SB Nation User Blog: Splice Today

Just Watch the Game

Splice Today — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 16:30:48 -0000

The sports media’s fascination with the private lives of athletes has reached a new, and disgusting, level.

By Russ Smith

From www.splicetoday.com

Early in March, I immodestly proposed that President Bush grant amnesty to all baseball players implicated in the still-ongoing steroids/PED “scandal,” reasoning that the excruciating litany of sanctimonious opinions issued by sportswriters—who were complicit, after all, in looking the other way at bulked-up athletes like Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa in the “magical” ’98 season—was just too much for a baseball fan to bear. Spitballs, greenies, truckloads of booze in the clubhouses, sharpened cleats, betting on games, cocaine, and, most egregiously, the refusal of owners and players to countenance non-white players until 1947, all of this is evidence of an imperfect sport. Had reporters back in the 1920s—when they were paid about the same as most ballplayers—told all the salacious stories they knew about Babe Ruth (who was breaking the law by drinking during the asinine failed “experiment” of Prohibition) it’s quite possible he’d have been booted out the game and wouldn’t, to this day, remain an American icon.

New York’s Daily News has been on a tear of late in its campaign to crush Roger Clemens, issuing daily revelations of his reported adultery and pathological hypocrisy, and the rest of the sports media has been glad to climb aboard the bulldozer aimed at the now smaller-than-life Texan. This is not a defense of Clemens’ apparently reckless and extraordinarily selfish lifestyle—and the allegations of his affair with a teenager when he was a 28-year-old Red Sox pitcher are truly creepy—but I’d rather not know the details. Unfortunately, if you follow baseball as closely as I do, in particular the ups and downs of the Red Sox (thumbs up) and Yankees (big toes down), it’s impossible to escape the almost daily denunciations of columnists posing as priests. Another recent unnecessary “news” story was that Alex Rodriguez passed out while his wife was in labor with their first daughter in 2004. Who cares?

The Washington Post’s Thomas Boswell, revered in the sporting world’s establishment, is among the very worst columnists when he writes about the “scandal,” which is often, but at least last Saturday, upon celebrating the careers of pitchers Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and John Smoltz, he didn’t touch Clemens’ non-baseball activities. (Boswell, although a snoot of the first order, isn’t dumb: he knows that scores of baseball stars have, ahem, colorful, private lives—just click on the blog “On the DL” to see what I mean—and wisely sticks to the playing field.)

Nonetheless, in plumping Maddux, he begins: “Eventually, your wins, like your sins, will find you out.” He says that “Searching for silver linings in a steroid age is hard work,” and then quotes a self-satisfied Glavine, who won his 300th game last year for the Mets (and also was so horrid in that team’s ’07 September collapse that he escaped back to Atlanta), who said, “We all deserve what we’ve gotten. Maybe people will finally pay attention to [Maddux, Smoltz and himself]. You don’t want to be elevated on somebody else’s mistakes. That’s hard to deal with. I don’t know [Clemens] well... But we have done it right. Hopefully, that will be appreciated more and the three of us will be a better example to kids." A “better example,” sure, at least until some writer digs up embarrassing dirt on the once-imposing Braves battery.

My view, certainly not in the majority, derives from the 1977 public divorce proceedings of Bob and Sara Dylan, which was so ugly—the singer/songwriter was accused of wife-beating—that for a brief time I couldn’t even play Blonde on Blonde. One day, after reading about this muck inRolling Stone, I chucked the magazine out the window into a trashcan and decided that I’d had enough. So, Dylan was a really shitty person (and slugging Sara took it to a new level), but what did that have to do with my appreciation of his music and undeniable influence on popular culture? Nothing really, not if you put sunglasses on and ignored all the celebrity gossip. God only knows what sordid scabs might’ve been picked at had Internet character assassins like Gawker and the like existed back then.

ESPN’s Keith Keown, perhaps trying to curry favor with Clemens/Barry Bonds arch-nemesis Rev. Mike Lupica, was way over the top in his May 5 story about the man once beloved at Yankee Stadium (The Rajah!), as he wondered whether “hubris” or “stupidity” was the root cause of the defiant pitcher’s “destruction.” Hey, I feel bad for Clemens’ four sons too, but is the following gutter prose really necessary? “Through this ongoing yard sale of Clemens’ legacy, personal and professional, one truth shines through: If it was not for his otherworldly ability to throw a baseball, this guy would be standing behind a convenience-store counter, rubbing his gut and betting his co-workers five bucks he could eat a dozen Slim Jims.”

