Back in Brooklyn

 By Jake Appleman

It is important in changing times to be reminded of things that remain, structures that stand, people who still are where they were. Even if most of it feels different upon return.

I hadn’t been back to the Barclays Center to cover a Nets game, which the Nets graciously allowed me to do for this blog, since their Game 4 loss against the Heat in 2014.

It was nice to be back, even if many of the faces playing and covering the game were different.I would be lying if I wrote that I didn’t feel slightly out of place, nervous and unsure of myself, the chirping cynical joker track of years past replaced, for a moment at least, with a more serious, pensive version of myself.

On the heels of the marching and social media sharing and pride going on in the U.S. on Saturday, it was nice to see two teams with ABA roots in action; the memory of the red, white and blue ball and all the creative freedom that came with it alive during a time when the country feels like it's undergoing a redefinition.

The Nets were 9-34, sporting the worst record in the league, still recovering from financial mismanagement and circus-like decision-making. The Spurs were 34-9, having just broken Cleveland’s 26-game home winning streak, the modern representation of sustained success and international harmony, even if Pau Gasol, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili didn’t play. Coming off a career-high 41 points, Kawhi Leonard sat out as well.

What the experience lacked in international flavor, it more than made up for in random music.

There was a bit of a Hip-Hopera in the media room before the game, songs by Ja Rule, Lord Tariq and Peter Gunz, and Black Sheep booming from a television, like old school late nineties/early aughts BET or MTV had fused with the YES Network. There was even an ONYX reference on the postgame broadcast. 

The Spurs won 112-86. It was 76 degrees in San Antonio on Monday afternoon.