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Inside the Unicorn Factory: the NBA's terrifying secret

Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid (21) and Sacramento Kings forward Garrett Temple (17) battle for position under the basket during the first half of an NBA basketball game in Sacramento, Calif., Monday, Dec. 26, 2016. Sacramento won, 102-100. (AP Photo/Steve Yeater)
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10th December, 2017
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21 June 2012: The Miami Heat dominate the Oklahoma City Thunder in the NBA Finals. Fears spread across the world of basketball that LeBron James may be legitimately unstoppable. NBA Commissioner David Stern decides to take action.

Having seen King James school a team comprising Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and James Harden like they were helpless children, Stern pulled the trigger on a secret genetic engineering project designed to create weapons that could keep the league interesting and, more importantly, profitable.

“It’s Stern’s turn to burn LeBron,” he said. “Activate Project Unicorn.”

Today in a Roar exclusive we speak to one of the scientists behind the NBA’s freakshow factory.

“It all started with Giannis,” says Dr Geoffrey Jones.

“We never thought they’d let us release Giannis. For years we just kept him locked in a cage, eating raw steaks and watching game footage of the 1987 Lakers.

“But then we got the call. We were so careful when we released him into the league. Small market, low draft pick, told everyone he had been playing in the Greek League. No-one suspected a damn thing. It was beautiful.”

And the name?

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“Oh. He was supposed to be named ‘Anti-King’, but an intern fell asleep on the keyboard. So we got Antetokounmpo.”

Hiding away in Milwaukee, Giannis was given time and space to become a force of nature, and a few years later he now looks like an MVP candidate. It gave the facility the confidence to push further into the realms of the unknown.

“The next year, they gave us a stack of money and told us no stretch was off limits. So that’s what we did. We stretched and stretched and stretched until we thought the poor kid was going to snap.”

(Image: Keith Allison, Wiki Commons)

More like kid-snap. Like Kristaps. You get it.

“He was so cute. You should have seen him walk for the first time. Like a seven-foot, three-inch baby deer. Exactly as adorable and terrifying as that sounds.”

They got carried away in 2015, releasing an obvious freak of nature like Porzingis in the top five of the draft to a major market like New York, but luckily everyone was too drunk on Karl Anthony-Towns to notice.

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But then they went too far.

“He was glorious. Such an incredible specimen, I still can’t believe we did it. We just said, ‘Screw it’ and built the perfect basketball machine. It was incredible.

“We started with Hakeem Olujawon, added some Kevin Garnett, a splash of Shaq, a dusting of Bill Russell. We even added the showmanship of Peak Vince Carter. Yes, we can isolate the showmanship gene.

“But we flew too close to the sun. He kept breaking down. We couldn’t keep him on the court no matter what we did. But we knew it would worth it. He was always going to be worth it. The ultimate unicorn.”

Now the weapons they built to beat LeBron James are finally on the court and are ready to take on the King. The Eastern Conference is interesting for the first time in years as the biological anomalies in Milwaukee, New York and Philadelphia finally play to their potential.

“One day people will say we played God. But I say God could never have built something as perfect as Joel Embiid.”

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