Or maybe Clemens, not demonstrably stupid if a stupendous egomaniac, might’ve wound up as a sportswriter, betting his colleague 100 bucks that the outspoken and very funny Pale Hose manager Ozzie Guillen will duke it out with Chicago Sun-Times moronic columnist Jay Mariotti by Independence Day.

As for this fan, my hobbyhorses are far more pedestrian. Here’s one: If you’re looking for an example of today’s ballplayers distancing themselves not only from the sport’s history but the spectators who shell out enormous sums to see them play, how about all the jewelry, or “bling,” that’s ubiquitous on any MLB diamond. As a Bosox fan, I’m looking forward to seeing rookie Clay Buchholz, barring injury, become an elite pitcher for years to come. He seems that good. Still, while watching a Sox-Tigers game last week, when Buchholz was struggling with his control, I wondered if it wasn’t because his beanpole frame wasn’t weighed down by the five different strands of junk swirling around his neck. He ought to take a tip from teammate Josh Beckett, who wears one necklace (sorry, fellas, but that’s what it is), which appears to be rawhide, perhaps a souvenir from one of his hunting trips. I have no problem with religious athletes wearing a Christian cross, or, in far less cases, a Jewish star, and most of them keep the chain tucked in their shirt.

Likewise, the Sox slugger David Ortiz—who’ll be lucky to still be playing three years from now, considering all those home cookin’ pounds he lugs around—is embarrassingly ostentatious with all the gold he wears. Which is a shame, since Ortiz (like many Hispanic ballplayers) is extraordinarily generous in dispensing large amounts of money in his native Dominican Republic and is a charity workaholic. Unlike, say, the multimillionaire Derek Jeter, whose future monument in the new Yankee Stadium is already being chiseled.

I also don’t particularly care for the fist-pumping theatrics of relievers Joba Chamberlain and Jonathan Papelbon, the admiring home run gazes of Manny Ramirez, the rash of injuries—pinkeye, hangnails, quad strains—that cause players (and nervous managers) to seek refuge in the disabled list, horrible rock songs played between innings at stadiums, premature “curtain calls” and $6 Cokes straining a family’s budget, but you can’t turn back the hands of time. You adjust. However, the media’s salacious junior high school dispatches on the personal lives of athletes—even if they’re wealthy entertainers—is a far worse disgrace than steroids or blow-up dolls in clubhouses.

Orioles Tragic

Splice Today — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 15:11:59 -0000

A life defined by the caprice of a mediocre team.

By Pete Backof

From www.splicetoday.com

Remember how much you cared about the fads and trends you liked in middle school? No one obsesses like a pre-teen struggling through puberty, because no one else is so painfully in need of something to identify with. Nothing makes sense for kids at that age. You know you’re not supposed to be a kid anymore, but all you really understand about maturity is a shimmering mirage of the real thing. In that chaotic search for self-esteem we all latch onto anything that gives us definition and acceptance. Inevitably this something is simple, and arbitrary, and we love it desperately. When so much of the reality inside you and around you is constantly changing, your idols become your anchors.

Maybe you idolized a band, or the way the popular girls dressed, or a certain magazine. To my regret, I idolized the Baltimore Orioles. The Orioles were the only major sports team in town at that point: baseball’s long season, arcane rules, and peculiar attention to statistics provided a ready obsession that distracted me from the inescapable shame of being in seventh grade.

I was not alone in this obsession, which was sort of the point. The Orioles have a special place in the hearts of the people of Baltimore. We do strange things to support our team, like scream “O” in the middle of the national anthem. In many ways, their history is our history. Baltimore, as a de facto rust belt city, suffered a slow economic decline after World War II. The Orioles, after assembling some of the best teams ever during the late 60s and early 70s, gradually lost ground to the changing economics of baseball.

The O’s last won the World Series in 1983, when I was two months old. My mother assures me that I was watching when a humble young shortstop named Cal Ripken caught the last out. It would be 13 years until they reached the playoffs again. In the meantime, as I meandered through childhood, the Orioles suffered. In 1988 they set a record by losing 21 games in a row to start the season. Between 1990 and 1996 the Orioles let pitchers Curt Schilling, David Wells, and Kevin Brown leave the organization, a trio that has combined for 616 wins, six World Series championships, one perfect game, and one no-hitter.

