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Now that LeBron has signed with the Sixers, we can finally go back to normal hoops talk.

But before we do, something has been on my mind for a while.

From conversations I’ve heard or been a part of in bars or with my friends to things I’m seeing on various social media platforms, today’s NBA fans think about transactions way more than I remember in the past as everyone has a “great” idea for how to fix their team.

“I’m so tired of the ‘We need X-Y-Z’ takes whenever someone has a bad game,” one friend texted. “You likely do not know better than folks employed to make those decisions, no matter how many tattoos you have declaring your undying allegiance to a franchise.”

Some version of the NBA’s Hot Stove League has been around for ages. We see proposed trades all the time. But when games started, it cooled down.

Now, it seems as if the stove is always hot in the NBA. Mainly, fantasy trade proposals are harmless, but if it’s the basis for your fandom, then, that causes problems, because, really …

Are we even having fun anymore?

I’ve seen fan trade proposals in graphics on Instagram. I’ve seen people discussing prediction market numbers on where a player might land. I’ve seen proposals on X (formerly Twitter) where one team trades a star for very little.

As an NBA reporter, I have to understand what the second apron represents, the tax ramifications of any trade, or what an individual player’s contract status might be. But fan investment isn’t found in those things. It’s found in the stories, in the players, the lore, the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat, the feeling of hope you have in October when everybody is 0-0 and just about anything feels possible. Dollars matter, but part of what makes you a fan is the emotions you feel participating in the rituals and community of sports.

Number-for-number swaps and bean counting isn’t truly what makes someone a fan, is it? That makes someone who loves accounting. There is so much more to assessing a player’s contributions, which sometimes don’t appear on the stat sheet. It must be difficult being a fan with such extremes.

I asked my sports-loving friends: a college professor, a few writers, and some homies who just love the game: Where did this start? What do you remember?

“Thinking like a GM has the average person thinking black-and-white when it comes to how good a player is,” one friend said. “You’re either a superstar or a bust. Nothing in-between.”

But they all somehow landed on the same inflection point: it goes as far back as the Trade Machine.

ESPN’s Trade Machine is a tool created by then-data analyst Sachin Gupta in 2006 — coincidentally, the same year Twitter was founded. Thanks to Gupta, who went on to serve as a basketball executive for the Houston Rockets, Philadelphia 76ers, Detroit Pistons, and Minnesota Timberwolves and is now chief of analytics with Chelsea Football Club, fans learn what moves can and cannot be made within the framework of salary-cap regulations and CBA restrictions. It’s a fun and informative way to engage with your favorite team but it seems to have opened Pandora’s Box for NBA fans.

Is it — and the many other trade machines you can now find on the internet — one of the reasons fandom of the NBA has become so focused on transactions?

This summer’s player-movement cycle, especially the Jaylen Brown trade, led to plenty of discussion about analytics anda player’s value to a team. And not just from analysts and media. Fans are deep into roster-building exercises themselves.

We have access to so much information about how basketball is played and what’s efficient (or not). There is data for just about everything you can think of.

And that’s not a bad thing. Having a deeper understanding of something you’re passionate about is perfectly OK. And I can’t discount the desire to win being the motivation in thinking we can make better decisions than someone whose job it is to make them.

But all of this “passion” can be misguided as it takes something that’s supposed to be like a fun group discussion, and turns it into a competition of “Who can be the expert?” And that level of discourse quickly goes from “This is what I would do differently” to “You don’t know what you’re doing at all.”

Everyone wants to have the one idea the rest of the world doesn’t have.

Dream team building doesn’t just happen in the NBAsphere though. Fantasy baseball has been around since the 19th century and evolved from a parlor table game. Fantasy football was started in Oakland, Calif. by Wilfred “Bill” Winkenbach, who formed the Greater Oakland Professional Pigskin Prognosticators League in 1963.

Fantasy roster building has become a lucrative addition for sports across leagues.

Fans in the offseason, notably baseball, would gather around a “hot stove” and toyed with the idea of trading away players they don’t like, getting All-Stars for role players, and offloading contracts they feel are prohibiting their team from greatness. But social media has added a whole ‘nother layer. Misguided trade proposals went from a funny thing to post to, in some cases, the primary way people seem to interact with the NBA.

Lost in the GM-ification of fans, though, is a consideration for the relationships and the team building necessary for chemistry — something not found in a trade machine or mathematical data. There’s human feel and intangibles at play when it comes to building a roster. A team isn’t just made of varying skills and contracts, but different personalities.

Fantasy roster building takes little or none of this into consideration. It can be unnecessarily reductive, overly simplistic, and quite frankly, a bit ridiculous.

And sometimes, the social media banter of it all, it fuels trade rumors.

When Bucks center Myles Turner left Indiana in 2025, he penned an essay for The Players’ Tribune about the highs and lows of his career to that point. For much of his career with the Pacers, Turner was often mentioned in trade chatter.

“Then suddenly my name was popping up in trade rumors a lot — and that’s not even anything bad, you know? Very few guys will ever be good enough at hooping to become an NBA trade asset. That’s a high as hell level to reach,” Turner wrote. “But it definitely took a toll on my mental health. I’d see stuff on social media like, ‘Myles Turner is a finished product’………. man.

“Even if I knew it was only basketball talk, it was still hard to keep it basketball-only in my feelings. And maybe that’s dumb when you’re making millions of dollars to play the game you love.

But what can I say? I was young, and I’m human. And I’m not ashamed to say I got pretty depressed.”

You’re entitled to whatever your thoughts are on Turner’s on-court play, but as he wrote, these conversations ultimately affect real people in real ways. Players are not immune to criticism, social media or otherwise. They’re online — so are their families — and see what’s being said.

Fantasy trade discussions can oversimplify what’s actually a more complicated process for those making the decisions. There is much to consider when trading a player besides the stats. What is the overall impact on the person and the team?

A well-functioning team needs role players and specialists. Talent often has to be developed.

You never know how someone’s game might evolve in a couple seasons, and we’re not always aware of what the expectations are in any given situation. That’s something a real GM thinks about because they aren’t just planning for today, but for the future. Real GMs: Macro; internet GMs: micro, and few of them look at the bigger picture.

We’ve seen trades receive sideways looks and question marks only for them to later pan out. Ever hear of Mikal Bridges? The Knicks stuck to their plan and are champions. That’s not to say everything will work out that way.

“Everybody’s on the couch claiming to know what’s best for their teams as if the pool of truly elite players who have the power to really make or break a team isn’t tiny,” one friend said. “We don’t know what all goes into decisions made about what teams pursue free agents or what those conversations consist of.

“But because we’re watching ESPN daily and watching games we think we know better?”

Fans don’t face the pressure of getting a deal right and won’t be fired. To some extent, maybe the practice allows you to empathize with GMs and that could be a good thing, but doesn’t it feel strange that transactions are the fuel for your fandom?

Fantasizing about a superstar or even just someone who can help win joining our favorite team is normal, but it probably isn’t the best way to connect with other NBA fans if this is the only thing you’re interested in. Especially not long term.

The real fun is in the players and from watching the games. Maybe that’s better than focusing on what you can’t fix?