* Guess that Miami Heat dynasty will have to wait a year. Sorry, Big Three.
* As much as we love to hate LeBron James - and we certainly do - there's a small little piece of us that does feel bad for him. If he thought the second-guessing and criticism was bad these last few days, he ain't seen nothing yet. Let the Miami finger-pointing begin.
* We do like Heat coach Erik Spoelstra. We just wonder where he'll be coaching next year. Someone may need to be the scapegoat. And in the NBA, that's never the players.
* Is it us or did the use of the phrase "give credit to" suddenly spike in usage by the TNT and ABC-ESPN commentators?
* We will happily take some credit for this championship. We wore the same smelly Dallas Cowboys T-shirt for all three of the Maverick's clinching victories. Should we wash it or store it for the fall NFL season? A tough decision.
* The way Dwyane Wade spells his first name really bugs us. There, we said it.
* One sportswriter noted: the Mavericks were playing like a team that wanted to win the title, while the Heat were playing like a team that thought they deserved it. We concur.
* Memo from the Washington Redskins to the Miami Heat: you can't just get a title by opening up the checkbook. You still have to play all of the games.
* It's not that LeBron James chose to sign with the Heat. He's a free agent and has every right to take full advantage. Whatever. But the smug, arrogant manner in which he did so was absolutely insufferable and proves how tone-deaf he truly is when it comes to basketball fans. Not only was the forum he used (a live ESPN primetime special) unbelievably self-serving and asinine, even the words he used were just oh-so-cocky ("I'm going to take my talents..."). He sometimes seems like a guy more interested in developing his brand than in hardening his basketball resolve.
* We'll be brutally honest here: we still only partially understand what a pick-and-roll is.
* The poetry is undeniable in comparing the 2006 Maverick collapse with the 2011 Heat collapse. Revenge is a dish best served cold. And closing out a series in Game 6 is indeed cold.
* Has LeBron always insisted on chewing on his mouthpiece like that? Yuck.
* Rick Carlisle does look like Jim Carrey. Sorry.
* For Dirk Nowitski, this is surely a much sweeter victory than it would have been had he moved elsewhere to win his first title. A sports columnist somewhere noted that LeBron would probably have to win three rings in Miami to get the same feeling of satisfaction and accomplishment as he would have gotten by scraping and fighting to win just one in Cleveland. In an era of wheel-and-deal trades and mercenary free agency, there remains something noble about sticking with the same team and working hard, overcoming adversity, swallowing losses, and learning from your mistakes. Even if no one does it anymore.
* We attended Mavericks games back in the 80s at musty Reunion Arena and cheered for such names as Rolando Blackman, Mark Aguirre, and white guy Brad Davis. Just saying.
* Class act, Mark Cuban, allowing first Maverick owner Don Carter to be involved in the trophy ceremony.
* Be curious to learn more about the truth behind those NBA Cares spots, as in, which players truly give their time and energy to charities when the film cameras aren't rolling?
* Odds remain good that tomorrow morning's ESPN Radio Colin Cowherd show will still focus mostly on "What's wrong with LeBron?" rather than "How 'bout them Mavericks?" We smell a lot of excuse-making from media pundits to try and explain how Goliath just got the snot kicked out of him by David.
* There's something robotic about competitive athletes. In watching Nowitski monotone his way through another interview tonight, we started to realize that all cold-blooded players demonstrate this same lack of emotion. It's like putting Spock into your lineup. They can be charismatic, sure. But Kobe, Jordan, Tim Duncan - there's just something humorless about them. They exist to win. The end.
* If you don't live in Miami and were still rooting for the Heat, we want to know why.
* We do wish ABC would retire that strange NBA Finals montage that opened each game, what with it's chintzy miniature work and goofy video effects that overlap all of that old footage together to make it seem like an NBA Hall of Justice. Much more powerful and evocative are the cool still photos of the star players from each team posing with the trophy and looking alternately introspective and hungry.
* Enjoyable side-effect of NBA playoffs: seeing what kind of insane-but-oddly-fashionable suits the players will be wearing at the press conferences.
* Show of hands: who still thinks Dirk is soft? The defense rests.
* Another villain to loathe on the Heat? One Udonis Haslem. We hate his dumb cornrows as well.
* Thank you, Tyson Chandler. Your impact cannot be overstated.
* If they could go back in time, would the Heat still put on that ridiculous pep rally extravaganza of smoke and lasers and fire before the season started? Way to raise the expectations, fellas.
* This victory proves to sports prognosticators can get it very, very wrong. Almost no one picked the Mavericks to beat the Heat. If you say you did, you're a dirty liar. We didn't even give them much of a chance against the Lakers three weeks ago. (Chronic mistrust is a symptom of being a Mavericks fan who gets burned season after season.) But we're glad they proved them wrong.
No comments:
Post a Comment