickster – a god known in many cultures. In basketball, it takes many forms (e.g. flopping [also involving Ares]. Trickster as well as Ran Dom is involved in, "That’s the way the ball bounces." Anything starting with, " Silly…" is also a candidate. [Some classify Trickster as an imp, but its importance has generally led it to be classified as a god.]
Now we come to entities that I have chosen to give more basketball-related names.
Energy and Focus– Thought to be previously unidentified daughters of Zeus, they are sister gods and are often invoked by players and coaches prior to and during games. What appear to be evil stepsisters, Lack of Effort and Lack of Focus, also exist and often fight with their siblings. However, in practice, the step-sisters are not for appealing to out loud before or during game. Rather, they are verbally invoked in postgame press conferences and interviews. They are also sometimes collectively referred to Flat.
Both the sisters and step-sisters have shown the ability to take persistent possession of players. However, the pairs of sisters often wrestle (catfighting would seem unseemly for gods)for control of players, and one sees a change in the possessors during a game. This appears to be most frequently referred to as a struggle occurring during halftime. However, I am unaware of any hard data.
Schedule angel – along with Ran Dom and Trickster establishes the schedule for games {sometimes known as the schedule sprite or fairy godmother. However, the schedule is also influenced by the next entity.
Schedule devil – is manifested in two forms Made for TV Games and close together scheduled dates for a teams’ games including scheduled losses.
Zone genie – Being in the zone is usually the result of and angel or genie taking possession of a player, though it is sometimes the result of possession by a demon associated with the opponent team.
Knot Fallin – "Shots are knot falling tonight." Such a statement clearly implies the basketball gods are responsible for the phenomenon, and not the shooter. This demon is invoked by such rituals as being off balance, lack of practice, receiving a pass in awkward place, and hurrying.
Sticki – a demon that can possess players causing them to be reluctant to transfer ball to a teammate.
Kalsi Twins – Bad Kals and No Kals. No question exists regarding the existence of results attributes to these demons when they are claimed to possess referees. But, the existence of the demons has, as one might expect, been denied at times including by referees, though in private some have been reported to say, "I do not know was possessed me when I made that call." Players and coaches also exhibit similar behaviors and exhibit even more Bad-Kals-like behavior. However, it is hard to identify when they are simply lying or exhibiting perceptual bias rather than being possessed.
Statstuffer – demon said to possess some players. Evidence for possession includes delaying the taking end of period shots until after buzzer sounds.
After my investigation, I found less clear whether several entities to which I have heard frequent references actually are entities. They probably are not. These include:
- Miss Rotation
- Miss Handle
- Ophoot – "Ball bounced [by] ophoot."
Finally, listening I found spirituality is also said to be involved in other ways.
Transcendental defense – Transcendental: definition: of or relating to a spiritual or nonphysical realm. This is often seen in transition defense where defense appears to exists in player’s minds but not in the physical world. For some teams and players is common throughout their defense. Frequently, hard to attribute defense to demonic possession as incompetence is a strong candidate for its cause although many prefer the later. Nevertheless, one hears, "I do not know what possessed him to make that play," such as leave Klay Thompson or Danny Green open or foul a dunker or 3-point shooter. Matador defense is a weak form of this as it has some manifestation, in reality, no matter how ineffective.
Mud – an ether over the court that appears to be a possible tool of the evil step-sisters Lack of Effort and lack of Focus. Normally, this is heard referred to in the phrase "They appeared to be playing in mud." An example is seen in failure to quickly fall back to perform transition defense. (Possibly, also occurs in horseracing.)
I concluded that regardless of frequent references to it, for example, "They are running downhill to the basket," Tilting the Court does not happen even in some spiritual realm. However, I am open to new evidence.
I hope you found interesting items on this list. If you have identified other basketball gods or spirits, please share this in the comments.