On The Button

When we think of great quintets, a few things come to mind. In the Hindu faith, the number five carries great weight, and when talking about such a group, the prefix pancha- is tacked on the front end.

Gawain (of Arthur’s Court fame) boasts a shield with a pentangle, the five-pointed star that represents the five senses, a fearless man’s five fingers, and Christ’s five wounds, amongst other seemingly countless, irrelevant fivesomes.

The most important quintet, though, these days at least, is the NBA starting five. They are the pillars upon which an entire team is built, and if they are weak, their team is weak. They are everything.

Back in the day—the 1970s and 80s, long before I (and basically every player in the NBA) was born—shit was different. A starting five needed at most one great player, one pretty good player, and three totally insignificant players.

A team like this would wreak havoc, which is why the NBA was grit-and-grind focused, team-centric (rather than player-centric), and, above all, largely ignored. 

Instead, the starting five of the populace’s collective brain was none other than the rock band. Men groveled at their feet. Women clamored for their gaze. Fish feared their sonic boom.

Rock bands were the behemoths of their day, but they have since fallen to the wayside, which, given that modern rock is both musty and boof, is very much warranted. In their place, surprise surprise, are the modern day NBA stars, the new behemoths of popular culture.

Five-man groups are still rocking popular culture.

The modern NBA starting five is very similar to the bands of the 70s and 80s. Both have five key players (duh!), and all members are crucial to the success of the collective.

Yes, the singers and the high-scoring, even-higher-flying unicorns are the mega-stars, but they still need their supporting cast—the bassists, the centers, the ball hogs, the constantly-soloing guitarists—to have their shit together just enough that they’re ready to strike when the time is right.

As individuals, they’re good, but as a collective, they are great. Think about it like this: whenever Axl Rose strikes off on his own, it’s a disaster, but when he links up with Slash, Duff, and the boys, it’s poetry in motion. 

And it’s for this very reason that, as we gear up for the Opening Night of the 2023-24 NBA season, I will break down the league by division and choose the most fitting old-ass regional rock bands to compare to each team.

This time, let’s take a look at the Atlantic Division, home to the giants of the league, of which several are looking to turn back time and relive the glory days.

Let’s get it.

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Boston Celtics

• Starting Five: Derrick White, Jrue Holiday, Jaylen Brown, Jayson Tatum, Kristaps Porzingis
• Rock Band Comparison: New Kids on the Block

There are a lot of bands from Boston, including, but certainly not limited to: Boston, the Pixies, Aerosmith, the Cars, New Edition, Belle Biv DeVoe, J. Geils Band, Mission of Burma, New Kids on the Block, and Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch. But are any of these bands even remotely similar to the Celtics?

It’s tough to say. None of them have the firepower nor the skill nor the sheer strength-in-numbers of the Celtics. Every player is a star.

Is there any band like this? A band that will decimate opponents with impunity and finesse? A band in which every member is/was a household name? 

It has taken hours of research, but I think I’ve done it. The 2023-24 Boston Celtics are most like…New Kids on the Block!

That’s right. I had to switch things up, take the road less traveled (shoutout to noted Bostonian Robert Frost; I’m sure he was a fan of the C’s), and choose a boy band to assign to the Celtics. It’s the only logical choice! NKOTB did numbers, just like Celtics of yesteryear. 

The Celtics of today are poised to do the same. The New Kids aren’t nearly as decorated, but that’s the only difference. In their day, they had white people going crazy, and the Celtics have been doing that since 1946 and show no sign of stopping. What more need I say?

Now, the Celtics recently got a facelift by trading for both Kristaps Porzingis and Jrue Holiday, so I can’t say much about their potential play for the upcoming season. 

However, if the jam-packed starting five can stay out of one another’s way, they might just walk themselves right into the finals with nary a sweat broken, the same way that the New Kids on the Block walked into the hearts of every pre-teen American in the 1990s. That’s how scary they look. It’s shaping up to be a movie. 

Brooklyn Nets

• Starting Five: Ben Simmons, Spencer Dinwiddie, Mikal Bridges, Cameron Johnson, Nic Claxton
• Rock Band Comparison: They Might Be Giants

They Might Be Giants are an alternative rock band founded in 1982 in Brooklyn, New York. They are most famous for making silly songs for children, tweens, and adults who are poor at regulating their emotions in a healthy, productive manner. This is pretty much all that needs to be said.

The same goes for the Brooklyn Nets. Children, tweens, and the aforementioned adults were quick to hop on the Nets bandwagon in 2021 and ask the person in charge of their household to buy them a Durant, Irving, or Harden jersey.

Shortly after, the Brooklyn Nets were decimated with trades, leaving the bandwagoners with jerseys cursed with what could have been.

They Might Be Giants aren’t a serious band, and the 2023-24 Brooklyn Nets aren’t a serious team. Their first option is Mikal Bridges and they’re banking on a Ben Simmons All-NBA bounce back. C’mon now. 

