Image via Complex Original
The 2013-2014 NBA season begins this week, but there's really no point in making on-court predictions. In professional basketball, more than half of the league makes the playoffs. So, unless you're from Orlando, Charlotte, or Sacramento, go ahead and pop a bottle of Dom Perignon and pour it over your head right now. Bam, there's your season preview.
That said, the style of NBA players is something that—for better or worse—has become a prevailing influence in popular culture and it's decidedly less predictable than team performance. It takes a real Nostradamus to predict the contents of a twenty-something millionaire's expansive walk-in closet. Take a peak into our crystal ball as we make 10 Style Predictions for the '13-'14 NBA Season.
Written by Sean Evans (@seanseaevans)
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After years of squinting through lensless frames, Dwyane Wade does irreparable damage to his vision and requires actual glasses.
Let this be a lesson to you dudes wearing drop crotch pants. If you continue to tempt fate this way, it's only a matter of time before a stomach virus forces a series of uncontrolled bowel movements in your expansive seat area. You've been warned.
Birdman arrives to a game buck-ass naked and no one notices for an hour.
Chris "Birdman" Andersen is the league's unhinged malcontent and he just so happens to look like an indistinguishable potpourri of random colors. The Miami big man is brazen enough to take the floor wearing only a pair of LeBron 11s, and he has a look that naturally cloaks poor life decisions.
Tim Duncan continues to wear that shit he bought at Casual Male XL back in '96.
When you're as wealthy and skilled as Tim Duncan, you don't need to overcompensate with designer threads. Since entering the league in 1997, the Spurs forward has shown the style acumen of a burlap sack full of assorted melons, and we don't expect that to change.
LeBron James inadvertently wears one of his toddler son's hats to a game, triggering a new style trend.
LBJ has life in a suffocating sleeper hold, and—right now—the dude can do no wrong. Whether it's by inadvertently wearing his young son's birthday hat to the stadium or by accidentally rocking his wife's thong panties instead of compressions shorts during a game, we fully expect James to start an impromptu, totally disturbing style trend in 2014. This is what you might call suffering from success.
In his ceaseless crusade to keep up with Russell Westbrook, Kevin Durant plays an entire game in a Yeezus-inspired, Maison Martin Margiela mask.
How do you outshine Russell Westbrook? The Thunder point guard is basically Lady Gaga with a 35" vertical leap. Meanwhile, Kevin Durant (AKA the Western Conference's best player) wanders in the style shadow of his much more ostentatious teammate.
Well, a competitor like Duranchula isn't going to sit by and play the fashion game's second fiddle. Despite seriously obstructing his vision, Durant will score 40 points in a game at Barclays Center while sporting a bedazzled ski mask.
Craig Sager comes under fire when one of his outrageous suits triggers a rash of epileptic seizures amongst elderly NBA fans.
Craig Sager is going to keep pushing the style envelope until one of his atrocious pattern combinations forces an AARP cardholder into an early grave. This guy's desperate desire for swagger is potentially lethal, and it's only a matter of time before tragedy strikes.
JR Smith gets suspended for wearing a HUF weed leaf shirt to a post-game presser, wears a "COMME des FUCKDOWN" tee in response to the uproar.
J.R. Smith is the NBA's greatest DGAF icon since Allen Iverson, and his personal style is a reflection of that irreverent, borderline psychotic persona. We fully expect Swish to troll David Stern with a subversive endorsement of bong hits and—when the foot drops—to compound his punishment with an inflammatory style encore.
Kevin Garnett begins incorporating leather into his wardrobe because he's now in Brooklyn and, as he'll put it, "leather is for bad-ass motheruckers."
Kevin Garnett's as good at endearing himself to a city as he is at drilling 15-foot jump shots. Now that he's in Brooklyn, he'll probably get a neck tattoo, edge his dome with an artisanal shaving kit, and rock more full grain leather than Dog the Bounty Hunter.
Amar'e Stoudemire trips over his own ascot and misses six to eight weeks.
During the 2012 NBA Playoffs, Amar'e Stoudemire busted his hand open by punching a fire extinguisher out of frustration. We don't expect STAT to knuckle up another steel-plated piece of safety equipment, but the dude's reckless layering and ornate accessories pose a new hazard to his health. Whether it's by tripping on an ascot or detaching his retina with a shattered monocle, the Knicks championship aspirations will be dashed by Stoudemire's idiosyncratic style choices.
Russell Westbrook rocks an insane Thom Browne off-the-runway look; everyone makes fun of him, and then dresses exactly like him six months later.
Russell Westbrook is going to show up to a post-game presser dressed like a parody of himself causing Twitter—as Twitter does—to lose its shit. Then, in summer 2014, the streets will be flooded with guys in Benjamin Franklin-style knee socks, powdered wigs, and dolphin shorts made out of high quality wool. You heard it here first.
