The Cavs just overcame some pretty immense odds to win the NBA Finals. For one, they beat the best regular season team in NBA history. They also did it after being down three games to one (which no team has ever done before). Most notably, they won the NBA Finals after having one of their players, Iman Shumpert, completely change up his hairstyle unannounced. Normally that kind of unexpected move is seen as a death sentence for a teams juju. And most of Twitter spent the past week-plus dragging Shumpert through the mud for ditching his signature Geraldian flattop. It all started on June 5 when he showed up to the arena with this wild mop of hair.
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After that, however, he transitioned to a topknot style. It was also not well-received.
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By Shumpert's own explanation, he lost the flattop because his hair is simply too long now to keep up in its perfectly geometric form. We get it—we just can't imagine LeBron was that stoked about the switch-up
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But here's the thing: The Cavs won. Some may say it is despite Iman's hair. (And let's face it, the guy only averaged 3 points during the Finals.) But maybe Shumpert's hair switch-up was the spark LeBron needed to go from downhill superstar to god-level NBA superhero. Maybe Shumpert's limp hair was confusing enough to distract Steph Curry and knock him from his pedestal and knock him down to just regular human shooting abilities. Of course, we'll never have the answers—we're just saying Iman Shumpert never won a title with a flattop. (Sorry Knicks fans.)
Jake Woolf is a writer who has covered men’s style for over ten years and has contributed to GQ since 2014. A graduate of Parsons The New School for Design (good school, long name), he also has bylines at Robb Report, HighSnobiety, Pitchfork, and the defunct #menswear website Four Pins... Read moreWriterXRelated Stories for GQNBAHairNBAcopyright © 2023 powered by NextHeadline sitemap