Happy Summer Solstice, sun seekers, and welcome back to the only way to set your seasonal clocks, a way that the ancient druids would surely prefer if they were here to see it: NBA Summer Vacation Watch!
If you are new here, welcome! This hallowed observance of the summer vacations and offseason activities of your favorite NBA athletes has been taking place, at some outlet or another, since 2017 (to catch up, you can browse the sunscreen slicked halls of antiquity here at Dime via the only good hashtag, NBA Summer Vacation Watch), because the people demand and deserve it, and because it’s the only reason we sit through the regular NBA season.
If you’re a returning holiday head, it’s so nice to have you back. I trust you’ve got your sunglasses on and the preferred refreshing bev of your choice in hand, because you know this first dispatch is a scorcher.
Serge Ibaka
The Ma Fuzzy Man is the consummate summer pro because he understands and values the sacred balance between time on and time, the hell, off. It’s to the point where dressing, embracing, and sometimes physically preparing for summer vacation is a given, and we’re all luckier for it.
First, he hit up Mexico for some R&R under a palapa with a green smoothie, because you gotta fuel up properly for this kind of dedicated decompression.
https://www.instagram.com/sergeibaka/?hl=en
Then, he was off to Italy to walk the red carpet of Florence fashion, but not before he enjoyed a topless espresso. I’ve heard you get a richer crema that way.
Rating: This man is just warming up, but he’s put the amateur beachgoers on blast.
Jimmy Butler
Much like Ibaka, Butler knows a thing or two about how to take a good vacation — namely, fitting in a little bit of everything. Some culture, some fits, some searching looks toward the ocean, and some footy. There’s this thing where when pro athletes try another sport in their downtime, with their other pro athlete friends, no matter how good they may be at it, it counts as leisure. I don’t make the rules (I do).
Rating: FKW (Full King Winter-denier)
Klay Thompson
Look, we have to start with the heavy summer hitters! And Klay Thompson’s been one, long before he got a boat. That boat has certainly upped the ante, though, and Thompson piloted it down to Mexico with some friends, stopping to fish and chill with humpback whales along the way.
Rating: Bonus for Thompson’s humpback impression, cetologists get at me but I think it was spot on.
Jayson Tatum
Tatum took a very cute vacation loaded with Daddy-Duece time, including Daddy-Duece jet ski, Daddy-Duece poolside, Daddy-Duece ocean inflatable ride, and Daddy-Duece matching swim trunks on the sandy boardwalk.
Rating: I know reading Daddy-Duece one more time is going to make you uncomfortable.
Rudy Gobert
Rudy Gobert is many things, to many people, but he’s now also a man who takes his cat on vacation. Gobert took a trip to Marie-Galante, in Guadeloupe, a location I can confidently say we’ve never seen featured in NBA SVW before. He did some of his fav things, which include wearing and/or holding big gemstones and working out on vacation.
Rating: The only person who can work out on vacation and not have it cancel out their vacation is Buddy Hield.
Devin Booker
A little behind the scenes for first timers, Devin Booker loves rustic ass vacation. Such trips have included stand-up paddle boarding in Colorado, horseback riding in Montana, and swimming in wild and remote lakes deep in the woods. Here he is trekking around the Grand Canyon to celebrate his dog’s birthday, which looks, from afar, like a bear.
Rating: Happy birthday, Haven, long may you reign over the wonders of this world.
JaVale McGee
The only thing better than seeing JaVale McGee clad in fluorescent swim trunks on the bow of an Italian leisure craft, is seeing JaVale McGee snuggled up to some stellar gowns on display in Venice and having a chuckle as if the mannequin was caressing his head.
Rating: Here at SVW, you really can have it all.
Myles Turner
Another guy who is having a ball in the Bel Paese is Myles Turner. Turner went to Milan for his first fashion week dressed like the most tender seafoam cowboy you’ve ever seen, got into Vogue, and I’m pretty sure is still over there, catching trains and living la dolce vita.
Rating: Would love to see some gelato but understand there are some things better left to the imagination.
Kyle Kuzma
Kuz is in ole Pari, declining his player option and solemnly leaning on the historic walls in one arrondissement after another about it, perfecting his Parisian pout.
