By Devon Birdsong | Pounding The Rock (PtR), 2026-05-22 11:30:00
我对“一时狂热”（fad）这一现象在历史上的不断出现非常着迷。
“Fad”这个词听起来很现代，但实际上古老得多。它大约诞生于19世纪30年代，可能是法语词“fadaise”（意为琐事和/或胡言乱语）的变体，而该词最终源自拉丁语“fatuus”，基本上就是“愚蠢”的代名词。
历史上出现过许多愚蠢的狂热风潮。有些变成了可爱且经久不衰的怀旧经典，比如《马卡雷纳》舞（The Macarena）、沙包（Hacky Sack）和呼啦圈（Hula Hoop）。另一些则成为了人类易受骗和营销力量的外部明证，比如宠物石（Pet Rock）、桑拿服（Sauna Suit）和振动减肥腰带。
如今，“一时狂热”已不再局限于19世纪80年代“时尚狂热”的定义，即使在算法时代，它依然作为一个社会有机体存在着。在出现我们现在所用的这个词之前，它就已经存在了，并且贯穿了有记载的历史和科技进步的每一个阶段。
我们甚至在NBA中也经历过几次这样的风潮。
“无位置”篮球。小球中锋的泛滥。理论上欧洲球员的“软弱”。以及尽管技术出众，也应该避开“不三不四”（无法归入传统1到5号位）球员的观念。
甚至还有一种已经成为现代比赛不可或缺的一部分：来自ABA的三分线。
我最喜欢的一种狂热风潮诞生于90年代初期，那是一个充斥着卡牌游戏（Pogs）和拍拍圈（Slap Bracelets）的时代，而那不朽又寻常的菲比娃娃（Furby）也即将降临，宛如栖息在我书房门上半身雕像之上的那只乌鸦。
在我小时候，《神奇立体眼》（Magic Eye）图片（也被称为“单幅立体图”）风靡一时。
单幅立体图于1991年首次成书出版，它们是二维图像，当观看者以特定方式调节视力时，可以在二维图像中产生三维图像的视觉错觉。
人们必须穿透图像本身去看，以触发“立体视觉”（Stereopsis，一种由于双眼对三维场景视角不同而产生的深度知觉技巧），这对于一个4岁的孩子来说很难解释清楚。
我太想看到那些画面了。我父亲尽了最大努力来帮我。他让我盯着图片上方的两个点，然后放松眼睛，直到它们变成三个，再往下看。没用。
他让我把鼻子贴在图片上，凝视虚空，然后慢慢往后退。还是不行。
想到那些就在眼前却看不见的画面，我心痒难耐。我盯着它们看了好几个小时，耐心（又焦躁）地等待着有什么东西能像大家描述的那样，从画面中跃然而出。
在看第二场比赛（G2）时，盯着电视屏幕的我发现自己也在做同样的事情：试图用意念让自己看到屏幕上正在上演的画面之外的东西。
裁判的判罚令人难以接受。文班在内线和外线都被彻底释放且肆无忌惮的以赛亚·哈尔滕施泰因 (Isaiah Hartenstein) 粗暴对待。德阿隆·福克斯 (De’Aaron Fox) 则因上一轮系列赛中伤势加重而缺阵。哈珀 (Harper) 走向球员通道，试图避开马刺的工作人员，然后再次消失在更衣室里，没人知道具体原因。
斯蒂芬·卡斯尔 (Stephon Castle) 被扯着头发拽来拽去，传球频频失误，神色愈发显得绝望和懊恼。而强烈的身体对抗几乎阻断了凯尔登 (Keldon) 往常对内线的冲击，他全场12投仅4中，还成了雷霆球员频繁假摔（swan-diving）的目标。
这倒不是说我看不清局势。到第三节结束时，我多多少少已经看明白了。这是一场惨败。
这是一场一边倒且丑陋的比赛，正是那种会让最冷静的马刺球迷也陷入崩溃的失利，我也不能幸免。
我正竭力想要看清这幅“画中画”里到底藏着什么。
这些重复的画面和违规动作，在它们杂乱无章和冗余的表象之下，究竟拼凑出了什么？比赛结束后，我重新播放了录像并继续盯着它看，就像我小时候盯着那些《神奇立体眼》图书一样。
一切看起来都很糟糕。确实如此。虽然我可以对自己说很多话来寻求安慰，但越想，情况似乎就越糟。马刺的三位全明星级别后卫如今只剩下一人可用。G1和G2的裁判判罚都相当不均衡，尽管G2的问题现在显得尤为刺眼。
即使其中一位（或两位）后卫回归，如果比赛继续允许这种强度的身体对抗，谁也无法保证他们不会立刻被再次打下场。而即便对抗强度下降，也无法保证带着潜在伤病的球员能发挥出应有的效率。
大约一个小时后，我回到床上睡觉，脑子里依然一团乱麻。
直到第二天下午，我坐在皮卡车里，因为被锁在门外而等待锁匠时，我才突然恍然大悟。我当时其实是在对眼（斗鸡眼）。
