Well, now that ‘The Last Dance’ is over and done, the quarantined life has us back to endlessly scrolling through our social media accounts, watching random stuff on YouTube, and scouring the internet for TV shows and movies – not that we didn’t do it while the docuseries was going on.

‘The Last Dance’ was very entertaining and surely made basketball junkies hungry for more content. We all know that the NBA is rich in history – good, bad, and ugly – and there are dozens of other storylines that deserve a deeper dive.

While some are borderline impossible since the NBA may swiftly kibosh its production, one can hope. I’ll list down some of the most interesting and deserving.

The Heatles

LeBron James sent shockwaves throughout the entire sports world in July of 2010 when he decided to leave his hometown team Cleveland Cavaliers for the Miami Heat.

Three things draw massive ire from the fans: 1) he broke the Clevelanders hearts by announcing his decision to jump ship in a diva-esque way, which was through a nationally televised special called ‘The Decision,’ and 2) he joined another elite-level superstar in Dwyane Wade, and they brought one more All-Star with them: Chris Bosh, and 3) James declared that they can win “not one, not two, not three, not four, not five, not six…” NBA championships – even before they played a pre-season game or had a training camp.

The Heatles went to the finals in each of their four seasons together and won two. The run included James imploding in the 2011 finals, the team dominating the league in the ensuing seasons, and then shockingly breaking up after James decided to return to the Cavaliers in 2014.

The Tim Donaghy betting scandal

Tim Donaghy is the disgraced former referee that placed bets on games that he refereed in (roughly between 1994 and 2007), which was considered a federal crime. He got convicted and served over two years of jail time for multiple cases.

Among the most high-profile games that he was known to fix via one-sided officiating is the San Antonio Spurs-Phoenix Suns series back in 2007, months before he resigned.

What makes this extra interesting is that Donaghy has said that the league knew about some of the refs’ point shaving. In fact, he has filed allegations against the NBA for the controversial 2002 Western Conference Finals series between the Los Angeles Lakers and Sacramento Kings, claiming that the league knew about the two referees that allegedly fixed games for the Lakers.

The 1996 NBA Draft

The 1996 NBA Draft is considered one of the best rookie classes in league history, maybe second only to the Michael Jordan-headlined 1984 class.

The batch of ’96 had 11 All-Stars and countless selections to the All-NBA and All-Defense teams. It also featured three future NBA MVPs (Kobe Bryant, Allen Iverson, and Steve Nash). Marcus Camby has zero All-Star appearances but he won Defensive Player of the Year in 2007 and led the league in blocks four times. The undrafted Ben Wallace, meanwhile, won the DPOY award in 2002, 2003, 2005, and 2006.

The draft’s other notable names include Shareef Abdur-Rahim, Ray Allen, Zyndrunas Ilgauskas, Stephon Marbury, Jermaine O’Neal, Peja Stojakovic, and Antoine Walker.

The vetoed Chris Paul trade in 2011

Laker fans haven’t forgotten this, and they probably never will. The Purple and Gold were reeling from getting swept in the 2011 playoffs, head coach Phil Jackson retiring, and the Lakers core losing firepower. A point guard like Chris Paul, who was at the top of his game would’ve been an interesting boost and new key partner for Kobe.

Here’s a summary of the infamous trade:

Los Angeles Lakers gets: Chris Paul

New Orleans Hornets gets: Lamar Odom, Kevin Martin, Luis Scola, and Goran Dragic

Houston Rockets: Pau Gasol

The NBA owned the New Orleans Hornets (now Pelicans) at that time and killed the trade because of “basketball reasons” – whatever it meant, it rightfully became a meme for a while.

Then-NBA commissioner David Stern has since passed but we’ll see if his team of executives during those years will share some info in the future.

Nellie Ball

Nellie Ball is the offense popularized by former NBA head coach Don Nelson, an uptempo, outside shot-heavy attack that used small and athletic players and players. The run-and-gun, positionless offense that we see all over the league today is considered to come from Nelson’s schemes.

During Nelson’s time, though, it was mostly overlooked and merely respected. Prior to the recent rise of the Golden State Warriors, basketball was always about having a dominant big man and setting up a half-court offense – factors that opposed the style of Nellie Ball.

It should be interesting to see how its slow spread throughout the years and then have a massive boom in the mid-2010s.