Rating: Should Albert Camus have hooped?
Scottie Barnes
Barnes took a nice little rip down to the Dominican with his boys to recline on a catamaran and spelunk into some cenotes. A few of them seem to have gotten matching shell necklaces and if the league determines these unfit for the in-game dress code, so help me.
Rating: Overlooking that one friend’s Bitcoin shirt because vacation clothes, to the newly inducted, can be a mess.
Jusuf Nurkic
Move over, NBA champion Nikola Jokic, because there’s a new horse guy in town! The Bosnian Beast was tamed in the woods by another gentle giant, this one standing, on average, about 19 hands high, but this is not a horse combine.
Rating: This horse is 16.5’ at its shoulders and looks miniature under the caress of Nurk, why can’t Meta put its millions toward recreating this experience as therapeutic ASMR instead of making your aunt a floating cartoon avatar in negative space?
Bogdan Bogdanovic
Do the Euro dudes of the league know how to take a nonplussed boat ride or what?
Rating: So cold, it’s hot.
Josh Richardson
Our bloke Josh Richardson went on not one, but two soccer (“footy”) vacations. The first to London, to mix it up with other “proper gooners” (Arsenal fans), and the second to Madrid to take in a Real Madrid match.
Rating: It’s okay if you love so much, but can’t communicate why, Josh Richardson bopping along to a singer, a guy on a tiny keyboard, and a goateed DJ in an Aperol Spritz lounge. Me too.
Josh Okogie
Guess who else was in Milan for fashion week, carrying around a perfect green apple as a snack and photo prop, chowing down on pasta, wearing I want to say an angora vest and beautiful tan brocade suit? That’s right, Josh Okogie.
Rating: Anchor of new Suns superteam, Josh Okogie, hits different in Italy.
Anthony Tolliver
This is a still from a story but without even knowing that you have a feeling that NBA legend, Anthony Tolliver, selfie video’d his phone all over Buen Retiro Park in Madrid, taking in the historic arboretum, the placid ducks, the well-tended grounds, looking first very straight faced and then gradually getting into it, smiling like a real dad on vacation, before panning the camera to his eye-rolling child. Which he did.
Rating: If not relatable to all of us, then certainly some of us. I almost wrote “summer of us” — which it is!
Kevin Knox
Speaking of relatable, there is something so understandable about half of the pictures in Kevin Knox’s dump of his family’s Jamaican vacation being blurry because the lens is smudged with sweat, sunscreen, food, or just the ubiquitous haze of summer.
Rating: You know what else fits into the ubiquitous haze of summer? Safety. Wear your helmets and life vests.
Terrence Ross
T-Ross has chronicled the wild flora and fauna he sees on vacation a couple of times before under the banner, “Nature w TRoss,” and I don’t want to say watch your ass Sir David Attenborough, but…
Rating: Watch your ass, Sir David Attenborough.
Ish Wainright
Dude, this is all there is. There is nothing better. You know deep in your heart, or your gut, or the most selfish and primal part of you that if you were in that raft, in a pool, and someone offered you a million bucks if you just got out for a sec, you wouldn’t do it.
Rating: We’re only human, after all.
Dennis Rodman
We always love to check in and see what the retirees and old timers are doing when we can, so a hearty thank you to five-time NBA champ Dennis Rodman for saving us the sleuthing and showing up at Home Depot in a customized apron (only in a customized apron) to help out in small appliances.
Rating: No one has ever been happier to be in a Home Depot, not even your dad.
Where in the world is Boris Diaw?
Welcome back to the very special section of NBA SVW dedicated to world traveler, explorer, and international man of mystery Boris Diaw. Diaw tends to get up to whatever he wants, wherever he wants, and some past activities have included snorkeling with whales off the coast of Tonga, showing up under a rocket set to launch at Cape Canaveral, and piloting his own sailboat around the world.
Lately, Diaw has climbed a mountain with some people he may or may not know in French Polynesia (he could’ve just been up there already, tbh), and underwent basic firefighter training for his captain license renewal (of course!) in Florida. Thank you Boris, and I’m sure we’ll see you soon.