这是我在花了无数时间盯着单幅立体图却毫无结果后琢磨出来的窍门。如果我故意对眼，而不是等待眼睛自己去适应，我就能让那些形状显现出来。
它们不会从画面中跃然而出，而是会凹陷进去，从而勾勒出隐藏的形状。这个发现让我兴奋不已，直到我把这件事告诉了父亲。
“用那种方法你无法看清所有的细节，”他微微皱着眉头对我说，“这就是为什么我没告诉你。我希望你能看到完整的画面。”
完整的画面。这正是被我忽略的东西。而且，正如我最终学到的那样，你必须放松下来才能看到它。但在经历了一场那样的比赛之后，放松可绝对不是人的第一直觉。
于是，我闭上眼睛，在脑海中重新过了一遍这场比赛。
我看到朱利安·尚帕尼 (Julian Champagnie) 和卡斯尔三分球合计13投仅2中，这种低迷的趋势很可能会反弹。我看到德文·瓦塞尔 (Devin Vassell) 在面对杰林·威廉姆斯 (Jaylin Williams)、贾里德·麦凯恩 (Jared McCain) 和以赛亚·乔 (Isaiah Joe) 时打得游刃有余，同时以近乎极限的效率在外线投射三分。我看到乔丹·麦克劳林 (Jordan McLaughlin) 在几乎没有准备的情况下贡献了高质量的出场时间，如果他需要打更多时间，这是一个好兆头；而如果哈珀和/或福克斯能够上场，他的存在自然就成了锦上添花。
接着，我看到那个形状直接从背景中跃然而出。高大、臂展惊人，将视线和触及范围内的一切球都扇飞。
马刺拥有维克托·文班亚马 (Victor Wembanyama)。这就是大局，这就是他们拥有而雷霆没有的王牌。当然，雷霆在这一场比赛中限制住了他。在他们的主场。在判罚几乎完全偏向他们（或者大量漏判漏吹）的情况下。而在此之前，他就像一只在俄克拉荷马城肆虐的狂暴怪兽一样，在第一场比赛中完全掌控了局势。
这种肆无忌惮的身体对抗策略只是一时狂热。各支球队纷纷效仿，因为这就是当下的风潮。这就是教练、管理层和媒体评论员们认为会奏效的方法。他们紧紧抓住任何能带来一丝成功的救命稻草，寄希望于这能阻止文班。
但这无法持久。它只能断断续续地起作用——偶尔在某些节或半场奏效。
这不是长久之计。它还没能赢下任何一轮系列赛，也不会长久存在。
在经济学研究的语境中，狂热风潮是由社会或心理因素引起的、偏离内在价值的均值回归偏差。它们之所以能成功，仅仅是错误信念的暂时延伸，随后便会回归均值。
就像络腮胡、平衡车和高底鞋（Chopines）一样，它们作为人类对新奇且（通常）荒谬事物的嫉妒与热情的残留物而存在，有时甚至会以持久的方式融入文明的结构中。整个时代都会被它们抹上色彩并被其定义。
它们可能是人类文明本身的碎片。也许直到人类灭亡，它们才会停止出现。但只要马刺拥有文班，我预计这些针对他的“风潮”就会不断涌现。
这恰恰说明了其他球员和球队是多么地在病急乱投医。这些狂热风潮正是时代的印记。
而当下，正是属于文班的时代。
关键启示
- 我第一个承认，在卡斯尔那一届新秀中，我起初并不看好他，但我知道马刺需要后卫，而且我确实认为（如果他能提高投篮的话）他有机会成为一个相当不错的双能卫。我当时无奈地接受了马刺选中卡斯尔的事实，但我真心希望他们能用另一个首轮签选中麦凯恩（当时根本无法想象马刺会在第二年得到迪伦·哈珀 (Dylan Harper)）。我说这些是为了让你们明白，当我说卡斯尔已经彻底征服我时，我是认真的。几个月后，我称他为“朱·霍勒迪 (Jrue Holiday) 2.0”，这绝对是极高的赞誉。霍勒迪是我最喜欢的刚从大学毕业的球员之一（仅次于拉马库斯·阿尔德里奇 (LaMarcus Aldridge) 和戈登·海沃德 (Gordon Hayward)），我认为他是过去十年中最好的攻防一体后卫。然而，问题在于，霍勒迪在职业生涯中表现最好的时候，往往是阶段性地控球，并与德里克·怀特 (Derrick White)、达米安·利拉德 (Dame Lillard) 和斯蒂芬·库里 (Steph Curry) 等其他后卫，以及/或者像扬尼斯 (Giannis)、米德尔顿 (Middleton)、阿夫迪亚 (Avdija) 和德雷蒙德·格林 (Draymond Green) 这样擅长组织策应的前锋共同分担后场压力。卡斯尔似乎也是如此，他在很多方面都能创造价值，以至于你很难去苛责他，甚至很难把这看作是什么缺点。然而，在福克斯和哈珀都缺阵的情况下，这个问题以一种历史性的丑陋方式暴露了出来，他和教练组必须解决这个问题，即使那两位后卫中的一人（或两人）回归。事实上，我希望看到他们在下一场比赛的早期，特意证明他们已经做出了适当的调整，并把球狠狠地砸进雷霆的喉咙里。卡斯尔拥有那样的职业态度、斗志和韧性，我相信只要赛前做好战术准备，他一定能做到。