Sure there were a few exciting moments. Camden Yards defined the retro stadium era when it opened in 1992. Cal made everyone forget about the players strike when he broke the record for consecutive games played, personifying working-class Baltimore in the process. But for the most part, they weren't an easy team to root for.

When the 1996 season kicked off I was finishing up sixth grade. I was gangly, crippled by the presence of girls, and had just started shaving. I really needed the Orioles. And that summer, they finally came through.

Behind the strength of Robbie Alomar, B.J. Surhoff, Cal, Mike Mussina, and a resurrected Eddie Murray, the Orioles made it back to the playoffs. The experience couldn't have been more glorious. The team bombed balls out of the park in the halcyon days of blissful steroid ignorance, setting a record for the most home runs hit on the road in a season.

The Orioles dismantled the Indians in the first round, setting up a seven game series with the Yankees. This was the ultimate test, our chance to slay the most hated team in the sport. The series started in New York. I stayed up late with my dad and my brother watching the Os take a 4-3 lead into the eighth inning. A smarmy rookie shortstop named Derek Jeter hit a long drive to right field, but it looked like the right-fielder Tony Tarasco could make a play. He backed up to the wall, and just as he was preparing to look the fly ball into his glove, Jeffrey Maier, a pimply middle schooler like me, reached over with his glove and snatched the ball away. It was as clear as day. (Watch it here.) Tarasco immediately pointed to the offender, but the umpire ruled it a home run. Tie game. The Orioles manager raged in a Sisyphean effort while Yankee fans shook that damn kid’s hand and bought him hotdogs. The Yankees won the game in extra innings and took the series in five.

I was crushed. The one sure thing in my life had evaporated. The world had proven that it was not merely indifferent to my life, but was actively conspiring against me, and using some New York City punk to do it. That kid, meanwhile, was treated like a hero, going on Letterman and receiving a key to the city as his team won the World Series.

I was stuck trying to make sense out of my now-rudderless existence while my doppelganger lived the dream. The whole experience psychologically branded my young brain, horribly conflating my Orioles fandom with my quest for self-understanding. It would take me many years to get over it.

The Orioles made the playoffs again the year after but it was never the same. 1997 would be our last winning season. As the Yankees—and later the Red Sox—spent astronomical amounts of money on Rolls Royce rosters, the Orioles overpaid for a used rental car in a sad attempt to keep up. Every year owner Peter Angelos hobbled the team with long-term contracts for crappy veterans, teasing fan expectations while consistently losing most of the games. The waste and profligacy reached comic proportions, mocking the blue-collar success of past Orioles teams. Albert Belle was paid $39 million over three years to not play after retiring due to a bizarre hip injury. Some major league impersonator named David Segui made $28 million while playing, on average, 50 games a year.

As I grew up I kept buying into the false hope. I needed the Orioles to be good again before I could bury my seventh grade sense of self. It never happened. While the O’s continued spending millions on the walking embodiments of mediocrity, the rest of baseball changed. New management styles took over. Smart, well-run organizations with half the payroll of the Orioles kept making the playoffs.

2005 proved to be a turning point. Before the season five players were dragged in front of Congress to testify on steroid abuse. Two of them were Orioles—recent addition Sammy Sosa and Rafael Palmeiro, one of the few vestiges from the last playoff team. Raffy made me proud during those hearings, emphatically pointing at his questioner as he swore he never used steroids. The team then seized first place for 62 days straight during the first half of the season. For the first time in a decade I felt a tentative confidence that the Orioles were a good ballclub.

Fate, however, was not done toying with my fragile and complex relationship to my team. Only two weeks after collecting his 3000th hit, Raffy became the first prominent major leaguer to test positively for steroids. At the same time the team suffered an epic collapse, led by Sosa, a suspected user and one-time 60-home run hitter who could barely hit the ball out of the infield. Just to make sure the hitters didn’t get all the attention, overweight pitcher Sidney Ponson was arrested for DUI three weeks after Palmeiro was busted.

