It can’t be the Alamo. After all, John Wayne was there. And, sure, that Riverwalk is a little muddy, but if Mark Cuban doesn’t like it, we know it can’t be all bad. It has a 24-hour Mexican restaurant downtown, a good one, and even Chicago doesn’t have that.
So why the heck don’t we love San Antonio?
Not actually the city, but its basketball team, the San Antonio Spurs, who remain in the process of having the greatest sports team ever that no one cares about. When they begin the NBA Finals at home Thursday night against the Cleveland Cavaliers, they will be trying to win their fourth NBA championship in nine seasons.
Larry Bird and the Celtics never did that. Neither did Isiah Thomas and the Pistons, Hakeem Olajuwon and the Rockets, Willis Reed and the Knicks, Dr. J and the 76ers or Wilt and anyone. Heck, Charles Barkley, Elgin Baylor, Patrick Ewing, Dominique Wilkins and Karl Malone didn’t even get one. Some of the best players in NBA history — Rick Barry, Jerry West, Oscar Robertson and Bob Pettit come to mind — were fortunate to be on teams that were there once.
“Put our team in New York,” the Spurs’ Tony Parker said recently, “and they’d be loving us. We’d be like the Yankees.”
Actually, you get the feeling if the Spurs were in New York they would be mugged and no one would report the crime.
Yes, they are seemingly that anonymous.
I must admit I love watching the Spurs, which, as with a lot of things, makes me an exception in America.
I was discussing this during the Spurs-Suns Western Conference semifinal series with a friend who is a major figure at ABC, which is televising the Finals. We were agreeing that series really was probably for the NBA title, and while the Suns were more popular nationally, the Spurs would be fine in the Finals as long as it wasn’t a Spurs-Pistons rerun.
But my friend said the network actually hates the Spurs and has been rooting against them. No matter their success, the feeling is no one cares — seen that, had enough — and it’s a ratings disaster.
That’s what makes the Spurs such an unusual exception. The best draw for sports usually is a dynasty, a team everyone can embrace, like the Bulls of the 1990s, or hate, like the Yankees in any era. The Dallas Cowboys branded themselves America’s Team, and at least you always had a rooting interest to see the arrogant champions knocked off or whether they could do it again. Even individual sports, like golf, prosper with a dynasty. Think Tiger Woods now and Jack Nicklaus then.
The Spurs’ lack of drawing power probably has something to do with star Tim Duncan, who seemingly has the personality of a grape.
His nickname is “the Big Fundamental.”
That’s right, tune in to watch him box out perfectly.
Or watch his bank shot.
How about that defensive rebound?
More Top Picks Best Automatic Watches For Women Under 200
Are we all so insipid? Can’t we appreciate great art, which is really what the Spurs practice on their canvas? Position defense, good shots, advantageous transition.
Did Monet paint to applause? Was Mozart on the 18th Century “SportsCenter” composers’ list with one of the Top 10 Super Symphonies?
Duncan is a treat to watch, probably the greatest star of this era even if we don’t know it.
Yes, Shaquille O’Neal has been on four championship teams, and his run with Kobe Bryant in Los Angeles was a classic of play and entertainment value. But Duncan has been relentlessly effective, which perhaps diminishes his influence in this era of fireworks and light shows.
Perhaps Duncan and the Spurs would have been appreciated more in another era, when carnivals and freak shows didn’t compete for attention.
The Spurs play defense without excuse. They go through Duncan on offense. He passes when he is crowded and shoots when it makes sense. He holds his hands high to rebound and defend. His positioning is flawless. He plays the angles. On the court, not in the casinos. No Spur gets arrested, though some are said to have watched “Arrested Development” to be wild.
The Spurs have made some concession to the modern NBA with the exhilarating play of Parker, who is marrying a TV star but still can’t get recognized in a New York cab, and Manu Ginobili, a lead actor in the floppers’ revue and a great court innovator.
“We are the bad boys,” Duncan said after the Cavs and fan favorite LeBron James made the Finals. “Yeah, yeah, I enjoy being the bad boys. We’re going to try to change our name or get a nickname or something for our team.”
How about, “The guys who think a Whoopie Cushion is funny?”
Bad boys? C’mon.
The bad boys rap comes from the conference semifinals, when San Antonio’s Robert Horry came off the bench to shoulder Phoenix’s Steve Nash into a table and create a near ruckus that resulted in the suspensions of Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw.
It did set a terrible precedent for the NBA because of the comparisons with a hockey goon being sent out to take out an opponent’s best player. The Suns had just tied the series 2-2 in San Antonio and Horry’s suspension hardly mattered because he only shows up to make a shot once a month and everyone declares it the greatest ever.
“We’ve been the bad boys since the second round,” Parker said. “We are not vanilla anymore. We are the bad boys.”
Hey! No giggling.
———-