Finals Game 4: Babys R Us

"Because this is what legends are made of. This is where you grasp the moment. Immortality. This is all you can do right now." -Glen Davis

The ravings of a madman are perhaps all that can be used to describe this game. Everything about it seemed backwards. Despite being completely outplayed, the Celtics snuck past the Lakers and tied up the Finals. Their salvation did not come from men nicknamed Jesus or Truth, but rather from the one they call Big Baby, and a sidekick who coincidentally looks like a Baby.

For the most part, this game looked like it was was being played on a Tuesday night in December. With the exception of Kobe, the entire Lakers squad seemed to want to excuse themselves for the evening. They passed too much, shot too little, and seemed to hope someone else would win the game for them. Well some other guys did win the game, but they were wearing green.

Going into this series I assumed we'd eventually see a night where the Big 3 crumbled and Rondo went limp and Sheed locked himself in foul jail. What I would not have guessed is that the dynamic duo surfacing to spearhead the effort to win this game would have been Glen Davis and Nate Robinson. It was a remarkable sight to behold, and their post-game interviews are among my favorite things to come out of this finals so far. Davis grimaced at the microphone, concentrating so hard, as though he'd practiced this speech (the nonsense in italics above) since he was a kid. When Nate came on, he had a towel rolled around his neck and tucked into his shirt the way my mom used to do when I got out of swim lessons. The absolute jubilation in their faces won me over. I forgot entirely that before last night I'd really only mildly disliked these two players.

There may very well never be a night like that again. Nate and Baby will not be tearing it up anytime soon, the Lakers are never caught sleeping twice. The Big Four were given a pass last night, but on Sunday they'll be back in LA, and naptime will be over.

Antiheroics

Derek Fisher's performance in Game 3 was inspiring. It inspired me to swear heavily, throw several things I was holding, and weep. That was Write on the Funny!

But seriously (ugh, sorry), Fisher turned in the kind of late-game superprowess that brings to mind the past exploits of Reggie Miller and Robert Horry. These are the kinds of players who (excluding Miller, to some extent) are not superstars, but who are almost more feared than the Jordans or the Kobes when there are less than three minutes on the clock. They are guys whose value is rarely thought about until they, time and again, come through in the clutch and give their team a spark that is hard to control and nearly impossible to counter. Fisher has the added impact of emotional appeal, best displayed by his fourth quarter entrance after leaving his ill daughter's bed a few years back and his overjoyed post-game interview on Tuesday. Even when talking about his own clutchness, he plays the role of Moral Orel.

The combination of this good-guy persona and the individual underdog triumph should make me love these players. Yet I often end up rooting against them more intensely than even the players who perform like this all the time. There are two major reasons for this, so far as I can tell.

Say Queensbridge

"'Five Dollar Foot-long' is one of the best songs. That's a hot song. You've got the FreeCreditReport.com, and then 'Five Dollar Foot-long' comes on. When 'Five Dollar Foot-long' comes on, they should play that in the club. They should play all those in the club." -Ron Artest

When Jason Richardson watched Kobe's airball for a second too long, allowing an offensive rebound and put-back, killing the Suns for the summer, I sent a text message to a few people: "At least it was Artest." If the only team left worth rooting for was going to get the boot, best by the hand of the NBA's mad prince.

That phrase—"At least it's Artest"—sums up my feelings on these finals. Because there's not a finals match-up that I could imagine being less pleased with. I've never been able to contextualize history, so the "classic rivalry" angle leaves me limp. And I get that it's "good for the league" and whatever else you want to "put inside quotes," but watching two teams that always win battle to see who can win again is awful. Depressing stats: Only eight different teams have won a championship since 1980; the Lakers or Celtics have won 13 times in those 30 years and at least one of the two teams has appeared in 17 of those finals.

They are both detestable, but the Lakers are the team to root for here. Why?

Bleeding hearts of the world UNITE!

Well, it's June and we're running out of options. The question we ask tonight is the same we've been asking for ten months: really, seriously, who is going to beat the Lakers? We've reasoned it out, convincing ourselves that almost any team, the Magic, Mavs, Thunder, or Suns could somehow pull it off, could save us from the collective yawn, the mind-numbing apathy of another post-Laker victory summer.

Now we look to our favorite Green Henchmen to save us. Not a month ago we were gleefully mocking the C's with our movie analogies. Yet tonight we implore, we beg them to rescue us from the smug Phil Jackson Press Conferences, from the douchey Kobe smiles and five-ring photo shoots, and from the harrowing proof that this league, renowned for surprises and upsets, can indeed be as predictable as a telenovela.

I don't care if the Celtics are ever a good team again. I don't care who plays or whether Ubuntu is involved, I don't care if this is an ugly, last ditch effort fueled by Rogaine and Bengay, I just want for the eyes in my face to see proof that somebody can beat this Lakers team.

One thing is certain, you cannot beat the Lakers on accident. The Thunder didn't have the experience, the Jazz lacked the talent, and the Suns just couldn't put it all together. But the Celtics could be different. Hell, they beat the Lakers recently, and that was before Rajon Rondo "hatched." Sure, it was also before the Big Three started aging in dog years, and before their front office started saying things like, "Hey Guys, Meet Rasheed."

The Lakers have been playing like it's Christmas in June. I know one guy who can end that. I'll give you a hint, he's green.

If You See Something, Say Something

IYSSSS is our semi-regular Internet intelligence report, a liberal arts approach to following the NBA on the Web. E-mail us at jewsforjesusshuttlesworth@gmail.com if you've got any suggestions.