That summer, as countless embarrassing stories about the Orioles blanketed the sports media, I realized that they had become the joke in our relationship. The Orioles needed me far more than I needed them, an understanding that liberated my middle school attachment. They were the shameful ones, the needy ones groping for an identity. I had finally put them in the proper perspective, and it only took the baseball equivalent of Greek tragedy to do so.

One final act remained in the form of Jeffrey Maier. Maier had gone on to play baseball in college. In 2006, as the Orioles looked to move past the worst year in franchise history, there was talk that the team might actually draft Maier into the organization. This was flirting dangerously with baseball superstition. Bringing in the kid that started a decade of losing might have cleansed the Orioles, but it could just as easily have cursed us for another 10 years. The Orioles didn’t tempt the baseball gods and stayed away.

I like to think that rejecting Maier cleared away the ghosts of the past enough to start a legitimately new era in Orioles baseball. Last offseason the team traded away their best pitcher and a steroid tainted slugger for prospects. They’re actually rebuilding for once, committing to the baseball equivalent of going through puberty. I know they’ll feel self-conscious and embarrassed as they go through awkward growing pains. I’ll be the rock this time. I’m there for you, Orioles. Maybe I’ll treat you better than you treated me.

The Real Town Hall

Splice Today — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 15:07:59 -0000

Friends don’t let friends argue about politics, but baseball disputes are completely in-bounds. Barack Obama and John McCain ought to merge the two subjects.

By Russ Smith

From www.splicetoday.com

Sunday morning, I clicked on David Broder’s Washington Post op-ed, “More Debates Would Bolster Political Dialogue” and was pleasantly surprised by the content. Nothing against Broder, who through the decades has seemed like a fairly reasonable fellow, but his good-government opinions are usually kind of dull. A lot of substance, plenty of on-the-record quotes (and humility that toxic partisans like The New York Times’ Frank Rich might consider emulating) but dull. Nevertheless, the thrust of this particular Broder piece was on the money: while his colleagues were writing and re-writing Hillary Clinton speculation columns, lost in the shuffle was John McCain’s challenge to Barack Obama that they hold 10 town-hall meetings across the country and talk to voters and each other. Tim Russert, Sean Hannity and Chris Matthews would be invited only as spectators, and they’d probably decline due to the lack of attention.

Obama’s camp claims they’re considering the proposal but it’s doubtful they’ll accede to McCain’s wishes: the GOP nominee, lousy on camera in canned network-sanctioned debates, needs a curveball to alter the dynamics of the election, which clearly favor the Illinois senator. On the other hand, if Obama bats down the idea, his aura as the “candidate of change” might take a dent. The following is a pipedream, but what I think would really be radical in presidential politics is if the two of them met five times, before the national conventions, at different baseball stadiums in mutually-agreed upon cities. No press allowed, no photo-ops, just Obama and McCain sitting in a skybox, and taking in games, gabbing about baseball or whatever else comes to mind.

Every four years editorialists natter on about the importance of a “civil” campaign, and this is one way to further that goal. The two senators don’t know each other well, but as any baseball fan can tell you, during the course of a game two acquaintances can, in an isolated setting, forge a friendship while discussing and debating America’s favorite sport. After these three-hour—remaining for all nine innings would be a condition—I find it hard to believe they’d allow their strategists to embark on what could be the nastiest presidential race since, well, 2004.

Say the two of them started off this week in Detroit (possible swing-state of Michigan), watching the disappointing Tigers take on Ozzie Guillen’s rejuvenated White Sox. The current baseball topics would be endless: Chipper Jones’ astounding batting average (.420 as of Monday morning); the wisdom of Joba Chamberlain joining the Yanks starting rotation instead of inheriting Mariano Rivera’s role as a dominant closer; the introduction of limited replays on disputed home run calls by umps; how the Cubs are going to blow it again late in the season; and the ramifications of amateur pugilist Coco Crisp setting off a brawl last Thursday night by charging the mound after the Rays’ excellent starter James Shields plunked the Sox outfielder on the leg.

