Colin Cowherd: SGA’s flops are like Life Alert meets Cirque du Soleil

Credit: Fox Sports / Ed Schipul via Wikimedia Commons

We all know the commercial.

Help! I’ve fallen and I can’t get back up!

Whoever made that Life Alert ad two decades ago deserves to earn residuals, because we’re still referencing it in 2026. But it takes a truly creative mind like Colin Cowherd to take that legendary commercial and use it to explain the game of one of the NBA’s biggest stars. Alas, Cowherd has made a career out of these illustrative monologues. And on Wednesday, he provided us with another all-timer by somehow comparing watching Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s patented flops to inserting the star of the Life Alert commercial into Cirque du Soleil.

If that isn’t painting a clear enough picture for you yet, let Colin explain.

“First of all, SGA’s a really good player. He’s a fluid athlete, one of the best mid-range jumpers of all time, he’s got tight handles, he’s a great player, he’s an all-star player,” Cowherd began. “But because the flopping is allowed … what bothers me is it’s become a central point of the playoffs and a central part of his game. If you do it once a game, I’m okay with it. It’s become the central point of his game, and the NBA is the sport with the most creative, artistic athletes, right? And this is like acting versus AI acting; it’s just not as authentic. Watching him flop during an NBA game is like, to some degree, it’s like inserting one of those Life Alert commercials, ‘I’ve fallen and I can’t get up,’ into Cirque du Soleil. It kind of tears at the fabric of the creativity of the NBA.”

What a way to land the plane, Colin. And the best part? It’s true! The modern NBA is a beacon for athletic creativity. No other sport compares. The fluid, free-flowing nature of the modern NBA can be mesmerizing, just like Cirque du Soleil. But that can all be ruined when a player compels the refs to blow the whistle with some dramatized contact.

Most basketball fans accept this as part of the game, but when a player, like SGA, is exceptionally good at drawing a whistle, fans start to lose patience.

You can’t blame SGA, either. He’s mastered the art of deception. But viewers aren’t tuning into NBA games to see sleight of hand; they’re looking for the beautiful choreography of basketball.