Brain On Funk: Amazing how Doc Funk was able to get on that space station with Jay-Z and Prokhorov.

Slam Magazine [via FD]: Preview of Lang Whitaker's cover story on Rondo. "I didn’t watch the NBA until maybe my freshman year of college, because I was trying to get there. It just wasn’t interesting to me." Says he never saw Jordan, never saw Garnett, never saw Hakeem. Makes sense in that his aesthetics are wholly unique and his approach is so blue-collar, but he just keeps moving further down the list of players I'd want to hang out with. Let's all pinky swear to buy this issue when it hits newsstands, underline all our favorite parts and keep it under our pillows.

Slam Magazine: LeBron on stage with Drake. Is LeBron so timid about throwing up the Roc because he doesn't want to offend Drake's Young Money sensibilities or because he suddenly realizes he's not entirely sure what he's supposed to do at a hip-hop show? Because he's a basketball player and all. (He is, right?) I hope he signs with No Limit Records in July instead of an NBA team and records "Make 'Em Say Uhh! Pt. II" featuring Mystikal and Troy Hudson, with Artest dropping Jeezy-level ad-libs.

Don Cannon/ Vitamin Water "Mixtape": In case you wanted to hear all the stale "reasons" why LeBron should/will come to [insert team with cap space here] spit by Jadakiss, Mikey Rocks and others (seriously, doesn't matter who), that's what this is. They all rhyme way too literally here, but Mikey Rocks drives home one thing we can all agree on: "Just no more rings for L.A./Nah, no more rings for L.A."

The No-Look Pass [via BDL]: Ignoring the urge to try to figure out if I would think this was gross if it was an NFL player wearing a comparable shirt. Because it's not. It's Kevin Durant and it's hilarious.

Bibby's World: A Cool Thing

As a huge fan of computers and the movie Minority Report, I find this video to be something out of my own personal fantasy. But what does this have to do with Basketball or friendship? Simple:

Life > Friendship > Basketball

This Machine will change Life.

Machine > Life; therefore,

Machine > Friendship + Basketball

People are always saying, "Who knows what the future holds?" I'll tell you: It's me playing Sega Genesis emulators with motion sensor gloves on.

This Summit Ain't No High Point

NOTE: As I was finishing the following post, news broke that there will be no summit. Whatever. My opinion still stands and it's not like these guys aren't talking in a less official capacity.

While I am (not) sure that Andrew will be getting us ready for Thursday with an extended post on why Celtics-Lakers is a big old crock of horse shit that smells like poop and puts his pretty little head right to sleep, I would like to gripe about the current NBA event that people actually care about.

So Amar'e is in on the conspiracy. He is going to attend this "summit" and take part in a conversation that will apparently shape the foreseeable future of the NBA. He is going to sit in some secret lair with his four besties and talk about where he wants to go for his all expenses paid extended vacation. I, for one, hope that he and Misters James, Johnson, Wade and Bosh all get very lost on the day of that planned summit.

Because, ladies and gentlemen, I don't like it, not one bit. There are plenty of reasons why someone like me should find this kind of thing positive and exciting. First, it's just kind of cool to think about these guys gathering for anything, really. Also, the more people involved with this talk, the better chance my Knicks will be able to land LeBron +1. Plus, the traditional free agent game--with the all-powerful teams courting players and crafting deals that make decisions seem solely money-based--is not really something to mourn when it is absent.

And yet, I just straight-up hate the idea of this summit. I hate the fact that these players can collectively decide to make the Eastern Conference even more top-heavy. I hate that they are all sort of giving the finger to their current teams, at least in a more visible way than free agents have tended to do in the past. But honestly, my real problem here comes down to the fact that I still have some crazy notion that opponents should try to win against each other to the point where they could not really be friends. Next season, when I see Wade and Bron or Bosh and Amare going head to head, I will be thinking about how they collectively decided that these were the matchups that would occur. It will seem contrived and just a little too...friendly.

Maybe I'm too old-fashioned and maybe my NBA mythology is a little too much based on a warrior model, but goddammit, I would at least like to pretend that these guys don't get to plan out the next five years of the league based on the buddy system.

Troy's Bucket

"Don't you realize? The next time you see sky, it'll be over another town. The next time you take a test, it'll be in some other school. Our parents, they want the best of stuff for us. But right now, they got to do what's right for them. Because it's their time. Their time! Up there! Down here, it's our time. It's our time down here. That's all over the second we ride up Troy's bucket."


Before we jump into this "historic" journey that is the 2010 NBA finals (the equivalent of two billionaires fighting for $1,000,000), let's give proper respect to your favorite team that's not your favorite team: The Phoenix Suns.

This movie match-up thing is close to it's breaking point (and we are all thankful we only have one left), but this one just might be optimistic enough to work. Getting some pleasantries out of the way: Nash looked like Sloth after getting hit in the eye, but is Mikey to the death. Amar'e is Corey Feldman. Grant Hill is Oscar-worthy in the Josh Brolin role of older brother who's not sure if they're allowed to be doing this. Leondro is Data and I guess Dudley gets requests for the Truffle Shuffle? Steve Kerr is Mikey's dad, ignoring his son's desire for stability and only thinking business. And whoa: Phil Jackson is Ma Fratelli.


Whatever, this is not about how they match up to the movie, this is about the feeling you first got watching Nash on the Suns and about how that era might be ending.