The Meme Team
We’ve had the 1992 Dream Team, the 2008 Redeem Team, in 2020 we have the Meme Team. We will be running through our meme starting five and will also have a couple of bench players, a coach, and a mascot. There are two rules for the meme team though, and rule one is that we won’t be including players that were punished with memes about particular skills (example: Kobe Bryant not passing memes). Memes poking fun at players for things they did off the court are accepted. Rule two, they have to have more than one meme, and the meme has to be well known for it to qualify. Keep in mind, were are trying to build the team around memes, not talent. Without further or do let’s get into the memes.
Point Guard – Nick Young
You cannot deny that ‘Confused Nick Young’ is one of if not the best NBA meme of all time. Unlike many NBA memes, Nick Young has been used in non-basketball memes as well. The missed three Nick Young meme will also be immortalized in NBA meme culture forever (the three meme qualifies because it’s what Swaggy P did after the shot). Nick Young is definitely in the GOAT meme race.
Shooting Guard – JR Smith
The Henny God is our starting SG. Squinting JR Smith is the second best meme of all time (in my opinion) behind Michael Jordan’s crying face. The epic moment of when JR ran the other way in game one of the 2018 Finals is not only iconic in meme history but basketball history in general. ‘The Pipe’ and ‘Other Team didn’t agree’ memes aren’t as funny, but are still classics. JR memes just always hit different.
Small Forward – Kevin Durant
Kevin Durant has been slapped onto a lot of memes, with his 1st popular meme dating back to when he said ‘You the real MVP’ in 2014. Since then he has been a part of several memes. For example, the ‘KD twitter burner’ still thrives in the community today, KD’s ‘Next Chapter’ meme was also very popular for many years and even though he wasn’t the main focus of the meme, he was a part of the ‘Draymond yelling at KD’ joke. KD is a confirmed HOF meme.
Power Forward – LeBron James
LeBron is so good that he doesn’t even have to be in the meme for it to go viral. We are talking about the famous ‘LeBraaaawn Jaaaames’, which isn’t used today but is iconic. ‘’Crybaby Lebron’ and ‘Trollface Lebron’ were also very popular templates to use back in 2012. But LeBron is still in his meme prime as he as pulled off ‘Durag LeBron’ which is one of the most flexible memes out there. LeBron and JR have a dynamic duo with the ‘2018 Game 1’ meme, and he was also the victim of the ‘Blowing in ear’ meme. This just proves LeBron is talented at everything.
Center – Shaquille O’Neal
Shaq was dominant on the court, and he’s dominating the memes as well. Shaq has had a legendary career in memes, with the most notable one being the ‘Surprised Shaq’ meme, which premiered on an episode of Hot Wings. There are many other great Shaq memes like ‘Shaq and Cat Shimmy’, the ‘I sleep’, and maybe the weirdest meme ever, the ‘Shaq and Seal Face Swap’.
Bench
Our 6th man is Michael Jordan. We do agree that the ‘Crying Face’ meme is the best meme of all time, but other than that MJ kind of lacks in his meme game. The ‘MJ Laughing’ and ‘Stop it’ memes are hilarious, but we couldn’t let him start over the Henny God. Our 7th man is James Harden. James Harden’s ‘Eye roll’ is one of the best memes in history, and ‘Shocked Harden’ and the ‘Eye Injury’ memes are all excellent as well, but Swaggy P was just too good for Harden. Our 8th , and final player is Klay Thompson. The Klay ‘Squidward’s House’ meme will never get old, the video of smoke coming out of ‘China Klay’ is a classic, and he’s got fairly recent memes with ‘Awkward Klay’ and ‘Sausage Party Wrap’. If Klay can reach max potential with his memes, he could end up in the starting line up someday.
Coach
The coach leading the Meme Team to wins, is Doc Rivers. Coaches don’t have a whole lot of memes, so it was fairly easy to make this choice. ‘Shocked Doc Rivers’ from 2012 is still used often today, and ‘Laughing Doc Rivers’ is also pretty popular among meme accounts.
Mascot
The Meme Team mascot comes from Toronto. The Raptor is a free agent and has signed with the Meme Team. He has two notable memes, the first one being ‘Raptor Mascot Fails’ and the other one is ‘Raptor devours cheerleader’. Both are hilarious, and the choice was very easy.
