Help me
One more time this spring about fucking sports.
There are much more important things to blog about these days, but at the moment I can only write about basketball.
I am rather disappointed with myself for how upset I got tonight watching the Denver Nuggets lose a close game at home to the Fucking San Antonio Spurs. This puts them down 3-1 in the series, with game 5 to be played in San Antonio, on I-don't-know-what-day, and I have specific plans to not watch, because they will most certainly lose that game and exit the playoffs, losing 4 games to 1 in the first round for the fourth year in a row. Four years since they acquired Carmelo Anthony, four years to build a team around him, and absolutely zero progress.
I wish I could say I'm happy for the Golden State Warriors, in the playoffs for the first time in over a dozen years, up 3 games to 1 on the top-seeded Mavericks. They're in the opposite position as the Nuggets, funnily enough. True, the Warriors have had some pretty abysmal seasons over the last decade. But the franchise has won a championship in its history. Sure, you say, but that was over 30 years ago. Yes, I reply, but it's still better than anything the lowly Nuggets can claim. The Nuggets once made it to the Western Conference Finals back in 1985, where they lost (to the Goddamn Los Angeles Lakers, of all teams), but that's the best year they ever had. So any team that's ever won a championship, no matter how long ago, gets no pity from me.
Also, I can't help but be envious concerning how the playoff draw worked out this year. I had a bad feeling in my gut as the Nuggets came on strong at the end of the season and took command of the #6 seed, since I could see that that meant they'd probably have to match up against the Fucking Spurs in round 1. I think the Nugs could've won at least 2 games against any other team in the playoff bracket. And I think they could've done just as well as the Warriors against the Mavericks, whose best player is the soft, weak Dirk Nowitzki. Nowitzki puts up very impressive numbers in the regular season, but I think it's pretty well established by now that he's not one of those great players who can go into another gear during the playoffs. So I think the Nuggets could be up 3-1 on the Mavericks, too, if only that's who they'd drawn for the 1st round. I also think they could've won two games off the Suns, but I don't suppose they could've won a 7-game series from them. But even just winning two games would constitute small progress for the Nugs. Instead, we get another year of 4-1 in the first round. The Warriors are playing great, and Baron Davis is definitely one of those great players who's certainly gone into another gear for the playoffs. But I can't really be happy for them, only envious.
And I really hate the Fucking Spurs. I'm so sick of them, with their slow-paced half-court game, emphasizing team defense, being horribly boring to watch. I'm sick of them advancing deep into the playoffs every year, always a force to be reckoned with, always winning these games where they hold their opponents under 90 points, never being fun & exciting to watch like the Suns are (or the Nuggets, for that matter). I hate the way it worked out for them so many years back that they got Tim Duncan in the draft because they had one lousy year when David Robinson was injured. They had been a top-tier team before that, and they've been a top-tier team ever since, and they only had to suffer through one season of winning less than 25% of their games. A total fluke. The Nuggets were in the draft lottery the year Duncan was picked #1 by the Spurs. I don't remember who they got, don't know if the guy even plays in the league anymore. It's just no fucking fair -- the Fucking Spurs have three goddamn trophies now, they've had their turn, they should be busted up, Duncan, Parker, & Ginobli sent to 3 other lowly teams, the Spurs roster filled with a bunch of sorry-assed nobodies. They should have to suffer now through 10-15 years of utter incompetency.
And the league rules should be changed to futher discourage defense-minded strategies like what the Spurs and Pistons use. Something drastic. Make it illegal to double-team the player with the ball, or something like that. Whatever it takes, until we get to the point where there's never any games where the winning team scores less than 100 in regulation, until we get to the point where you win championships with lots of offense, lots of exciting scoring, one basket being made after another. I am not nearly enough of a connoisseur of the game to appreciate stingy, stifling defense. I want a stop put to it. And I want to see my Nuggets make a real run during the playoffs. Enough's enough. They're like the St. Louis/Phoenix Cardinals of the NBA. They've never won anything and it seems like they never will. No fucking fair. When does my team finally get a chance to be really good? I really did get my hopes up this year, against my better judgement. I couldn't help but hope that adding Iverson (9 for 25 from the field tonight, sigh) really would make a positive difference. They were leading tonight when I turned the game on just before halftime, and I thought, "Hey, they might win tonight, even up the series at 2 games each -- even if they lose the next two after that, at least they gave the Fucking Spurs some trouble, and won't go out 4-1 again."
All of that is just a prelude to me saying, next year at this time, please remind me often not to invest any real emotion in the outcome of a professional sporting event, because it's stupid. There's not a damn thing in the world I can do to influence the outcome of an NBA playoff game, so I really should cultivate more disinterest. Next year, even if I'm writing here that I'm not getting my hopes up, I need you to hammer it home anyway. Keep reminding me not to care too much, even if I'm telling you that I'm not caring too much. Because ultimately, the thing I really do understand on an intellectual level is that sports really aren't very important in the grand scheme of things, and it's a big problem in our society that so much emphasis is placed on them. Help me keep this in mind next spring when the playoffs start.