Hi! You can call me Hal.
I was born and raised in West Michigan, and I'm in my mid 20's. I enjoy a good bad movie (you know exactly what kind of movie I'm talking about), fantasy novels, video games, and a wide range of music. I go by the handle Halbridious (A product of a childhood imagination, but I've used it for 15+ years now. It's never taken when signing up for things, which is what's important.). You can call me 'Hal'. I'll root for any local team, professional or collegiate (The Michigan Wolverines always take priority, but I have no real beef with any Spartan fan, welcome.).
I'm a basketball fan (you probably guessed as much). My basketball fandom started as a kid watching the '04 Pistons squad's rise to greatness. To be honest with you, I don't even remember the championship itself... just the family sitting on the couch for a few hours at least once a week, watching and enjoying the game at as basic a level as you can in sports (I still remember how nasty I felt watching LeBron James crush the life out of my team in Game 5 though... Somehow THAT stuck with me.). I remained a fan through most of the '08 season, when the Chauncey Billups trade basically neutered my fandom (he was, is, and always will be my favorite player). I climbed back out of my hole sometime around '13, and have followed the sport with increasing intensity since then. While working on completely unrelated stuff at my desk, I tend to have a game streaming almost all the time. The more games I watched, the more interested I became in the depth of the game. I readily admit, I never played basketball at any organized level, so I made it a personal mission to really dive in and learn the nuances of the game from a coaches perspective. Now 4+ years after rediscovering my love of the sport, I'm hoping that I can lend myself to discussions around the league, and hopefully bridge the gap between the hardcore and casual fans. I consider myself a bit of a realist, both in life and in sports. I don't usually hop on the hot take of the day, or get swayed by singular performances. That said, I think sports fandom is rather dry without some hope and positivity, and that will likely be reflected here in my writing. I don't generally buy into many streaky things as being sustainable, but that doesn't prevent me from wanting them to be, or from asking, "What If!?". I will readily admit to the one exception to my general positivity: I have serious issues with officiating in modern sports. I think it's very unfortunate that modern sports are mostly officiated the same archaic and analog way they were decades ago. Arguably my favorite conceptual part of sports has always been watching rookies blossom. I loathe college basketball (Zone defense is stupid. College offenses are crippled by the spacing of a shortened 3pt line. The game is severely stunted by worse-than-normal officiating. I can't stand the NCAA's greedy business practices and exploitation of athletes. I'm not convinced it's the best developmental ground for elite prospects.) but in spite of that I suffer through anyways because one of the most fun discussions in the sport is projecting young talent forwards. There are many, many people better than I at scouting the nuances of a player's game, but I take a sincere joy in buying stock in players and watching them achieve and exceed expectations. It's my hope that I can extend the fun of the NBA draft to readers.
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