The Cavs are kind of just like The Bachelor: While We’re Waiting…

The first time I wrote a While We’re Waiting, I joked that I’d be writing about “The Bachelor” franchise. Well guess what, friends? I’M NOT JOKING ANYMORE.

Here’s the thing. There are, undoubtedly, about a million things to talk about today. The beginning of bracket-busting season. St. Patrick’s Day. Donald Trump’s impending Presidency of doom. The Browns’ roster, which appears to be evolving by the hour minute.

But instead, I want to focus on The Bachelor for many reasons. Mainly because it’s one of my favorite things on Earth. Also because the franchise’s most recent season just wrapped up on Monday evening. Most importantly, though, it dawned on me how much my beloved reality show has in common with the Cavs.

Hey now. Don’t roll your eyes just yet. Let me make my case, OK?

The Star

Let’s start with twenty-six-year-old Ben Higgins, the Bachelor himself on the show’s most recent season. For all intents and purposes, the show, its universe, and the emotional well being of its entire fan base pretty much revolved around him. Ben has an off night? Ben’s an emotional wreck? Ben says or does something vague and cryptic and confusing? Fans of the show were a mess—and completely engrossed.

The thing about being the star is that, in addition to the fact that just about everyone wants you, the highs are extremely high and the lows are extremely low. And, with all eyes on your every move, everyone from the couch to the coach (whoops, HOST) totally feels it.

Sound like anyone we know, you guys?

The First Choice

Spoiler alert: In the end, Ben chose 25-year-old flight attendant Lauren Bushnell. Nicknamed “Lauren B.” by producers to distinguish her from the 17 other Laurens on the show, she was pretty much Ben’s first choice from early in the season.

Lauren was always quiet and pretty reserved. You didn’t always get a lot from her personality-wise, but she was always present. And none of that mattered to Ben—because he was already head over heels.

I struggled with this choice a lot, because I realized that, despite having watched the entire season, I still felt like I didn’t know a ton about Lauren B. And then it dawned on me that she’s essentially James Jones.

It doesn’t matter how big our star may get, he’s always going to go back to the one he feels closest to. That’s why, despite co-staring in movies and getting the Futures of the world to drop entire albums with a mere tweet, LeBron has holiday dinners with JJ. The heart wants what it wants, right?

The Second Banana

In what host Chris Harrison called “the most DRAMATIC season finale EVER,” Texas real estate developer Joelle “JoJo” Fletcher was dumped and sent packing in a few swift minutes. We’re going to look past the emotional turmoil to focus on the fact that she was, essentially, the show’s “number two” player.

That makes JoJo a total Kyrie Irving, no? At 24, she’s a little younger. She showed tremendous promise right away, and followed through to meet the expectations she faced. Plus, JoJo was a bit on the flashy side—both in personality and in the fact that she wore head-to-toe sequins in the show’s final episode—and that feels kind of Kyrie-ish, too.

But most importantly, perhaps, JoJo has been selected to star as the Bachelorette on the franchise’s next season. Essentially, she’s stepping out from behind Ben’s shadow to come into her own. It might not be Kyrie yet, you guys, but it will be someday.

The Early Favorite Let-Down

It’s hard not to classify 23-year-old Olivia Caridi as this season’s “Villain” or “Crazy One,” because she ended up being both of those things. But, as the recipient of the all-important “First Impression Rose” in this season’s first episode (I hate myself for typing that sentence), Olivia was a favorite that stood out from the pack almost immediately.

Expectations are always elevated with the early favorite, and Olivia was no different. She showed promise, hopes were high, and countless fans of the show drafted Olivia onto their Bachelor fantasy teams. (Don’t judge—it’s a thing.)

And then, just like Kevin Love, she just didn’t quite follow through. I won’t go as far to say that Cavs fans dislike K. Love the same way fans of the show ended up hating Olivia, but I’ll certainly say that both have left us feeling a bit letdown after tons of initial hype.

The Twins

For the first time in the franchise’s history, a pair of twins appeared on the show as contestants. Twenty-three-year-old Las Vegas natives Emily and Haley Ferguson came to the show as a packaged deal, and appeared to be better off together.

Until, all of the sudden, they weren’t. Ben sent one twin packing about halfway through the season (apologies, twins, I don’t know which one of you it was), forcing the other to find her way alone. And you know what? She did… and she did so just fine.

The saga of the twins reminded me all too much of the on-court chemistry and off-court friendship between Matthew Dellavedova and Anderson Varejao. Yes, it broke Delly’s heart (and all of ours) to see Andy go, but it was a situation beyond his control.

The Fans

Although I’m not in love with the phrase, “Bachelor Nation” and Cavaliers fandom are so much the same, it’s not even funny. We plan our days around being able to live-tweet each episode, alternating between being glued to our phones and screaming at our TVs. We discuss every little thing; we over-analyze even more. There are blogs and podcasts and entire reddit threads devoted to each one, and we fans are all too willing to spend as much of our free time as we can with them.

True story: I watched Monday night’s Bachelor finale over pizza and Moscow Mules with a group of friends, playing “BENGO” as we went. When JoJo was announced as the next Bachelorette, one of those friends, an ardent supporter of the Texas native, jumped up and pumped his fist like his team had just won the Super Bowl. Because, like it or not, shows like the Bachelor—and teams like the Cavs—pull us in and grab us, right by the feelings. Because, throughout the course of the season, through every single up, down, and absurd twist in the road, we fans invest much more than just our time.

Which brings me to now. It’s a Wednesday evening and I’m watching the Cavs—without their star—trounce the Dallas Mavericks. The game hasn’t been terribly exciting without LeBron, and I’m instantly reminded of the second-to-last episode of the Bachelor. Always called “The Women Tell All,” the finale-before-the-finale is essentially a roundtable of that season’s contestants, with a marginal amount of Ben, the star, sprinkled in. Yawn.

♦♦♦

If you haven’t unfollowed me on Twitter yet, you’ll know I’m a big fan of watching the Bachelor live while tweeting about it as I go. In marketing, we call doing so “second-screen viewing,” which means, quite simply, you’re simultaneously engaging with two screens at once. In life, I call it “pretty damn fun.” Whether it’s the Bachelor or the Cavs, “Scandal” or the World Series of Poker, connecting with other fans of your favorite pastime can make the experience of watching that much more interesting—for better or for worse.

Happy Thursday, you guys. Go get lucky.