Baseball, as has not been observed by enough politicians and the journalists who cover them, is a cultural equalizer, a plain fact that both Obama and McCain ought to realize. Shysterball’s Craig Calcaterra made a good point in an email over the weekend that neither of the candidates appear to be even mild baseball fans (unlike Rudy Giuliani and George Bush), and so they’d drift off to non-sports conversations, not unlike businessmen clogging up the good seats via corporate season tickets. But, at least by my reckoning, that’d be okay too, as long as they spent time together without the pressure of “gotcha” media dogs hounding them. Calcaterra wrote: “The bigger question: Could Obama name all the guys in the White Sox’s rotation, and could McCain name that of the D’Backs? I’ll admit that I’m leaning Obama, but if McCain knew who Micah Owings was, I’d have to think hard.”

That remark was made in jest, of course, but does address the very real tonic that a diversion like baseball (or sports generally) can have on friends who refrain from political debate because it just gets too incendiary. Calcaterra added: “In my own experience writing my blog, I’ve found that I can say the most outlandish, mean-spirited things possible about a baseball player or team, but the reaction to that pales compared to even the most innocuous political thoughts I insert into a post. Most folks I know would rather talk about baseball than politics, but in their heart they know one matters and one, ultimately, does not.”

David Pinto, who mans the go-to blog Baseball Musings, agrees that “people take politics more seriously than sports,” and though he’s got definite opinions about national affairs, he makes his forum a politics-free zone. As do other blogs, such as Joy of Sox, Allan Wood's blog with a message at the top of his page that reads “Iraq War Resisters In Canada—Let Them Stay.” On the other side, there’s Mr. Baseball Crank, a diehard conservative who writes a lot about politics but at the top his homepage gives readers the option to hit the “Baseball-Only Content” option. On the left side of the site, there are three quotes, old chestnuts from Tug McGraw and Branch Rickey, sandwiched by a famous proclamation of Winston Churchill’s.

(A digression: I agree with a lot of people that the Yanks’ de facto boss, Hank Steinbrenner, is a loudmouth borderline lunatic, but he had a great, and withering, response to Johnny Damon’s complaint to the media that moving Joba to the starting rotation was a blunder worthy of his old man. The New Boss said: “I love Johnny Damon as a player and a person, and he’s doing a really good job now. But let’s be honest here, he’s not Branch Rickey. Johnny is a player, and as players, they all need to let the brain trust do the thinking and talking. They players just need to play and to worry about winning games.” Translated: You might be a millionaire, but your brain is the size of a peanut, so shut the fuck up.”)

When I attend a game with friends, politics is verboten, and I tell my McCain-backing 13-year-old to shut his yap on that subject and stick to balls and strikes and the menacing glare of Jonathan Papelbon. Last week, four of us went to Camden Yards to see the O’s and the Sox and the name Obama wasn’t mentioned once; instead two of the guys, confirmed Orioles partisans, looked forward to the day when the park wouldn’t be called “Fenway Park South” and Manny Ramirez might think twice before saying, as he did upon hitting his 500th homer there, that he was glad he could attain that feat “in front of my fans.”

Here’s an example of why I think McCain and Obama (and the electorate) might profit from the five-games plan proposed above. A buddy of mine in New York is close to Jonathan Tasini, the well-known union organizer in that state (he ran against Hillary Clinton in the ’06 Democratic senate primary) and though Tasini’s a Yanks fan, we’ve exchanged good-natured emails on baseball. Jonathan wrote the other day about the value of sports in today’s politically charged culture: “I’ve always been amazed at the reaction by too many people on the progressive/left side who have disdain for people like me who love sports as if it’s a waste of time. As a union member (particularly UAW), I’ve always thought that I can talk to just about anyone, anywhere, about sports. It’s an entry point and a bridge—not intentionally but naturally—no matter what people think about [political] issues.”

I can’t let this opportunity slip to throw in a few words about the Sox-Rays brawl last Thursday night. First, why Jon Lester was suspended for five games is beyond me: yes, he hit a couple of Rays but wasn’t ejected from the game. Two, Coco Crisp was spoiling for a fight and charging the mound after Shields intentionally hit him in the leg was overreaction; what I don’t understand is why Shields would retaliate against the Sox outfielder in thesecond inning, knowing he could be tossed. It resulted in the Rays’ bullpen being taxed and a loss in a game between the sudden rivals. A more seasoned pitcher, say Josh Beckett or Mike Mussina, would wait until later in the game to exact revenge and stick up for his teammates.

