NBA Summer Vacation Watch: Free Agency and Fourth of July

Well we’ve almost made it through the bane of Summer Vacation Watch: free agency. Every year, the chaos of nerves and new contractual deals keep guys from getting away and enjoying themselves. You might ask, "But don’t guys with new deals eventually go on vacation?" Maybe! But also maybe not! Most players feel pressure, especially if they’re moving to a new city, to buckle down right away and post photos of themselves in their new team’s warmup gear with captions like, “Grind starts now” or “Ready to deliver for my new favorite city in the whole world” plus a smattering of sweat and fire emojis, because the average NBA fan is a fickle, awful creature that always needs to be calmed.

And while the 4th of July is not a historically chill holiday, it’s still a great excuse to see a lot of players enjoy a hot dog or two with their families while wearing some form of sandal or unique summer hat. Free agency traps those toes and unadorned heads in decision caves and judgement caverns, away from the sun and eating too much before going in the pool. But until there’s a motion to move this fun-and-sun theft of a week to, say, early September, I will scour what vacations there are in this prime real estate of summer.

The one exception to free agency aftershocks is the king of everything, including summertime: LeBron James. LeBron could sign a deal and then go on vacation wearing a head to toe melange of every team he has every played for or thought about except the team he’s going to and it truly would not matter. While James doesn’t exactly start off strong (no one in Italy could get him his own exercise ball, he had to bring one?) he emerges from the yacht he’s cruising around the Amalfi Coast with his family on in a funky backwards hat, tank top, possible swim trunks, alongside Jimmy Iovine (???), ready to Vacation. While this may be the last time Iovine is featured in SVW this season, this is probably just a warmup for LeBron.

Rating: Fingers crossed that giant ball turns out to be for a new form of core-focused tubing.

Matching shorts and slides is one thing but matching shorts and slides to your last name, entirely another way to signal, “I’m having fun.” Draymond is on the Greek island of Mykonos, which is one of the party islands but seems in this captured moment to be incredibly chill. Love to see a good palm tree dotted vista leading out into turquoise waters wherein the sea eventually meets the sky but is in no special hurry to get there. Draymond took some time off from being evil these past playoffs and I’m happy to see him continue to do so.

Rating: Do you think he packed Aegean jacket? I’ll be here all summer.

Welcome back, China Klay! Sorry to double up with Dubs but I guess when your team has once again solidified its championship before the season even starts you get on with enjoying your summer. Klay Thompson in China last offseason proved to be a lighter, freer Klay, getting out of his comfort zone and trying on new cultures and full-mouth smiles. Happy to see him back, even happier to see him escape from a soccer net (slide 6 and 7) he got himself stuck in, so he can continue to dance and play someone else’s drums.

Rating: China Klay is the final form of Ball of Klay, hot out of the summer vacation cultural kiln.

The Brodie is on a family vacation in Hawaii and wearing what I can only assume are custom matching swim trunks on the beaches of Maui with his son. Sorry if you are a cold-hearted loser who doesn’t find this cute, for even the most fleeting of seconds!!

Rating: Attention all other beaches you are missing one and a half Brodies.

Looking at these photos might hurt the Magic’s front office’s feelings a bit given their salary situation due to this same big man that can be seen casually leapfrogging the pyramids, carefree, but who cares—Biyombo is having a time.

Rating: UNESCO’s about to protect that poor horse, too.

Now this is patriotism done the right way. The young Utah guard put a call out for a July 4th BBQ and wouldn’t you know it, some good American came through. What they probably did not expect was for Mitchell to also come through, but he did, and they even had a pool. Both parties had to have been pleasantly surprised.

Rating: (To the tune of "Stars and Stripes Forever") Let Donovan in triumph float/And some dude with a Q extend his hand/A 6’2” guard appears ‘mid thunderous cheers/The buns and burgers of the Western fans

Now here is a departure from our regularly scheduled tarps off-top down coverage! Tobias Harris treated himself to button-up shirt-on culinary trip to Chicago’s Alinea, to scarf a balloon full of green apple helium gas and call it a day.

Rating: What do you think the odds are the Clippers invest in a helium diffuser to fill their regular balloons with the gases of Harris’s fav foods in order to keep their last, best asset from leaving for the Windy City? Anyway, looks like a nice dinner.

The OKC Center was in South Korea, doing his summertime poses.

Rating: Extremely tranquil, especially the pagoda and traditional village well thumbs up.

If what you were looking for was more Dame Lil cruising the Columbia River singing a Raphael Saadiq song with a toothpick in his mouth while he bops and lets go of the Jetski controls and his buddy just beside ghostrides his ‘ski then here you are, and don’t ever say I didn’t deliver.

Rating: Needs sunglasses!

Also without sunglasses is a squinting Shaun Livingston, who got to the Amalfi Coast with his family before LeBron did. Shaun seems to be wearing sweatpants shorts and you know what? I’m fine with it. Shaun Livingston’s daughter’s smile is how I smile when writing all of these, for all of you, all summer long.

Rating: Dad on a boat aka top-shelf, 100 percent SVW quality content.

Bonus: Minus one Jimmy Iovine and minus one giant exercise ball makes this the winner of the battle of the free agency week Amalfi vacations—congratulations, Shaun and the Golden State Franchise! You’ve taken this away from the rest of us as well!

Meanwhile, Thad’s at the Waffle House ordering the whole entire menu to himself. The beach is going to get whatever body you give it, remember.

Rating: In his own words, “Amazing,” truly.

I like that we know exactly where Gary is.

Rating: Fingers crossed he does the one where he pretends to push the Tower of Pisa back up next.

While I am biased and think DeMarre does a better job coming up with outdated jabs against his former teams than playing basketball, he really got me with this rustic swing in his Saint Lucian mountain overlook pool. Lord.

Rating: This hurts like hitting cold water after sweating all day or in the immortal words of John Cougar Mellencamp, “Hurts so good.”