I don't even know if I can be coherent at the moment. My four favorite players in the NBA, still active, are, in no particular order, Kevin Garnett, Tim Duncan, Rajon Rondo, and Paul Pierce. In my previous post, I described, with full-on vulgarities, how I saw Tim Duncan heartbreakingly lose the 2013 NBA Finals to the Miami Heat in Game 7. It was devastating. Particularly in the context of the give away in game 6 to Ray motherfucking Allen (my least favorite player in the NBA right now).
You see, sports can break your heart ten ways to Sunday (Copyright Silver Linings Playbook). One of the ways was the Spurs loss in Game 6 - a Stomach Punch, loosely described by my favorite sportswriter, Bill Simmons, as "...any roller-coaster game that ends with (A) an opponent making a pivotal (sometimes improbable) play or (B) one of your guys failing in the clutch. Usually ends with fans filing out after the game in stunned disbelief, if they can even move at all. Always haunting, sometimes scarring." Imagine if you or someone you're rooting for is so goddamn close to achieving their heart's desire, particularly given that it may be your or that someone you're rooting for's last crack at the achievement, and then, at the very last minute, you or the person you're rooting for just choking in the clutch. Like maybe completely screwing up at the final stage interview for a dream job. That's a Stomach Punch game.
Another way sports can break your heart ten ways to Sunday is the way the Spurs lost in Game 7 to the Heat. Basically, when Pandora's Box was opened, hope was supposed to be the saving grace for humanity. Well, hope can also be, in the words of the Football365 forums, a "cunt's trick." Consider the Dead Man Walking, described as "...any playoff series in which your team remains "alive," but they just suffered a loss so catastrophic and so harrowing that there's no possible way they can bounce back...Especially disheartening because you wave the white flag mentally, but there's a tiny part of you still holding out hope for a miraculous momentum change." The Spurs were so goddamn close in Game 7 that I almost believed it was possible that they could win the title. And then, the Guillotine happened - "...Your team's hanging tough (hell, they might even be winning), but you can feel the inevitable breakdown coming, and you keep waiting for the guillotine to drop, and you know it's coming -- you know it -- and when it finally comes, you're angry that it happened and you're angry at yourself for contributing to the debilitating karma. These are the games when people end up whipping their remote controls against a wall or breaking their hands while pounding a coffee table. Too many of these and you'll end up in prison."
But, all that can sometimes feel be out-hollowed and out-devastated as well. Sports is more than just the games that teams play. For the athlete, sports is the product of a lifetime of hard work and perseverance, dedicated solely to the improvement of the craft. For the fan, sports is a way of caring and feeling emotionally involved with something bigger than yourself. Look, I'm not the biggest Kobe Bryant fan in the world, but I felt devastated when he tore his Achilles. As much as I dislike his game or whatever, Kobe Bryant does not deserve his career to end in that fashion. Here's a guy who is the most hardworking, most dedicated athlete - who spends endless hours trying to improve his game (and remember that his skill level is so high that diminishing returns had kicked in long ago) - and one of the most strong-willed guys to ever play. And his career might end because of a torn Achilles? That's not fair.
But you know what, life is indifferent to issues of fairness. Yes, Kobe deserves to go out with his head held high, not limping off the court. But life does not give a fuck. Similarly, when my team, the Boston Celtics, traded, not more than 5 hours ago, Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce - two of my favorite players in the NBA - to the Brooklyn Nets, I just felt so goddamn hollow. Rondo is the best player on the Celtics at the moment - consider him the brain of the Celtics. But KG and Pierce were the heart and soul of the team. Losing them just feels like the team lost its identity.
Imagine if you were a massive fan of the Beatles in the 1960s. Suddenly, Lennon and McCartney were traded by the band's manager for two other guys. The band is still called the Beatles, but are they the same? Of course not. But imagine how you would feel. You've seen the guys go through so many wars together, more heartbreaks than triumphs, and not only did they go through the wars together, they went through the wars in the best way possible - having given everything they could possibly give and having left everything they could possibly leave on the court.
