Basketball Legend: When Pride Still Matters

Some people had expected the Bucks and the Supersonics to meet in the finals. Indeed, there were signs of something similar in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals held at North Shore Garden. Kevin Martin and Danny Granger played excellently, but the Milwaukee frontline, or rather, Pau Gasol, whom they had always relied on, got exploded by Garnett. This triggered a chain reaction. With the Bucks' frontline that usually stood its ground against the Celtics broken, Milwaukee had to lean on its perimeter players. They had a kind of faith that kept the game alive until the end. Unfortunately, home-court advantage and fate might have been at play. Garnett sank an impossible shot, and Pierce isolated Granger to make a crucial basket to widen the gap. 94 to 89 The once kings, the Bucks, who had won four championships in the last five years, fell at the doorstep of the finals after losing the league's number one player. How close were they? "Their bodies had crossed the line, but unfortunately, it was the Boston Celtics who stood on the court in the end," wrote Marc Stein of ESPN. This defeat meant that Milwaukee's dream of a three-peat had gone bankrupt. But as the primary tool of the so-called 'Flight-back faction' this season, they had done quite well already. Why were they the tool of the Flight-back faction? Just look at their record, and you would understand. Think about the extensive discussions on "Whether Jordan was piggybacking Pippen" after Jordan first retired and Pippen led the team to the semi-finals, and you would realize how satisfactory the Bucks' achievements were to the Flight-back faction. However, for those Bucks players who had fought alongside Yu Fei, this defeat was heartbreaking; they could not meet at the top. Granger wept on the court. "We were really close," Martin said in an interview, "but... you know, our team is too young. Frye taught us a lot, but there are things that can't be taught, like dealing with pressure. When Frye was around, we just needed to do our own thing beside him. Now, we have to finish his job, but tonight, we didn't manage to do so." That night, Yu Fei received a text message from Granger. "Win that damn championship for everyone!" As the Bulls and Miami Heat, like in a previous life, won this year's lottery draw, claiming the first and second pick, respectively, the only remaining suspense for the 2007-08 NBA season was the ownership of the championship. If we start from the grand narrative, both teams had compelling reasons to win the championship. It had been thirty years since the Supersonics' last championship, and this time, their contention for the title was not merely about sports; it was about rekindling the home crowd's passion for the team, in exchange for more support and a greater chance to push through the new arena financing plan in the future. But if we emphasize this point, it might smell too much of copper. In professional sports, we should emphasize glory and dreams, right? The Supersonics had both of these. They finished second to last in the league last season and were the top team in the Western Conference this season. Yu Fei changed everything when he gave up the chance for three consecutive championships in Milwaukee—now unquestionable with Bucks' battle against the Celtics in a seven-game Eastern Conference Finals—and voluntarily left the Chosen Empire to save his hometown team from the relocation that was supposed to happen this season. Their popularity soared, the market was completely revitalized, and the Supersonics are now the hottest stock in the professional basketball market. A team that was rotten has gloriously turned around within a year, fought their way to the finals, and now only four games away from making the perfect fairy tale a reality. What about the Celtics? Years later, when someone like Gilbert Arenas, who had only won one playoff series, blatantly stated, "The Celtics were irrelevant in the last 30 years of basketball history," where does the fault in this statement lie? It is a fact, but a fact with a qualifier. It's like how some media have to set a bunch of conditions for their favorite players to rank high on certain lists. The biggest limitation of this theory is the timeframe. Within the time Arenas specified, it's true the Celtics were largely inactive for a good part of it. But if we count from the birth of the NBA, for half a century, the Celtics were always an evergreen in the NBA. An intentionally set time limit yields a biased result. If Arenas limited it to 20 years, then Jordan's Bulls would also be irrelevant to the basketball world, and if we limited it to the past 10 years, then the Spurs dynasty, officially recognized by the NBA, would also be irrelevant to the most recent