It's half time of Game 7 of the NBA Finals. Miami vs. San Antonio. One game for the championship. I've got my DVR running, and in a few minutes I'll be heading downstairs to watch this season's closing act. But first, a little reflection.
Granted, every pro sports team is little more than a randomly assembled collection of athletes who wouldn't piss on their adoring fans if they were on fire. They aren't residents of your city, playing for the pride of your city. They're mercenaries, and they move to Florida or Arizona a day after the season ends. No team breaks that mold. But something about watching these South Beach cheese-balls deliriously cheer on the Fog Party Super Friends makes me start to hate sports, just a little bit. It's nothing personal. I wouldn't jeer James, Wade or Bosh if they were leaving the court after a rough loss. I don't want them to lose in an embarrassing way. I don't even hold the fog party against them (well maybe just a little, it was one of the lamest spectacles of my lifetime after all). America is a land where you roll how you want to roll, and this is how these guys wanted to roll. I'll even be happy for my lone Heat fan friend if they take it down (an authentic fan of course, in other words pre-dating the fog party). But a small piece of the enthusiastic young sports fan still living inside me will die all the same.
What I loved most about the Mavericks' championship in 2011 at the expense of the Heat was the tone it set around the league. Stars across the sport were a bit cranky after the creation of The Super Friends: Fog Party Edition. They took a look at their teammates and said, "well, I would stay, but how can I compete with that, unless I team up with some Super Friends too?" But when Dallas won, a team carried by the star who has driven the bus since he was drafted, and rounded out with complimentary players filling all the right roles, it threw a tiny little speed bump in the path of the star consolidation movement. Maybe teaming up with a couple fellow all-stars is not the only way to win a title. Maybe it's not even the best way. Maybe making a commitment to a city, and buying into a coach, and allowing management to build a culture, maybe that's how you're gonna get your ring.
It was all good even when the Heat beat the Thunder last year. You're not gonna hold a team with James and Wade down forever. And they were still just one among many teams good enough to win a title in recent years- like the Celtics, and Lakers, and Spurs, and Pistons. But if they win this year too? Bye bye speed bump. 2011 will start to look like a transition year. "The blueprint laid out by the Fog Party Super Friends is the only path to rings in this new era of pro basketball," players will think. The Spurs were the blueprint for success in the old era. And isn't it fitting that the torch was passed this year?
Please no. I'm not saying a Heat win would signal the end of grass roots team-building for all time. Pro sports experience cycles just like anything else. But I'd love to see the Spurs give the next generation of stars one more good, loud argument for sticking it out wherever the draft gods throw you, through thick and thin. Why do I care? Because, even though at the end of the day the outcome of a sporting event doesn't carry a solitary shred of importance, a likable team can make me forget that fact for a few hours. And I happen to like teams brought together by fate, and kept together by a commitment to the city and uniform that happened to fall on each of them. The unique team cultures that spring up organically across the NBA landscape- the Showtime Lakers, the Bad Boys Pistons, the New York Knicks ogre-ball of the 90s, the stoic Spurs, the unselfishly flashy Kings, the run n gun Warriors of today. Teams who find that star the hard way, invest their faith in the vision of their coach, and have that faith returned by the players- those teams are what I love about basketball. Three stars planning a fog party in South Beach? Just some uber-talented guys bouncing a ball around. The fickle, front-running fans of Miami suit them perfectly. And I hope they all go home unhappy tonight, because collectively they make sports start to suck, just a little bit. At least in my eyes. And well, those are the only eyes I have. So go Spurs.
Sigh. I'm heading downstairs....
