Clang!

The New York Times > Magazine > Clang!: "Behold the slam dunk, the pulse-quickening, throw-it-down, in-your-face signature move of the National Basketball Association. The dunk is a declaration of power and dominance, of machismo. In a team game, an ensemble of five players a side, it is an expression of self. In a sport devoted to selling sneakers, the dunk is a marketing tour de force, the money shot at the end of every worthy basketball sequence. (When you see the shoes in the 30-second spot, what is the wearer of those shoes always doing?) Next weekend in Denver, the cultural moment that is the N.B.A. All-Star Game will take place, an event set annually amid a weekend of concerts, lavish parties and showy displays of fashion. On such a big stage (and with defensive standards momentarily relaxed), the game itself is sure to be a veritable dunkathon, a string of self-satisfied throw-downs by the league's biggest stars. If I had my way, at the conclusion of the game the dunk would be taken out of commission. Banned as a first step toward rescuing a game that has strayed far from its roots, fundamentals and essential appeal.

The addiction to the dunk is emblematic of the direction in which basketball -- like all major pro sports, really -- has been heading: less nuance, more explosive force. Greater emphasis on individual heroics and personal acclaim, less on such quaint values as teamwork and sacrifice. Basketball's muscled-up, minimally skilled dunker is the equivalent of baseball's steroid-fueled home-run slugger or the guided-missile N.F.L. linebacker, his helmet aimed at anything that moves. It is all part of a video-game aesthetic being transplanted into our real games: the athlete as action hero, an essentially antisocial lone wolf set apart from teammates, dedicated to his own personal glory and not bound by much of anything, even the laws of gravity. (Last month the sports media giant ESPN entered into an $850 million partnership with Electronic Arts, the video-game company that turns real-life athletes into digitized figures, further blurring the distinction between flesh-and-blood athletes and the superhumans we have come to expect in the sports arena.)

In November, an ugly incident, a brawl between N.B.A. players and fans in Detroit, led some commentators to conclude that pro basketball is populated by thugs. (My online search of the keywords ''N.B.A.'' and ''thug'' a month later produced more than 400 hits.) But the fight was an aberration; N.B.A. players are, in my experience, as gentlemanly as (or more so than) athletes in other pro sports. The N.B.A. doesn't have a thug problem; it has a basketball problem. Its players are the best athletes in all of pro sports -- oversize, swift and agile -- but weirdly they are also the first to have devolved to a point where they can no longer play their own game.

The dunk, by the way, has been banned once before, for reasons other than the one I am proposing. In 1965, a 7-foot-1 basketball player of uncommon grace and coordination graduated from Power Memorial Academy in New York City and enrolled at U.C.L.A., then the dominant force in college basketball. In his first season, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (then known as Lew Alcindor) led U.C.L.A. to a national championship. Faced with the probability that no other team would have any chance at a title for the duration of Abdul-Jabbar's stay, the N.C.A.A. outlawed ''basket stuffing,'' aka the dunk. No one said straight out that the new rule was meant to handicap the young giant, but it immediately became known as the Alcindor rule. U.C.L.A. still thrived, winning national championships in both of Abdul-Jabbar's remaining two seasons. ''After the so-called Alcindor rule was passed . . . some skeptics said he wouldn't be as great,'' John Wooden, the legendary U.C.L.A. coach, observed years later. ''They ignored his tremendous desire and determination. He worked twice as hard on banking shots off the glass, his little hook across the lane and his turnaround jumper.''

One reason that fans of a certain age remember and still cherish the great Knicks teams of the early 70's is because they seemed to be such a functional, appealing social unit. The guards Walt (Clyde) Frazier, Dick Barnett and Earl Monroe were sort of urban hipsters. Bill Bradley, the dead-eye shooter and future United States senator, was an Ivy League wonk nicknamed Dollar Bill by his teammates for the presumed cost of the bargain-basement suits he wore. Willis Reed and Dave DeBusschere did the dirty work under the basket and were so blue-collar in their approach to the game that it wasn't hard to imagine them carrying lunch buckets to some M.T.A. railyard. They meshed seamlessly on the court, elevating the concept of sharing the ball (Coach Red Holzman's mantra was ''hit the open man'') to something like an art form. The same could be said of the Los Angeles Lakers of Magic Johnson and Abdul-Jabbar in the 80's, the so-called Showtime teams. The multitalented Johnson, in particular, was understood to have sacrificed his own scoring in order to involve teammates in a free-flowing, high-scoring offense.