- 我开始觉得，如果/当雷霆试图重新在内线搞那些粗暴的对抗小动作时，马刺需要考虑启用“法式香草”（French Vanilla）。据我理解，这正是引进科内特 (Kornet) 的目的，所以看到他没有被这样使用很奇怪，尤其是当马刺甘愿让卡鲁索 (Caruso) 随意出手时。如果你打算给那家伙空位三分的机会，那打双塔又有什么关系呢？这感觉就像是一个自然的应对手段，当雷霆亮出底牌时，马刺必须予以回应，因为我敢肯定雷霆还会故技重施。
- 在经历了一些起伏不定的投篮表现后，瓦塞尔的投篮命中率在每一轮都有所提升。他在前两轮的投篮命中率分别为42%和44%，三分命中率为35%。到目前为止，他在这一轮的表现堪称中流砥柱，将投篮命中率提升到了46%，远投命中率提升到了43%，此外他在季后赛中还展现出了极其出色的防守。我知道我之前说过很多次科内特和尚帕尼的合同有多么超值，但即使拿着2700万美元的年薪，瓦塞尔在性价比方面也完全不遑多让，而且他的薪水明年实际上还会*下降*！圣安东尼奥马刺的管理层绝对会让联盟中的每一位老板都羡慕不已，无论他们是挥金如土还是极其抠门。更不用说，他们是在没有削减任何合理开支的情况下做到这一点的。我猜波特兰的那家伙觉得他能超越他们，天哪，如果他真觉得自己能行，我真想把爱荷华州唯一一次鲨鱼袭击事件的发生地卖给他。
散场音乐——今晚的主题曲：
Godzilla —— 蓝牡蛎合唱团 (Blue Oyster Cult)
由生成式人工智能翻译，译文内容可能不准确或不完整，以原文为准。
点击查看原文：What we learned from the Spurs Game 2 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder
What we learned from the Spurs Game 2 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder
I am obsessed with the historical occurrence of the fad.
Fad is a word that sounds contemporary but is actually much older, having been coined back in the 1830s as a probable variation of the French word ‘fadaise’ (meaning a trifle and/or nonsense), which was ultimately derived from the Latin ‘fatuus’, which is basically another word for stupid.
And there have been a lot of stupid fads. Some have become lovable and enduring forms of nostalgic lore, like The Macarena, the Hacky Sack, andthe Hula Hoop. Others serve as an external testament to human gullibility and the power of marketing, like the Pet Rock, the Sauna Suit, and vibrating exercise belts.
No longer confined to the “fashion-craze” 1880’s definition of the word, the fad lives on as a societal organism, even in the age of the algorithm. It existed long before the word that we now use for it, and has endured through every phase of recorded history and technological advancement.
