Ime Udoka’s Rockets Are the Future of Big-Man Basketball

Turns out the great Don Nelson was wrong.

Ever since the disciples of James Naismith witnessed the rim-rattling of Wilt Chamberlain, they knew big men would dominate the sport the good doctor, who couldn’t dunk even if jumping off one of his peach baskets, had invented.

So they went about fixing that. They drew up a limited-access zone – called a key – then widened it. They created a term – goal-tending – and banned it. They even took the game’s most exciting play – the dunk – and for a while prohibited it.

Nelson witnessed the evolution first-hand. He played against Wilt and with Bill Russell. But it was mostly guys like Zelmo Beaty, Bob Lanier and Walt Bellamy – human refrigerators designed to stand between Wilt and his nightly feast – who caught Nelson’s eye.

An innovative coach after an overachieving playing career, Nelson envisioned basketball turning into a little man’s game. He already had the rules-tinkerers on his side. Now he just needed to be bold enough to actually scheme plays in which Tim Hardaway could get face-to-belly button with Bill Cartwright.

With the help of the ABA, creators of the 3-point shot, and the referees, who stopped calling palming, Nelson used the little-man approach to carve himself quite a coaching career … Until Chris Webber came along and ruined everything.

The NBA game in recent years has become what Naismith’s editors, and in turn Nelson, thought it would be: Fast-paced with hands-off perimeter defense, dazzling shooting and even another key within the key – a restricted area in which Wilt used to pitch his tent and block so many shots, the statisticians lost track of them.

The fans love it as vertically challenged guys such as Stephen Curry, Russell Westbrook and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander are now capable of earning recognition as the game’s most valuable players. Imagine that.

Meanwhile, those returning from Mars are starting to ask: Whatever happened to the American big man?

I’ll tell you what happened: He certainly didn’t get any smaller. Rather, he got trimmer and more athletic. Now he not only shoots 3-pointers, but also defends 3-pointers.

Bob Lanier never did that.

And therein lies the foundation of a new revolution that is shaking the core of the NBA. Years from now, it’ll go down as the Victor Wembanyama Era. But, actually, it’s going to take a Nelson-type forward-thinker to kick it into high gear.

Enter Ime Udoka, a sturdy 6-foot-5, 220-pound kid who could have been somebody had he been a half-foot taller.

Still, being 6-5 in his glory years around the turn of the century was plenty big to physically dominate basketball at most levels. So Udoka knows its potential.

On Opening Night, having lost his best little guy – Fred VanVleet – for the season, Udoka dared to trot out a starting lineup of ladderless gutter-cleaners – a 6-foot-7 guy and four others who stood 6-11. Against the defending champs, no less.

Taller defenders harassed Gilgeous-Alexander into a poor shooting night, and it took the Thunder two extra periods, at home, to send Udoka to the team bus a loser.

But in fact, he hadn't lost at all. He had won. If the giants could nearly slay the best team in the league, good luck to everyone else.

It was borderline unfair – like sixth-graders against third-graders at recess. Speed can prevail over size, but not when the size has just as much speed.

Then it becomes Wilt against the proverbial plumber. Only in this case, it’s Wilt and four cousins against the Roto-Rooter Five.

Due to a combination of the peerless perimeter defense of 6-7 Amen Thompson, the world-class athleticism of 6-11 Jabari Smith Jr. and 6-8 Tari Eason, the ability of 6-11 superstars Kevin Durant and Alperen Sengun to coexist as forwards, and a pair of interior forces in 6-11 Steven Adams and 6-10 Clint Capela, Udoka’s Rockets have the potential to knock the basketball world silly.

All because 6-11 guys are starting to play like 5-11 guys. And the 5-11’s will never play like 6-11’s.

So we end up with the mismatches Naismith made possible before all the squares, rectangles and arcs were added to his masterpiece.

Alas, like Nelson was peer-pressured into doing at times when he weighed down his Ferrari by throwing the likes of Alton Lister, Victor Alexander and Adonal Foyle into the back seat, Udoka has gone away from his revolutionary lineup in recent games, inserted a traditional little guy (6-4 Josh Okogie) into the starting lineup in place of his toughest big man (Adams).

Forget the six wins in seven games. It’s a mistake. Sengun, Durant, Smith and Thompson all lose their advantage dueling bigger opponents, and with that, the Rockets can’t possibly make it out of the second round of the loaded Western playoffs. Especially with Okogie and 6-2 Reed Sheppard playing prominent roles.

You might argue the Rockets also have no chance of succeeding when playing a lineup of the future in the present, but likely the Thunder, after what they witnessed on Opening Night, aren’t convinced of that.

And if Udoka is willing to go all-in, imagine at the trade deadline prying Ausar Thompson – Amen’s 6-7 mirror image – from the Pistons to make the team photo even more imposing.

Maybe Udoka has gotten cold feet. If so, then the gutty Nelson should give him a call.

Some would say the leader of the 20th-century light brigade never won a thing. Others might argue he made the game what it is today.

You never know until you try.

Udoka has a chance to impact a Nelson-magnitude change, but in the opposite direction. It’s a big ask, but with a huge upside.