Which Region Runs Basketball Culture?

Today in questions we’ve always wanted to ask but were too afraid to bring up: Why the heck does Red Bull own so many sports franchises? Turns out there’s an answer.

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Where is the epicenter of contemporary basketball culture? In the past, it was a pretty easy question to answer. Chicago in the 90s. Los Angeles in the early 2000s, Miami when LeBron made his move. But the league is transitioning. The legends of the last generation are still around, new heroes are emerging, and the spheres of college basketball and the WNBA have more cultural sway than ever before.

To get to the heart of it, OffBall asked three NBA commentators and writers to make their case: @ClaireMPLS, @MasterTes, and @Kazeem. With the NBA season underway, we posed a simple, but monumental question: Who holds the cultural crown of basketball?

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Any New Yorker will tell you that the best thing about New Jersey is the view you get of New York. However, Piscataway has entered the chat and is set up for a basketball renaissance. Rutgers University is home to two of the top five prospects in this year's NBA Draft—Ace Bailey and Dylan Harper look to bring blue-blood level attention to the closest big-name program near the city not named St. John's.

Of course, there's no talking about the Big Apple without the city's heartbeat—The New York Knicks. Mike Tyson once said everyone’s got a plan until they get punched in the face, and make no mistake, the Boston Celtics landed a historic opening night haymaker. Luckily, the New York sports orbit revolves around all-world point guard Jalen Brunson, who is used to eating a few tough hits. The city hasn't had an athlete whose game and personality matched the DNA of the Tri-State since Derek Jeter. It’s no wonder folks will go to absolute war over #11. 

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It's long been fabled that sports, specifically the NBA, are better when New York is relevant. We'll see that theory put to the test this year.

It’s easy to get lost in the coastal biases that dominate our sports landscape, don’t get it twisted—the South is running basketball culture in every aspect. 

First, the most prominent domestic NBA stars were built in Atlanta, All-Pro phenom Anthony Edwards and NBA Finals MVP in Jaylen Brown who grab our attention on and off the court.

Second, South Carolina doesn’t get enough love. You can dismiss Ja Morant and Zion Williamson all you want, but I know better than to doubt someone from the Palmetto State (which is also home to the unanimous WNBA MVP A’ja Wilson and Dawn Staley’s 38-0 Gamecocks). I’m buying up all the Ja and Zion stock this season.

The public forgot about Ja, but he’ll be back to his posterizing ways this season. He’ll be battling with Ant for Western Conference supremacy and the most popular basketball sneaker in the game—pitting Ant’s incredible Adidas signature shoe against Nike’s recently unveiled Ja 2s. 

We haven’t even gotten to the Thunder, the betting favorites to win the Western Conference thanks to SGA’s swaggy persona. They’re sleeping on the Mavericks, the reigning Western Conference champs, that added big shot Klay with Luka and Kyrie. 

And there’s an alien in Wemby descending upon San Antonio to shatter all hopes and dreams that enter his orbit.

The West Coast is selling nostalgia. The East Coast is selling the future. But the South is now, and it’s here to stay.

I recently watched two guys walk by each other in Kobe Bryant gear and give knowing nods, as if to say, “You see it.” A few miles down Figueroa, LeBron James made his season debut alongside his son Bronny, making NBA history. Just down the street, JuJu Watkins prepares to take the throne as queen of college basketball, the spot vacated post-Caitlin Clark.

A couple hundred miles north on I-5, Steph Curry is unsatisfied with just Olympic glory, and still on a mission to get his Golden State Warriors back to the promised land. And across the hall, the Warriors have new neighbors in the Golden State Valkyries, the first WNBA team in the Bay.

From the Showtime Lakers and the Kobe and Shaq one-two punch, to the Warriors Dynasty, the West Coast has a strong basketball history. But even now, the “best coast” has a strong case to hold the crown. One needs look no farther than the song of the year for evidence that California maintains its cultural stranglehold over the NBA.

The more things change, the more things stay the same, and while other parts of the country (and world) have made their cases for being the basketball epicenters, an enduring truth remains: For now California is still the basketball capital of the world.