Let Us Now Praise Obscure Men

In early 2013, the Milwaukee Bucks traded Tobias Harris and sundry minor players to the Magic in exchange for J.J. Redick. As the blog’s resident Milwaukee fan, I’m driven to consider the year Milwaukee had in the wake of this: Redick moved, Caron Butler happened. Another of the Bucks’ “win now” moves resulted in a salad of mediocrity worse than the sum of its ingredients, a naive re-sorting of luxury cabins in the Hindenburg.

But we’re here to talk about the Magic, aren’t we? 2013 also marked the shifting of McRoberts to the Bobcats for coin. 2013 marked the changing of Tobias Harris’ number from Bucks 15 back to Volunteers 12—surely the number holds no significance for Magic fans. But there’s an engine behind the Bucks, an eptness in social media marketing as profound as the previous management’s ineptness at making a good basketball team. The Bucks present themselves perfectly to basketball Twitter as the team for the viewer that likes players individually, that likes promise and developing talent over realized greatness and W’s. It’s no surprise, then, that Tobias Harris somehow drifted below the radar even as he grew into a more competent player on the Magic. The Magic fail to grasp how they can be sold. The Magic don’t see the hordes of LeaguePass kids begging for a reason to like the team.

Look at that. This is the Magic reaching out to you. Does it register? Do you feel yourself represented by the man on the right? (Or the man on the left, for that matter.)

This is the same team that played U2’s “Vertigo” to get the fans hyped up for an important pre-halftime play out of a time out. It’s as if they’re trying not to get your attention.

And in all of this we miss Willie Green, without the LeBron-headband, boldly asking you to confront the reality that is his hairline. We miss the (romantic?) connection building between blog-favorite Elfrid Payton and Tobias Harris. We miss Tobias developing into a man that can do actual damage. 

Perhaps it’s not because of the Twitter Bucks Bias, or Twitter Magic Ignorance, perhaps it’s because he’s missing certain features. Braggadocio is certainly first among what Harris lacks. He brings an intensity to every play that utterly vanishes as he descends from the basket, as he walks up to the interviewer and tells her he thanks God that he’s even here. This after dropping twenty-plus points and assorted dimes in a game-winning effort. 

Maybe it’s because he makes one too many threes. He makes the kind of threes that reassure him it’s okay to take them from time to time, when his overall performance beyond the arc, stats-wise, is more reminiscent of Josh Smith than Kevin Durant. This is one of a few flaws. 

But watch him ram the ball home off a pass in the paint. Watch him exhibit self-control and humility and a commitment to the team, and not to himself. Really sit down, watch a Magic game, and tell me why you care about Khris Middleton more than you do Tobias Harris. 

Maybe he’s not out on the streets of Milwaukee getting photographed with BANGO THE DEER. Maybe that’s not where he’s supposed to be.

-David