Nate Oats doesn't care about college basketball

But someone important needs to

This photo is three years old

Want to see the funniest thing we saw all week? Here it is:

There aren't many posts that can get us to stop scrolling these days. So much of the Internet is a depressing mess. So much of it is slop. This tweet, purporting to be a “leaked photo of Heaven,” a truly incredible concept, had 11,000 likes Thursday night. Eleven thousand! We find ourselves increasingly ignoring the whole thing — barring, say, Indiana football winning a national title, in which case we thumb the screen like an 88-year old slamming token slots.

Anyway, to be fair, the above post was worth it. It’s amazing.

It was published shortly after former Alabama center and multiple NBA-contract-signee Charles Bediako won a 10-day temporary restraining order from a Tuscaloosa, Ala. judge, an order that made him immediately eligible to play college basketball for Alabama. Yes, that Charles Bediako.

The news rocked college basketball. Sure, Baylor’s recruitment of James Nnaji felt like a bad joke, because Nnaji was drafted 31st overall in an NBA Draft. (Which has looked even crazier since Nnaji got to Baylor and done nothing — how did NBA teams almost take this guy in the first round three years ago?) But, as the NCAA clarified during that uproar, crucially: Nnaji never signed an NBA contract.

This is the meaningful distinction, the hill the NCAA is currently planning to die on. After the Nnaji mess, NCAA President Charlie Baker made clear in a statement that “the NCAA has not and will not grant eligibility to any prospective or returning student-athletes who have signed an NBA contract (including a two-way contract).” The rules feel weird these days, to the point of most fans and media members assuming they’re nonexistent, but this was a clear marker. Sign an NBA contract, and you’re ineligible. OK, fine. Seemed straightforward enough.

Bediako, obviously, did not fit Baker’s description. This did not matter to James H. Roberts Jr. of the Tuscaloosa Circuit Court this week. Roberts, who has absolutely no personal interest in Alabama athletics, not that it really matters, Roll Damn Tide, ruled that Bediako is “immediately eligible” to practice and play for ‘Bama, and also wrote that the NCAA is “restrained from threatening, imposing, attempting to impose, suggesting or implying any penalties or sanctions” against the player, the Tide, Nate Oats, or anyone else affiliated with the program until Jan. 27, when a full hearing is scheduled.

All of which brings us back to the tweet. We have a long-held personal rule: We try not to criticize other journalists, or sports media people, or influencers, or whatever folks want to call themselves. We’re all out here making our way on our God’s Earth — trying our best, slinging our takes, caring too much about a thing that only matters as much as we want it to.

Having said that: Is Aaron Torres, bless his heart, under the impression that Charles Bediako’s parents dropped off their son at Coleman Coliseum without any prior notice? Did this 7-foot, 23-year-old basketball player just show up one day with his sneakers and a water bottle and a Wilson Evolution with “BEDIAKO” written in permanent marker on one of the panels? Did he drift down the Black Warrior River in a basket? Did Sandra Bullock drive around her SUV and find Bediako eating leftover concession food off the bleachers in Bryant-Denny Stadium?

Does anyone think Nate Oats shows up to his team’s practices and likes to be surprised? That he was just totally caught off guard? Did his staff tell him to close his eyes before he walked into the gym? Wow, Charles, what are you doing here?! You came all this way? Great to see you, buddy, but we’re not sure we can bring you on — it might be against NCAA rules! Is that the idea?

Of course Nate Oats knew. It was his decision! According to Field of 68’s Jeff Goodman, Oats is planning to play Bediako Saturday against Tennessee. Of course he is! And everyone already knows why: Because Nate Oats doesn’t give an orbital fuck what you think, or how much you love this sport, or whether college basketball has enforceable rules, or anything else in the world that doesn’t involve Nate Oats-coached teams winning games.

Still, Aaron’s fanfiction was directionally correct: It would be great if someone did.