Everybody expects the captaincy to go to Kagami during the last year at Seirin, because he’s pretty much the face of the basketball club at this point. He’s got the presence and the “fuck yeah!!!” enthusiasm that motivates everybody, it seems like a given.
But he’s just so relieved when he’s passed over because seriously, he loves basketball and he’s been sort of getting used to senpai-ing Yagi and the walking attitude problem over there Asahina over the past year, but man he is so not the leadership guy. Or the strategy guy. Or the “herding a bunch of cats” guy.
So yeah. That torch thankfully passes him by and goes straight into the hands of poor Furi, who looks ready to have a heart attack at the mere idea of being chosen, something is wrong here, surely Hyuuga-senpai was nominating some other Furihata–– *distressed fish noises*
He calms down somewhat when he remembers that vice captaincy is a thing and that it goes to Kuroko. Together they basically form one functional captain unit because Kuroko has the preternatural calm and Furihata exists in the visible light spectrum.
Kagami is proud as fuck that Kuroko’s finally getting some recognition of his own, though “recognition” is kinda relative when people keep mistaking Kagami for the team leader. Whatever, he’s more than happy to tell them how wrong they are.
Kaijou is home to a large-scale social experiment in third year as Kise more or less has to don the mantle of captain since he’s the only third-year starter remaining. (Don’t remind him, you can catch him staring wistfully at the empty gym after practice and dabbing at his eyes as it is).
Everyone who hears about it expects the basketball club to descend into complete chaos within the week because yes, Kise has charisma out the ears and is extremely good at getting things to go his way, but he’s also kind of a beautiful insane butterfly on most days.
Joke’s on them, though, because man oh man, you have not seen serious dedication until you’ve seen Kise busting his ass trying to fill the mighty big shoes left behind by his former senpai, trying to do them proud.
Nobody knows how he manages to balance being a third-year and modeling and captaincy (and a rumored Tokyo sweetheart because who else would he be texting all those heartmarks), but Kise lives for the challenge.
(You can totally tell when he’s channeling Kasamatsu, too, because his voice drops and his whole posture changes as he repeats advice he’s been given in the past and just up and perfect-copies some inspirational speeches ad verbatim because dammit, he’s a model, not a motivational speaker!)
Shuutoku is surprisingly safe in Takao’s scheming, mischievous hands.
Nobody seriously considered appointing Midorima because while he has been mellowing out some, he still has all the social graces of a wooden plank. Miyaji-senpai-the-Younger couldn’t be sure he wouldn’t try to bench a third of the team because their star sign decided to implode or they’re bad feng shui or they’re not wearing striped socks today or whatever.
He still backseat-captains whenever he deems any of Takao’s numerous character flaws too egregious to continue unhindered (nanodayo). Takao has long-since figured out that this is the Midorima version of genuine support.
Takao is actually pretty happy to dump organizational stuff on him because Midorima is nothing if not a cranky medical lexicon/human calculator/over-prepared contingency-plan-for-the-contingency-plan kind of guy. So he can go juggle the numbers while Takao goes to juggle all those impressionable first years~~~
(The considerably less impressionable second years quickly learn that when the captain says “I SAW THAT”, then yes, he really did see that, and if you want him to keep mum about your shameful secrets you’ll totally do whatever he tells you to, mmkay?)
Touou passes to Sakurai because come the hell on. Aomine can’t be trusted to be in charge of a paper bag, let alone actual humans.
(That’s no joke, by the way. When Sakurai was having a meltdown over being unworthy and inexperienced and trying to spontaneously combust from shame and despair in the middle of the gym floor, Momoi successfully persuaded him to accept the captaincy using this very method.
She left a paper bag beside Aomine on the bench and not twenty seconds after she left Aomine had blown it up balloon-style and smashed it in his palm. Then he tried to sweep the paper scraps under the bleachers.
“Now imagine a first year in place of that bag.”
“But Aomine-san wouldn’t–”
And at Satsuki’s raised eyebrow, Sakurai had to pretty much abandon his futile defense of Aomine’s nonexistent honor and accept that he was the only thing standing between a bunch of innocent first-years and certain death.)
It’s okay, Momoi helps him out. A lot. They spend whole afternoons doing rote memorization drills about how “a captain is never sorry for anything”. (She handles all the actual emergencies, anyway, because Sakurai’s poor heart would combust from the stress otherwise).
Even Aomine sometimes goes around terrorizing the newcomers into respecting the captain OR ELSE *cracks knuckles* and calls it “helping”. (He’s really proud of himself for it, too, and everybody generously refrains from pointing out the irony of him giving kids shit for things like not cleaning up the gym properly when his first-year self couldn’t even be bothered to drag his own ass to practice on the regular.)
Some reserve player or second-year inherits Yosen.
Murasakibara is not pleased.
Not because he wanted the job (lol), but because "You’re not Murochin.”
Murasakibara points that out, very often and very sullenly, so poor, harassed Reserve Player-san assumes that’s some kind of criticism or mutiny in the making and tries to figure out how he’s supposed to fight some 2.10 meters of solid muscle for the captaincy help––!!!
That is, until he catches Murasakibara muttering "You’re not Murochin” to every poor shmuck who gets paired with him, and that’s when the lightbulb goes on.
He, Reserve Player-san, hasn’t just inherited the most cantankerous of the Miracle Monsters, oh no.
He has inherited the most cantankerous of the Miracle Monsters who has a massive SAD because he fucking misses their former captain so much he can’t go a day without mentioning it in the most ass-backwards way imaginable and I’m not getting paid enough to put up with this shit seriously how did Himuro-san /deal/???
I have no idea what Rakuzan will be doing because man, if the pressure in middle school was bad enough to make Akashi crack and grow an alter, how on Earth is he going to deal with being a third-year preparing for entrance into the topmostestest university in all of Japan (nothing else will do, after all) and being the fucking student council president (somehow???) AND running a basketball team.
Maybe he just grows another alter and figures out how to astral-project it into practice while the rest of him catches up on schoolwork and prep courses (you know he’ll be in ALL of those) and sleep.
In all seriousness, though, I hope Akashi’s more-or-less canonical Mayuzumi-stalking helps him gain some perspective. I’m pretty sure nobody can spend an extended period of time around a human salt pan and not stop giving certain fucks, themselves. Imo Akashi desperately needs to learn how to depressurize and let things go and fucking fail more, and actually give himself a chance to dissociate himself from his father’s absolute bizarro worldview.
So yes. If I wanna imagine a future where he’s not completely broken, he’ll step down, stay on as a regular player and dedicate his sudden spare time to figuring out the meaning of life. Also, stalking.