decade. This is something a player who will be utterly forgotten in 20 years might say during media work for the sake of grabbing attention, but the question is, what led to The Celtics being "irrelevant" for the past thirty years? It began with the abrupt drug-induced death of Len Bias in 1986, continued with the unexpected demise of the new Celtics captain Reggie Lewis due to heart disease, followed by missing out on Tim Duncan in the 1997 draft, treating Rick Pitino as the new Auerbach, hoping he would save everything like Red did back in the 1950s, but after assessing the situation of The Celtics, Pitino felt there was no hope, hence he destroyed everything. Then there was Pierce who was nearly murdered in a nightclub after being stabbed 11 times. The glory of The Celtics had become the curse of The Celtics. As is well known, due to Yu Fei's influence, the media overwhelmingly promoted the Supersonics as the second-to-last ranked team last season. So who was the team that ranked last? Correct, it was The Celtics. But the media building up Yu Fei's profile didn't mention that. Because unlike the Supersonics, who rose to power through the strength of one man, Yu Fei, The Celtics had a trio of stars and several veterans who voluntarily signed on for a direct shot at the championship. This was the backdrop of the 2008 Finals, and also the reason why the NBA went all out in its promotional efforts. Not only were the two teams imbued with compelling historical narratives, but their match-up also appeared similar to what's been called the greatest World Series in MLB history in 1991. The World Series that year also featured the bottom-ranked teams of the previous year facing off at the pinnacle the following year, delivering to fans five nail-biting games, three deemed classics, and one unforgettable Game 7. The League hadn't encountered such a promotable series in a while. With the marketing machine in full gear, the influence of the Finals had expanded beyond the cities and states of the teams, beginning to spread nationwide. Fans across the country actively chose their allegiances. Among them, the supporters of the Supersonics accounted for eighty percent. The key reason was the presence of Yu Fei, the fairy-tale allure of the Supersonics over The Celtics' self-rescue carried more warmth, and another key point was the onset of PTSD in most areas where Boston was concerned. Boston has always been a well-known sports city, but historically, it also has rich cultural heritage. Yet, before the new millennium, apart from the pre-90s Celtics and the 70s Bruins (NHL), Boston's professional sports were always linked with failure. However, with the new century, it seems The Celtics' misfortunes have oddly benefited other teams: The Patriots picked the best player in NFL history at an impossible draft position, the Red Sox broke the Baby Curse, Boston College claimed the NCAA hockey national championship, and now, even The Celtics have risen from their tomb. The pride and bravado of Bostonians were intrinsic, with the enormous success in sports allowing them to rightfully discuss all of Boston's achievements. Their writers won numerous awards, and even the golden age of American sitcoms last century began with the airing of "Cheers". What? The creators of the show have nothing to do with Boston? Please, the main city setting of the series is none other than Boston, how could it be unrelated? Even in a recent "Favorite Deceased President" poll, a Bostonian was leading the pack. At least for now, Bostonians are a more loathsome lot than Yankees fans. A journalist from The New York Times, after witnessing a series of successes in Boston, expressed dissatisfaction with its inflated fans, writing in an opinion piece: "We should be thankful Neil Armstrong wasn't a Bostonian, otherwise we might see a headline in The Boston Globe like 'Bostonian Lands on Moon'." The distaste for Boston had become a social talking point for a time. Perhaps these Boston haters believed that if Goku needed to borrow the strength of the entire universe to eliminate Syn Shenron with his Spirit Bomb, then the Supersonics needed their help too. Because The Celtics seemed far mightier than the Supersonics. If the Supersonics were the heroes, The Celtics were the evil dragons. In the grand backdrop of the era, everyone has their role. For Bostonians, they relished the position they were in. And truly, they believed that The Celtics could defeat the Supersonics, for they had a group of mature veterans, while beyond Yu Fei, Marion, and Brown, what experience did the Supersonics have to speak of? "17!" "17!!" "17!!!" On the day of the Finals opener, the Supersonics arrived in Boston, greeted outside the airport by massive crowds of fans who chanted "17," declaring their resolution for the championship.