About

Heat Nuggets? What Is This, My Damn Microwave? is an oft-repeated catchphrase and usually ironic joke about the 2023 NBA Final between the Miami Heat and the Denver Nuggets that makes a pun from the two teams and their names. In May 2023, the joke became so widespread online that it led to anti-meme and parody variations.

Origin

In the NBA playoffs, the Eastern Conference Finals were played between the Miami Heat and the Boston Celtics while the Western Conference Finals were played between the Los Angeles Lakers and Denver Nuggets. On May 16th, 2023, Twitter user @leahjcover^[1] remarked they were hoping for a Heat / Nuggets final, calling it a "Microwave Dinner NBA Finals" (shown below).

On May 22nd, 2023, as both the Heat and Nuggets seemed likely to win their respective series, Twitter user @davecantread^[2] posted, "Heat nuggets NBA Finals? What is this my damn microwave!! 🤣🤣🤣," gaining over 1,300 retweets and 7,200 likes in nine days (shown below).

Spread

Over the following week in late May 2023, the "damn microwave" pun was often repeated almost verbatim on Twitter, commonly with excessive emojis suggesting the poster was making the joke ironically (example tweets shown below).

The joke became so prevalent in the following days that several posters began riffing on it with more deadpan and anti-meme variations. For example, on May 30th, 2023, Twitter user @beijingdou^[3] posted a variation that gained over 20 retweets and 130 likes in one day (shown below, left). On May 25th, user @brrandonlamont^[4] posted a joke imagining a struggling stand-up comedian telling the joke (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References