Look, I know the video of Steve Kerr’s weirdo east-west handshake is 24 hours old, what I’m telling you is that I can’t stop looking at it. Or thinking about it. Or pondering what brings a person to shake someone’s hand in such a manner.
Here, take a look:
I have so many questions that I’m not even sure where to begin. The whole thing starts out fairly normally, with Kerr using a run-of-the-mill north-south shake with second-round draft pick Trayce Jackson-Davis (Go Hoosiers). But then? He decides to switch it up for first-round pick Brandin Podziemski and go with this bizarre coast-to-coast thing. But Why?
There are so many possibilities. Does Kerr never do the same shake twice? Was it intentional to impress Podziemski because he’s a first-rounder? Was it some kind of MLK Ultra psychological test to see how Podziemski would react? Was it some sort of secret society handshake that none of us are privy to? Was this a failed flirtation where one person holds on to the other’s hand and swings it back and forth? Is this just how kids are shaking hands these days? I’m legitimately asking. I have no answers.
To Podziemski’s credit, he either doesn’t notice or he totally notices but plays it off well enough. First day of work, meeting the new boss and all that. And that was the right play, to be honest. If Podziemski had made a big deal out of it, people would start imitating it. It would become A Thing — a joke at first, but then hipsters would declare they actually like it better than the up-down shake. Fitness influencers would start making TikToks about how it’s actually better for your shoulder joint to go side-to-side or some nonsense. Next thing you know, every time you go in for a shake, you don’t know if you’re doing the traditional thing or newfangled swingy palms. You could probably get away with assuming everyone over 30 would be a traditionalist, but who knows what road Gen Z and Gen Alpha would take? Just imagine the awkwardness in job interviews, the forced laughter after you practically rip the HR lady’s arm out of its socket because you guessed wrong. Absolute anarchy.
Nice try, Steve Kerr. This is America, where we go up-down or we don’t go at all. Try one of the Scandinavian countries, maybe.