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Caris LeVert’s Top 10 Plays In 2018-19 Thus Far

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So, here we are.

Caris LeVert, how we miss you so.

At one point, this Brooklyn Nets season appeared wholly optimistic — for the first time in years, the franchise looked competitive and youthful. Although plenty of sidekick partners contributed to the Nets’ impressive start, it was, of course, fueled by LeVert himself. A man on the verge of a major breakout, pundits, writers, and fans league-wide began to take notice of Brooklyn’s budding star. With LeVert taking a step, even reaching the postseason didn’t look entirely out of grasp. And then it happened. After one unfortunate chase-down block gone wrong, the entire season changed and LeVert’s future was left hanging in the balance.

Just about everyone feared the worst given that Paul George, Gordon Hayward, and Isaiah Canaan have all had injuries that looked just as bad optically and each missed the rest of the season suffering extensive damage and needing surgical repair. By some stroke of luck, LeVert suffered but a dislocation with only moderate ligament damage and he will won’t need surgery, according to Nets surgeon — and possible deity– Dr. Martin O’Malley, who is no stranger to these injuries. Is LeVert’s body made of adamantium? I have no scientific or medical background but I’m inclined to say yes given that his leg looked extremely broken and that’s putting it generously.

Still, silver linings and all, the Nets have gone just 2-11 since the injury, so, uh, not great.

LeVert will miss a whole lot of time, undetermined at this point, but his season may not be over which is possibly the best case scenario anybody could have hoped for. With better days on the eventual horizon and the Nets’ season sinking faster than a stone, let’s remember the good times and check out the best plays from the Nets’ very own Wolverine.

10. LeVert breaks Isaiah Canaan’s ankles so badly here that he just quits on the whole play. Look at the sad shoulder slump of a man who wants none of the smoke. Canaan has tried ever since to scrub the smell of defeat off of him like Ace Ventura in the shower but nothing works. Nothing will ever work.

9. The caption says it all, really. If LeVert somehow can’t get his rubber band body to break the laws of physics around your block attempt (because you’re cheating obviously) then he’ll just truck straight through it for the And-1.

8. The LeVert-to-Allen Connection sounds like a terrible 70s one-hit wonder act, but it is actually less than it is finding yourself in late-90s WWF being blasted through a table by the Dudley Boyz.

7. Did we mention it works in reverse as well? Because it does. Here’s Jarrett Allen setting up the ladder while LeVert Swanton Bombs off of it and all over the Pelicans.

6. Most of the time, LeVert is content enough to flush home a largely uncontested fast-break dunk smoothly rather than stuffing it with authority. That’s fine, it fits the rest of his game, I guess, but what I really get up for is him absolutely yamming it on the run as he does here against the Pistons. By God, it’ll be on replay until the day I die.

5. Speaking of smoothness, here’s LeVert welcoming Damian Jones to the league by transporting his physical body completely out of it. Jones is allegedly still tumbling through the void of space trying to work out where LeVert is.

4. Joining Jones in the Nether Zone is former First Team All-Defense member — and new owner of two bloody stumps where his ankles once were — Victor Oladipo. This whole sequence looks like a Mortal Kombat fatality. Pacers management allegedly left Oladipo’s kicks in this exact same spot on the Banker’s Life Fieldhouse as a mark of respect and also in the vain hope that Oladipo can one day find his way back to them.

3. Here is LeVert carefully considering the opinion of everyone who thought he wasn’t the front-runner for Most Improved Player this year and casually spiking it into the nearest trash receptacle where it belongs.

2. The upcoming Avengers 4 should just be this game-winning play on a loop. Never looking quite legitimate contenders in this contest, it was LeVert who sparked the comeback in the fourth quarter and nearly got the first Nets buzzer-beating game-winner of the season. He won the game, nonetheless, by snapping his fingers and turning half of the population of Denver into space dust in the process.

1. This is where it all started this season, however, on this beautiful play. When I get married, I’m going to tape over my wedding video with this. If he were mic’d up on this play, we would have heard LeVert muttering “Kali Maaaaaa!” as he hit this game-winner and ripped the hearts out from our enemy across the river? And what about that flex on them afterward? One of the best moments the Barclays Center has ever seen, hands down.

Something tells me that this list is a long way from being finalized. Get well soon, Caris, Brooklyn needs you.

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