New York’s Daily News runs a terrific blog called Subway Squawkers, in which a Yanks fan (Lisa Swan) squares off against a Mets booster (Jon Lewin) in a good-natured back-and-forth. I can’t stand the Yanks, but Swan is an interesting read: last year, she lobbied for Joe Torre’s dismissal long before a lot of the beat writers, and in the past has defended Alex Rodriguez when no one else would. Last weekend, she skipped the Crisp/Shields/Gomes/Crawford/Casey pile-up and instead commented on the very weird dugout scuffle between Ramirez and Kevin Youkilis that occurred a few innings after the main event of the evening. Reportedly, Manny was pissed about Youkilis chucking stuff in the dugout after striking out on a disputed call and tempers flared. Not a big deal in my book; the Yankees of the late 70s hated each other (that means you, Mr. October) and were a lot more interesting than the bland team that dominated the last half of the 90s.

Swan wrote: “[W]hat I find fascinating is that Ramirez, who so often draws attention to himself by posing at home plate after a homer, decided to be the self-appointed enforcer on Youkilis. Mind you, I actually kind of like Manny [a huge and honest admission from someone who follows every inning of every Yanks game], but still. Why was a showboater like him the one to say something? Manny being the one to do it [instead of the more sober Mike Lowell] is like Paris Hilton telling Britney Spears to stop being a publicity hound.”

See what just happened? After opening up about politics I ran aground when thinking over the dozens of baseball dramas played out in the past week, which is why someone like Jonathan Tasini and me would never be seen at the same political rally but would have a delightful time at Yankee Stadium or any other park. And that’s why I think McCain and Obama would be smart to flummox the media and not play by its rules during this long general election campaign. Go to Coors Field, fellas, have a few drinks and get to know each other. It’s possible the country will be better off no matter who wins.

Just Watch the Game

Splice Today — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 15:05:54 -0000

The sports media’s fascination with the private lives of athletes has reached a new, and disgusting, level.

From www.splicetoday.com

Just Watch the Game

Splice Today — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 15:02:17 -0000

The sports media’s fascination with the private lives of athletes has reached a new, and disgusting, level.

From www.splicetoday.com

No Cinderella In Boston

Splice Today — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 14:48:27 -0000

Everyone thinks the Boston Celtics had a miracle turnaround, but the only thing miraculous about their championship was trading a bunch of eighth graders for All-Stars.

From www.splicetoday.com

I make a solemn plea to sports analysts everywhere: Please stop referring to the 2007-08 Boston Celtics as the greatest turnaround in NBA history.

Or can we at least put an asterisk next to such a comment?

For those sports fans who were not aware (and I’m looking at you, people living in the Biodome), the Celtics won the 2008 NBA Championship, and in the process they won an impressive 66 games. During the 2006-07 season, however, the Celtics managed only 24 wins—but that’s pretty impressive considering the team consisted of Paul Pierce, some eighth graders and a couple of those old guys whom you see playing at the rec center with Horace Grant-style glasses and braces on both knees. I mean, sure, we all remember the huge splash they made in the free agent market when they signed Kevin Pittsnogle on July 26, but amazingly they turned right around and got rid of him on October 20.

The increase of 42 wins shattered the previous record of 32 games, set by the 1997-98 San Antonio Spurs. Some attribute that amazing feat by the Spurs to the addition of guard Reggie Geary, but I’ve stubbornly held that it had more to do with the drafting of this guy named Tim Duncan (coupled with a healthier David Robinson).

Well, what happened in Boston? Did Brian Scalabrine pull Larry Bird out of his ass? Not that I’m aware of. Did Doc Rivers learn how to coach? Definitely not. The Celtics were poised to get the number one pick in the 2007 NBA Draft and make Greg Oden the “Shaq” to Paul Pierce’s “Kobe.” But at the end of the Draft Lottery, Boston was shocked to find itself with the fifth pick, which was definitely the opposite of “wicked awesome.” With Pierce growing more and more frustrated with the overall shittiness of the franchise, General Manager Danny Ainge decided it was time to resort to Plan B, entitled: “We Got the Fifth Pick? Holy Shit! What the Fuck Are We Going To Do Now?’