We’ve even cycled through a few in the NBA.
‘Positionless’ basketball. The proliferation of small-ball centers. The theoretical softness of European players. The idea that ‘tweeners’ (players who didn’t slot into a traditional 1-5) should be avoided in spite of skill.
There’s even one that’s become an integral part of the modern game: the ABA three-point line.
My favorite fad was introduced to the world in the early 90’s, an epoch rife with Pogs, and Slap Bracelets, with the immortal and quotidian Furby to come, perched upon the sculptured bust above my chamber door.
Magic Eye pictures, also known as autostereograms, were all the rage when I was child.
First published in books in 1991, autostereograms are two-dimensional images that can create the optical illusion of a three-dimensional picture within the 2D image when vision is manipulated in a specific way by the viewer.
One must look past the image in order to see this, to engage Stereopsis (a trick of depth perception caused by the different perspective each eye has of a three-dimensional scene), which is a difficult thing to explain to a 4-year-old.
I wanted to see the pictures so badly. My father did his best to help. He told me to focus on the two dots above the picture, and then relax my eyes until they turned into three, and then look down. No dice.
He told me to touch my nose to the picture, stare into space, and then slowly pull back. No luck there either.
Tantalized by the knowledge of pictures just beyond my sight, I stared at them for hours, patiently (and impatiently) waiting for something, anything, to pop out of the frame in the way that so many had described.
Staring at my television in Game 2, I found myself doing the same thing; trying to will myself into some vision beyond what I was seeing play out on the screen.
The officiating was jarring. Wemby was being manhandled both inside the paint and outside it by an unleashed and unchecked Isaiah Hartenstein. De’Aaron Fox was out recovering from a re-aggravated injury from the series before. Harper made his way up the tunnel, made a bid to escape Spurs staffers, and then vanished into the locker room yet again, with no one certain of the cause.
Stephon Castle was yanked about by the hair and fired errant passes with an air of increasing desperation and chagrin. And the physicality all but barred Keldon from his usual forays into the paint, as he went 4-12 and found himself being targeted by the swan-diving Thunder.
And it wasn’t that I couldn’t get the picture. I more or less had it by the end of the 3rd quarter. This was a loss.
It was one-sided, and ugly, and exactly the kind of defeat that could send even the most composed Spurs fans into a spiral, and that included me.
I was straining to see what the picture within the picture was.
What were all of these repeating frames and violations composing out of their shape and redundancy? I restarted the game after it was over and continued to stare at it, just as I had the Magic Eye books of my youth.
Everything seemed bad. It just did. There were a lot of things that I could tell myself to feel better, but the more I thought about it, the worse things seemed. The Spurs were down to one of their three all-star caliber guards. Both Game 1 and Game 2 had been called fairly unevenly, even though Game 2 had now glaringly overshadowed it.
Even if one (or both) of said guards returned, there was no guarantee that they wouldn’t be ushered right back off of the court if the same degree of physicality was going to be allowed. And even if it wasn’t, that was no guarantee of effectiveness from players with potentially nagging injuries.
An hour so later, I went back to bed, no clearer on the matter than before.
And it wasn’t until the following afternoon, sitting in my truck, locked out of my home and waiting on a locksmith, that it clicked for me. I was crossing my eyes.
It was something I had figured out after enough time spent gazing at autostereograms with no result. If I crossed my eyes on purpose, instead of waiting for them to adjust, I could make the shapes appear.
Instead of popping out of the frame, they would sink into it, creating the impression of the hidden shape. I was thrilled by this development until I told my father about it.
“You won’t be able to see all of the details that way”, he said to me, frowning slightly. “That’s why I didn’t tell you about it. I wanted you to be able to see the whole picture.”
The whole picture. That’s what I was missing. And the thing is, as I had eventually learned, you kind of have to relax in order to see it. And relaxation isn’t exactly one’s first instinct after a game like that.
So, closing my eyes, I went back over the game in my mind.
I saw Julian Champagnie and Castle going a combined 2-13 from three, a trend likely to reverse itself. I saw Devin Vassell putting in savvy work against Jaylin Williams, Jared McCain, and Isaiah Joe while dropping bombs near max efficiency. I saw Jordan McLaughlin put in quality minutes with little to no preparation, boding well if he has to play more, and becoming positive by default if Harper and/or Fox are able to play.
And then I saw the shape pop right out of the background. Long. Rangy. Swatting everything in sight and reach.
