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“Holy Airball” and the Ubiquity of Basketball Terminology
The viral trend just reinforces that deep down, we’re all basketball fans on some level
The ball is in your hands, and you have a perfect look at the basket. You line up the laces and shoot. It feels good. It looks good. The ball flies through air in slow motion, and you are certain it’s going to be a swish. As it gets nearer to the rim it falls short, and hits nothing on its way to the ground. With a look of dejection, you can’t believe it — you shot an airball.
Shooting an airball is one of the most dejecting feelings in sports, because it starts with so much promise only to lead to inevitable disappointment. It is such a rollercoaster of emotions that it has spawned a viral trend on TikTok where people have highlighted an interesting fact about them by exposing an incorrect assumption that people have made about this interesting fact (such as a professional baseball player being asked if they play baseball on the college level). The post then ends with either “holy airball” or “holy f*****g airball”.
The trend is good fun and has covered a wide range of topics including dating, jobs, and hobbies. The popularity of the trend has reenforced that basketball, more than any other sport, has terminology that just sticks in pop culture and the general lexicon. It speaks to the universal nature of…