It's easy to remember the 2008 Championship, when KG, Pierce, Allen and Rondo came together for the first time and won the NBA Championship. And that was great. But what I will remember about the KG-era Celtics was not so much that they won that title, but in the way that they fucking fought with every single thing that they had to remain and climb the mountaintop again. Look, it's okay to lose, really. But if you're going to lose, I expect you to lose with all your shots fired and all your energy sapped. That's what KG and Pierce were all about. That's why I loved watching these Celtics. They weren't supposed to beat the Cleveland Lebrons in the East Semis in 2010, but they did. They weren't supposed to reach the NBA Finals in 2010, but they did and lost in heartbreaking fashion. They weren't supposed to challenge the Miami Heat in the East Finals in 2012, but they did. All the way to Game 7 which they lost in heartbreaking fashion. When Rondo went down with an ACL injury in 2013, they weren't supposed to give the Knicks a good fight in the playoffs. But they did.
KG and Pierce have too much goddamn pride to just roll over. And that's why I loved these Celtics. They were the proudest basketball team, playing with a real "eff-you" mentality that sometimes translated into blood basketball. Take for example Game 3 of the 2011 NBA East Semis, when the Celtics played against the Heat. Rondo's shoulder got dislocated in the midst of the game. What did he do? He fucking popped the shoulder back into place and went on to play, WITH JUST ONE FUNCTIONING ARM, leading the Celtics to victory. That's the kind of team I want to root for.
But see, none of this happens without Garnett. KG is the most intense, most proud, most give-it-everything-you've-got player I've watched on a regular basis. Simmons describes KG's mentality as "an intensity normally reserved for mothers trying to rescue their children who are trapped under a truck but with an "-itis" at the end." KG singlehandedly changed the culture of the Celtics in 2008. Because of him, suddenly everyone played unselfishly, suddenly everyone had to hustle on defense or else, suddenly everyone played with immense ferociousness. Watching KG has been one of the privileges of my life, in all seriousness.
And Paul Pierce. Man. He has spent his whole career (all 15 seasons) with the Celtics. He went through the period where the Celtics looked like they might have been good. He went through the period where the Celtics utterly and completely sucked. And he stuck through it all. He deserves to be a lifetime Celtic. He's the motherfucking captain of the Celtics. He has just as much pride as KG, if not as much on-court impact. In recent seasons, I couldn't really tell if Paul Pierce was going to have a good game or not during every big game, but I did know that he would only have left the court completely spent. Every bullet fired. It really sucks when someone like Paul Pierce gets traded. A guy who spent 15 years with a team, dedicated his heart and soul to the team, was proud to be a Celtic and understood exactly what it meant to be a Celtic.
 |
| Look how much this means to him. After all the years in Boston and all the struggles. |
And now what? KG and Pierce are gone. They're going to the Nets. When the Nets visit Boston for the first time this coming season, I will be at the game. To say thank you to KG and Pierce. For all the years in which they fought and played blood basketball for the Celtics. For the incredible moments. For making me feel proud to say I'm a Celtics fan. For making me feel such immense pride when watching the team play. For making me understand what a heart of a champion truly is all about; like I said earlier, you don't discern a champion by the simple fact of that person becoming a champion. Anybody can achieve one great achievement. The truly great ones are the ones who claw with their motherfucking fingernails for every single inch so that they can hold on to or re-achieve that achievement. And by damn, KG and Pierce fought for every single inch as Celtics. And really, what more can you ask from anyone?
I'm still a Celtics fan. And I will still support the Celtics. And I will still root for laundry. But sometimes, it just sucks. Part of being a team sports fan is understanding that the team always comes first. Sometimes, I wish it weren't so, and I wish to holy hell that I could really convince myself that, "It's not about the team, it's about the guys who make up the team." I want to believe that at times like these. But I can't. Because it is about the team. Because it is about laundry. And just because you loved the guys who used to wear that laundry doesn't mean you should stop supporting that laundry when those guys leave. KG and Pierce are among the Celtic greats. They did it with pride, dignity and ferocity. It was an honor. Thank you.
No comments:
Post a Comment