I hope they’re good. They’re defense has a chance to be rock solid. But I’m a realist and don’t really want to associate myself with them for much longer. I carry no ill will and wish them the best, but what’s even left to say? I’ll gladly eat my hat when the time comes.

New York Knicks

• Starting Five: Jalen Brunson, Quentin Grimes, RJ Barrett, Julius Randle, Mitchell Robinson
• Rock Band Comparison: Blondie

Here’s an honest fact: New York City has no shortage of legendary rock bands. It cannot be denied.

In the 1970s and 80s, they were known for their avant-garde rock bands like the Velvet Underground. And in the 1990s and early 2000s, they were cranking out alternative trail blazers like the Strokes. Despite this, few fit the identity of the 2023-24 New York Knicks. 

The Knicks aren’t artsy playmakers, nor are they soft-spoken finishers, so I’m not quite sure what to do with them. They live in the nadir between the two, so we need to find a band that existed and thrived after the Velvet Underground and before the Strokes, which leaves us with only one band: Blondie.

And, to be honest, they’re a perfect match. Blondie was most famous for their not-quite-punk, not-quite-dance brand of new wave. They somehow lived and succeeded in the gap between, and I suspect that this year’s Knicks team will do the same.

As they are, Jalen Brunson is the team’s Debbie Harry, running the show and holding it down in a pleasantly straightforward manner. 

Just as Harry’s trademarked vocals were matched by keyboardist Jimmy Destri’s cutesy chords and drummer Clem Burke’s serviceable patterns, Brunson’s signature playmaking and shooting is matched by Julius Randle’s serviceable finishing.

Randle isn’t really one to successfully bang it out down low, but he manages to get the job done. 

The 2023-24 Knicks aren’t poised to be legends by any stretch of the word, but for a team that simply needs to act as the missing stone on the team’s path to success, they’ll do well—the same way Blondie filled the gap in NYC’s rock journey.

Philadelphia 76ers

• Starting Five: James Harden (??), Tyrese Maxey, Tobias Harris, PJ Tucker, Joel Embiid
• Rock Band Comparison: Boyz II Men

Whether you realize it or not, Philadelphia has a rich musical history. Unfortunately, much of this history consists of the finest of RnB’s solo acts and dynamic duos, but I’ll make it work.

I couldn’t possibly pick The Roots for the 76ers—the comp is too lopsided—so I’m stuck with Boyz II Men. I think it’s a good choice, though, but it’s contingent on one thing: the trading of James Harden.

Before we get into all that, though, we need to talk about the grounds for comparison. Boyz II Men are sleeper legends, a lot like the 2023-24 76ers.

That said, their fans are ravenous and will defend the two groups until the end of time. Call either of them anything other than the greatest of all time, and their fans will use their venom-filled words to take down both you and your family. 

As the current team stands, Harden, Embiid, and Maxey match up nicely with Boyz II Men’s classic lineup. However, if the boys from the Sixers want to become men, something’s gotta give, and that “something” is James Harden. 

Harden, unfortunately, has been acting childish all offseason, and it looks like he will continue to do so until he gets what he wants. He continues to say that Daryl Morey is a liar and a snake, which is probably true—he is a basketball executive, after all—but he shouldn’t have believed him in the first place. 

Regardless, Harden is a moody cloud of insubordination hanging over a Sixers team looking to make the next step. In an ideal world, the team should be rocking and rolling in the relatively weak East, but with Harden, they may never grow up. Something’s gotta give this season.

Toronto Raptors

• Starting Five: Dennis Schroder, Scottie Barnes, OG Anunoby, Pascal Siakam, Jakob Poeltl
• Rock Band Comparison: Rush

The biggest thing in Canada’s basketball world deserves the biggest thing in Canada’s rock world, no? Look no further than Rush, Toronto’s premier prog-rock band with a cult following. 

Rush fans are feverish and clamoring in ways that no other fans could ever dream of being. These fools love Rush, and for good reason! Geddy Lee and the boys crushed it from 1968 until 2018, and their music will live on forever. 

Sure, Rush has had a few lulls in popularity and drastic changes in style, but as a whole, they have achieved success seldom seen from a Canadian rock band. The Raptors are in a similar position. Since their inception in 1993, no Canadian basketball team has lasted longer or been more popular than them. 

At times, the Raptors have been garbage, but their fans never faltered in their love for the team.

In the 1990s, the team was known for their high-flying ability and stylish play. Then, in the 2010s, they were famous for their retro-revival brand of basketball, thanks to two-point specialist DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry, the best YMCA baller the league has ever seen.

In 2023, the Raps’ identity is unclear. Their starting lineup is complicated, to say the least, but they are in position to shake things up in the sluggish Atlantic Division. I mean, complexity was Rush’s bread and butter, so why can’t the Raptors be the same?