And so the Celtics executed a number of personnel moves (the most underrated of which was the signing of James Posey). Of course, the primary moves were a trade to acquire Ray Allen from the Seattle Supersonics and a trade to acquire Kevin Garnett from the Minnesota Timberwolves. In fact, out of 15 players on the Celtics 2007-08 roster, only six were on the team during the 2006-07 season. Boston went from a starting lineup of (then-rookie) Rajon Rondo, Wally Szczerbiak, Paul Pierce, Al Jefferson and Kendrick Perkins to a lineup of Rajon Rondo, Ray Allen, Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett and Kendrick Perkins (not to mention a slew of better bench players). So, really the analysts are right: the Celtics experienced an incredible single season turnaround. Unfortunately, it was a turnaround of their roster.

Does this devalue the Celtics championship? Of course not. My frustration is merely with those people who tend to give credit where credit is not due. To most people, a “dramatic turnaround” is keeping relatively the same roster, drafting one (albeit incredible) player and winning 32 more games—it’s not adding two future Hall-of-Famers, completely changing your bench players and winning 42 more games.

Which brings me to Danny Ainge. We’re quick to forget that he was on the hot seat before this season. I’ll admit, Ainge deserves credit simply for pulling off these trades, but it’s time for everyone else to admit that he fell ass-backwards into this scenario: he is not some sort of GM genius. First of all, he was extremely lucky that there were two teams out there that were in full rebuilding mode and were very eager to unload their respective superstars. People are acting like somehow this was Ainge’s plan all along: stockpile young players and eventually trade them for superstars. In what way is that a reliable strategy? In actuality, Ainge was planning on drafting Greg Oden or Kevin Durant and hoping that either one would form a nice core with Pierce and Al Jefferson. When they wound up with the fifth pick in the Draft, Ainge was forced to say “fuck it” and trade the team away or risk being fired halfway through the season.

This probably makes me seem bitter about the Celtics’ success; however, although I wouldn’t say that I was rooting for them in the Finals, I definitely was not upset about them winning. There are three reasons for this mindset: 1) My hatred of Kobe, Phil Jackson and the Lakers reigns supreme; 2) The result of the Finals made my team, the Cleveland Cavaliers, look pretty damn good considering we almost defeated Boston with nothing more than Lebron James and some cardboard cut-outs of basketball players; and 3) I’m kind of excited (make that downright giddy) about the prospect of the Celtics following the exact same path of the Miami Heat. Much like the Heat, the Celtics mortgaged their future to win a championship right now. There’s nothing wrong with that, but Boston fans need to be prepared for the repercussions. By my math, Ray Allen will be 98 at the start of next season, and he showed significant signs of slowing down throughout the playoffs. Additionally, Kevin Garnett proved to the world that he is content with taking 18-foot jumpers every time down the floor and that he really doesn’t feel compelled to take over a game on most nights, even though he is talented enough to do so.

I congratulate the Boston Celtics on their NBA Championship, but can we please stop talking about this like it’s a rag-tag, Walt Disney, underdog sports tale, reminiscent of Tiny Giants?

No Cinderella In Boston

Splice Today — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 14:18:25 -0000

Everyone thinks the Boston Celtics had a miracle turnaround, but the only thing miraculous about their championship was trading a bunch of eighth graders for All-Stars.

www.splicetoday.com

See the rest at www.splicetoday.com

SB Nation User Blog: Splice Today

Just Watch the Game

The sports media’s fascination with the private lives of athletes has reached a new, and disgusting, level.

Orioles Tragic

A life defined by the caprice of a mediocre team.

The Real Town Hall

Friends don’t let friends argue about politics, but baseball disputes are completely in-bounds. Barack Obama and John McCain ought to merge the two subjects.

Just Watch the Game

The sports media’s fascination with the private lives of athletes has reached a new, and disgusting, level.

Just Watch the Game

The sports media’s fascination with the private lives of athletes has reached a new, and disgusting, level.

No Cinderella In Boston

Everyone thinks the Boston Celtics had a miracle turnaround, but the only thing miraculous about their championship was trading a bunch of eighth graders for All-Stars.

No Cinderella In Boston

Everyone thinks the Boston Celtics had a miracle turnaround, but the only thing miraculous about their championship was trading a bunch of eighth graders for All-Stars. www.splicetoday.com

Everyone thinks the Boston Celtics had a miracle turnaround, but the only thing miraculous about their championship was trading a bunch of eighth graders for All-Stars.

www.splicetoday.com