The Spurs have Victor Wembanyama. That’s the big picture. That’s the trump card that they have that the Thunder don’t. Sure, they forestalled him for a game. On their home court. With foul calls going almost entirely in their favor (or largely uncalled). After he bent Game 1 to his will like a raging Kaiju let loose in Oklahoma City.
This strategy of unchecked physicality is just a fad. Teams have been trying it out one after another because that’s the fashion. That’s what coaches, and front offices, and talking heads are thinking will work. They’re clinging to anything that offers some modicum of success. They’re hoping that it’ll stop Wemby.
But it hasn’t for long. It works in fits in starts — in sometimes, and quarters and halves.
It’s not a long-term solution. It hasn’t won a series. It’s not here to stay.
In the context of economic studies, fads are mean-reverting deviations from intrinsic value caused by social or psychological forces. They succeed only as a temporary extension of misguided belief, and then return to the mean.
Like mutton-chops, and hoverboards, and chopines (platform shoes), they exist as residue of human envy and enthusiasm for that which is novel and (often) absurd, and sometimes become a part of the fabric of civilization in enduring ways. Entire eras are colored and defined by them.
It’s possible that they are the debris of humanity itself. That they’ll cease to occur in the same gap of time that we cease to exist. But so long as the Spurs have Wemby, I expect them to keep popping up.
That’s how much players and teams are grasping at straws. The fads are the sign of the times.
And this is the time of the Wemby.
Takeways
- I’ll be the first to admit that I wasn’t big on Stephon Castle out of his draft class, but I knew the Spurs needed guards, and I did think that (if he could improve his shooting) he had a shot at becoming a pretty decent combo-guard. I was resigned to the Spurs drafting Castle, but I was really hoping they’d draft Jared McCain with their other 1st rounder (not being able to imagine a world where they landed Dylan Harper the following year). I say this so that you understand when I say that Castle has completely won me over. After a couple of months, I pronounced him Jrue Holiday 2.0, which I meant/mean as an absolute compliment. Holiday was one of my most desired players coming out of college ever (after LaMarcus Aldridge and Gordon Hayward), and I consider him to be the best two-way guard of the last decade. The thing is, though, that Holiday has historically been at his best running the point in stints, and sharing the back-court with other guards like Derrick White, Dame Lillard, and Steph Curry, and/or heavy assist forwards like Giannis, Middleton, Avdija, and Draymond Green. The same appears to be true of Castle, who creates value in so many ways that it’s really hard to fault him, or even really consider it much of a shortcoming. With Fox and Harper both out, though, it came to the forefront in a historically ugly way, and he and the coaching staff are going to have to figure this out, even in the event of the return of one (or both) of those guards. In fact, I’d like to see them go out of their way to make a point early in the next game that appropriate adjustments have been made and ram the ball down the Thunder’s collective throats. Castle has that kind of work ethic, fire, and grit, and I’m certain that he can do it with a strategy session beforehand.
- I’m starting to think that the Spurs need to kick the tires on French Vanilla if/when the Thunder try to go back to some of their rough-and-tumble paint hijinks. As I understood it, this is exactly the sort of thing that Kornet was brought in for, so it’s odd not to see him used in that way, especially if the Spurs are content to just let Caruso fire away. If you’re gonna give that guy open threes, then who cares if you play two bigs? It just feels like a natural counter that needs to be shown when the Thunder play that hand, as I’m sure they will again.
- After some inconsistent shooting performances, Devin Vassell has improved his shooting with every round. He shot 42 and 44% in the first two rounds, and 35% from three. So far, he’s been absolutely huge in this round, upping his shooting from the field to 46% and his long-distance shooting to 43%, in addition to the largely outstanding defense he’s put on display in the postseason. I know I’ve talked a lot about how insanely good Kornet and Champagnie’s contracts are, but even at 27 million, Vassell is giving them a real run for their money in terms of value, and his salary actually *drops* next year! San Antonio’s front office has to be the envy of just about every owner in the league, be they spend-happy or thrifty beyond belief. And to think they did it without cutting every reasonable expense in the process. I’m guessing that guy in Portland thinks he can outdo them, and boy, would I like to sell him the site of Iowa’s one-and-only shark attack if he thinks he can make that work.
Playing You Out – The Theme Song of the Evening:
Godzilla by Blue Oyster Cult
By Devon Birdsong, via Pounding The Rock