It’s like watching a nature documentary about sloths, but the sloths are actually basketball pyers trying to defend. Their frantic arm fils become these nguid, graceful arcs, like underwater seaweed swaying in a slow, gentle current. Their aggressive shoves transform into gentle, almost apologetic nudges, like they’re politely asking him to maybe move aside at a crowded bus stop during rush hour.

  The suffocating pressure? Poof! Disappears like a fart in the wind. Vanishes into the ether, leaving only the faint, lingering scent of desperation. In his suddenly serene, slow-motion world, James is bathed in an oasis of time and space, a bubble of calm amidst the storm. He’s got all the time in the world, baby. All the room he could possibly desire.

  It’s like they’re trapped in mosses, moving at gcial speed, while he’s just… vibing in normal time, sipping a metaphorical iced tea, chilling, and thoroughly enjoying the bizarre, slow-motion show unfolding around him.

  He can see their intentions brewing, bubbling, slowly forming in their mosses-filled, slow-motion brains before they even fully solidify into actual, physical action. He can anticipate their moves, predict their next step before they even think about taking it.

  It’s like watching a py unfold in super-duper slow motion, like he’s got the script, the director’s notes, the behind-the-scenes footage, and a comfy front-row seat to the whole, drawn-out performance. And he’s the only one moving at normal speed, the only one operating in real-time.

  Unfair? Ethically questionable? Probably bordering on cheating, let’s be real. But effective? Oh, my sweet summer child, you have absolutely no idea. Absolutely, hiriously, devastatingly effective. Like a cheat code for life, but specifically for basketball.

  Ahsan, Banani’s point guard, the brains of the whole operation, the basketball whisperer, instantly registers the triple-team formation. He sees James completely surrounded, cocooned in a ridiculous, three-person defensive cuddle-puddle.

  For a split second, a nanosecond of pure, unadulterated doubt flickers in his eyes. Should he bail? Pass it out to someone else? Is James… actually contained? Has Coach Rahman, in his infinite, slightly unhinged wisdom, actually stumbled upon a solution? Maybe? Just maybe? Doubt gnaws at him, a tiny, irritating mosquito of uncertainty buzzing around his brain. For a fleeting moment, he almost believes the impossible.

  But then, then he sees it. A micro-movement. A nano-adjustment. James, in the very midst of this three-man defensive hug, executes this subtle, almost invisible maneuver. A slight shift of his weight, a nearly imperceptible step to the side, creating… nothing. Wait, no, hold up. Creating a sliver.

  A hair’s breadth of space. A microscopic, almost theoretical opening in the wall of defenders. It’s so subtle, so fleeting, most of the crowd, heck, even some of the pyers probably missed it entirely, blinked and you'd miss it kinda subtle. But Ahsan? Ahsan’s got that Spidey-sense, that uncanny, almost supernatural intuition for basketball geometry, for angles and openings that mere mortals can’t even perceive.

  And James? James, of course, saw it. And in the hyper-speed, split-second world of professional basketball, sometimes a sliver, a hair’s breadth, a theoretical opening, a whisper of opportunity, is all you freaking need. Connection established. Mind meld initiated.

  Ahsan unleashes the pass. Not just any pass. The pass. A ser-guided, heat-seeking, no-look missile of a pass, threading the needle, splitting atoms, perfectly splitting the difference between two of the lumbering, slow-motion triple-teamers.