History WebOriginal / TheDeathOfBasketball

* ForWantOfANail: One key quirk resulting from using ''NBA [=2K19=]'' resulted in the ''Fumble Dimension'' equivalent of "The Death of Basketball" being delayed by a few in-game decades: the game ''itself'' creating basketball player draftees as a borderline last-ditch effort to prolong the influx of the 40 overalls.

* AwardSnub: [[invoked]] {{Discussed}} when Manu Ginóbili is excluded from the Hall of Fame after his retirement. In real life, he entered the Hall at his first opportunity in 2022, with most analysts having considered him a shoo-in, but the ''2K'' games find his individual accomplishments too meager.[[labelnote:Background]]Actually, Manu's ''NBA'' accomplishments are somewhat marginal for the Hall, his championship rings notwithstanding. However, it's important to note that there's no such thing as the NBA Hall of Fame. It's the ''Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame'', whose scope covers basketball throughout the world. Manu was a shoo-in for the Hall once you include what he's done outside the NBA. He and fellow Hall of Famer Bill Bradley are the only players to have won a [=EuroLeague=] title, an Olympic gold medal, and an NBA title. In 2008, Ginóbili was also named by Euroleague Basketball, operator of the [=EuroLeague=], as one of the 50 greatest contributors to the growth of the [=EuroLeague=] in the 50 years since its predecessor, the FIBA Europe Champions Cup, began play.[[/labelnote]]
* ButtMonkey:

-->'''Jon''': 2K had gone rogue, inventing its own players to draft instead of choosing our 5'4" creations. By the time we realized what it had done, the game-generated players were dominating the league, with nearly 200 of them seeing enough playing time to be PER eligible. Thankfully, Kofie managed to shut it down by tweaking the draft class to include ''all'' positions, not just centers, thereby taking away 2K's case for making up players of its own. But... our project was contaminated. The NBA was now full of young, decent players, and we had no choice but to wait for them to retire. This was not even ''close'' to done.

** The final moments of "THIS IS THE END" are panning shots of the arenas of teams who never won a championship; the last shot is for the Clippers... before moving up to the rafters, where the Lakers' banners are kept.

* EarnYourHappyEnding: Six teams won their first championship in the Doomsday Era: the Nuggets, Cavaliers[[note]]who went on to win the Finals in real life in 2016[[/note]], Grizzlies, Hawks[[note]]in Atlanta, as they won a championship in St. Louis[[/note]], Pacers, and Bobcats. In the Dark Era, the Pelicans, Jazz, Magic, and Nets also won their first title[[note]]Not counting the Pacers' or Nets' ABA titles[[/note]].

* AfterTheEnd: The Dark Era, after the retirement of the last normal players and Doomsday Players make up the entire league.

* AwardSnub: [[invoked]] {{Discussed}} when Manu Ginóbili is excluded from the Hall of Fame after his retirement. Most analysts in real life consider Ginóbili a shoo-in for the Hall, but the ''2K'' games find his individual accomplishments too meager.[[labelnote:Background]]Actually, Manu's ''NBA'' accomplishments are somewhat marginal for the Hall, his championship rings notwithstanding. However, it's important to note that there's no such thing as the NBA Hall of Fame. It's the ''Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame'', whose scope covers basketball throughout the world. Manu is a shoo-in for the Hall when you include what he's done outside the NBA. He and current Hall of Famer Bill Bradley are the only players to have won a [=EuroLeague=] title, an Olympic gold medal, and an NBA title. In 2008, Ginóbili was also named by Euroleague Basketball, operator of the [=EuroLeague=], as one of the 50 greatest contributors to the growth of the [=EuroLeague=] in the 50 years since its predecessor, the FIBA Europe Champions Cup, began play.[[/labelnote]]

* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: One paragraph from the '22-'23 season posits that Doomsday Players can't find jobs like plumbing or medical work because the NBA is desperate to fill their rosters, so they forcibly sign people unfit to play the game, akin to conscription.

In 2019, the idea was expanded in the first video of a new series called ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-yfZn5iYJE Fumble Dimension]]'', this time done in ''NBA [=2K19=]'' and with the assistance of SB Nation's own Kofie Yeboah. This gave more of a story to the idea by creating an army of clones of one absolutely terrible man, Stupid Crap Face, slowly killing the game by infecting the league with him over and over and over again, and watching the games' good players valiantly fight to keep it relevant. The series later expanded to other sports, such as football, soccer, and golf.