Few teams play like that anymore because basketball culture in America is broken in ways that go beyond the addiction to dunking or the decline in fundamentals like shooting. It has always been possible to identify extraordinary basketball talent at very young ages. The game's phenoms present early, like female gymnasts or violin prodigies (and unlike athletes in, say, football or baseball, where seemingly talented 12-year-olds often just fizzle out). What has changed in basketball is that a whole constellation has been created for the phenoms; they are separated out and sent off to dwell in a world of their own. An industry of tout sheets and recruiting services identifies them as early as fifth or sixth grade, and they begin traveling a nationwide circuit of tournaments with their high-powered youth teams. In the summer, the best high-school players attend showcases sponsored by the big sneaker companies. (The latest of the prodigies earned cover notice on Sports Illustrated in January. ''Meet Demetrius Walker,'' the headline said. ''He's 14 Years Old. You're Going to Hear From Him.'')

One night earlier this season at the press table at Madison Square Garden, I was seated next to Jeff Lenchiner, the editor of InsideHoops.com, an online magazine for basketball aficionados. During a lull in the game, he turned his laptop computer toward me and directed me to watch an electronic file of Stephon Marbury highlights, an array of breathtaking moves: crossover dribbles that left defenders looking as if they were stuck in cement; spinning, twisting drives to the basket; soaring dunks. The last clip showed the 6-foot-2 Marbury rising up for a jump shot over a taller defender. At his peak, just as the ball left his hand, his sneakers looked to be about three feet above the floor. ''Look at him!'' Lenchiner shouted. ''It's like he's in a video game. He's got thrusters!''

The Olympic basketball tournament amounted to an indictment of U.S. basketball. If you had just watched the games in Athens and knew nothing of basketball history, it would have been reasonable to conclude that the sport had been invented and popularized in, say, Argentina or Italy -- and was just starting to catch on in the United States. Other teams passed better, shot more accurately, played better defense. (Foul shooting is generally regarded as a matter of discipline and repetition. With enough practice, most players can become proficient. It's worth noting that in Athens, the gold-medal-winning U.S. women's team made 76 percent of its foul shots while the men connected on a woeful 67 percent.)

This season, some good things are starting to happen in the N.B.A., possibly because the Olympic debacle was such an eye-opener. Scoring has started to edge up for the first time in years, and some coaches have begun to trust their teams to play a fast-breaking style. After years of exporting the game, the N.B.A. is importing not just players but also a style of play from abroad. The high-scoring Phoenix Suns have been the surprise team of the N.B.A. season so far. Their coach, Mike D'Antoni, holds dual Italian and U.S. citizenship and has spent most of his career playing and coaching in Europe. The Suns' point guard, the master orchestrator of their run-and-gun offense, is Steve Nash, a Canadian. (The Suns signed him as a free agent to replace their point guard of last season, Stephon Marbury.)

The San Antonio Spurs do not play at the frenzied pace of the Suns, but they are one of the N.B.A.'s best teams and, within the coaching fraternity, probably the most admired. On offense, they are a five-man whirl of movement. A player who passes the ball cuts to the basket. The player receiving a pass either shoots, makes a move toward the hoop or quickly passes to someone else. They execute the old-school ''give and go'' play -- a player passes to a teammate, cuts, then gets it right back. ''The Spurs are the gold standard,'' Van Gundy said.

For Marbury, playing the Spurs must have felt like being back in Athens. Their style is sometimes called Euro-ball, but it is really nothing new: constant motion on offense, hit the open man. It's the game that used to be played in the U.S. but was forsaken for a more static style.

What the N.B.A. needs, most of all, is to get older. Last summer, eight first-round draft choices were high-school kids; four were college seniors. There are some true prodigies out there, young men ready to go straight from seventh-period English to the N.B.A. But not that many. The most notable recent one is LeBron James of the Cleveland Cavaliers, who somehow survived intense high-school fame to emerge as a mature, team-oriented professional basketball player.

For most, though, the N.B.A. is a bad place to learn, no matter how many coaches are available as tutors. The league is increasingly stocked with athletes who might have ripened in college -- if they had not been picked so young. They end up stunted. The players are paid, but the fans, and the game, are being cheated.

Michael Sokolove, author of ''The Ticket Out: Darryl Strawberry and the Boys of Crenshaw,'' is a contributing writer for the magazine."