Naero
10-05-2015, 08:14 PM
For true fans of any team, we feel merciless against any match-up that threatens the aspirations of our teams. While we may enjoy watching other teams play or revere some of their players to point where their own success isn't an unwelcome sight, that fondness is suspended whenever they're matched-up against our team.
However, whenever our team is mathematically out of the hunt for the title, it's not uncommon for even the more devoted fans to look for consolatory aftereffects—that is, the next-most optimal outcome.
More retributive fans may hope for their team's eliminators to be avenged by a later opponent, whereas the less antagonistic fans may hope for damage control in the sense that their team lost to the eventual champions; we may also root for whichever players on other teams that we want to see succeed the most.
Regardless of where we're predisposed, we most likely have varying levels of predilections for other teams' chances and thus stronger gratification for other teams than others.
Aside from your own favorite team, which team were you the happiest for when they won a championship?
My own favorite:
The 2011 Dallas Mavericks.
It's the team that thwarted my Lakers' chance for a three-peat—which we all knew was the last chance for Kobe to lead his team to the feat in his career—and ended the Phil Jackson era on a sour note. Once again, my Lakers failed to take a loss honorably, as they not only succumbed to another emphatic blowout in an elimination game; two of its players, Andrew Bynum and Lamar Odom, classlessly committed frustration-driven flagrant fouls, which opened up the floodgates for revilement against this once-dynastic franchise.
As embittering as the loss was to me, I once again philosophized the platitudinous but consolatory adage: "Everything happens for a reason." The only chain of events that'd require a Lakers loss in the fold was for their eliminators—the Mavericks team—to go on to win it all themselves.
And there were more than enough positive reasons to find from it.
This is a Mavericks team that comprised a glut of ringless veterans who were possibly playing for their last plausible chance to win one:
Dirk Nowitzki - easily the greatest Germanic player of all time, and his devastation over his then-failure to have won a ring up to that point in his career was the most transparent.
After squandering a 2-0 lead in the 2006 NBA Finals to land the franchise its first ring, the road to redemption for the then-32-year-old has been a rocky one up to that juncture.
He was on the agonizing end of what's considered the biggest first-round upset in playoff history, having lost to the 8th-seeded Warriors after leading his team to the league-best record. Rather than availing from the home-court advantage his team clinched in later rounds, he would receive his MVP award that season in a press-conference room, lamenting over the fact that he was one of the rare MVP awardees that couldn't accept it in a pre-game ceremony in the second round.
In 2010, rather than expectedly matching up against the previous-year Lakers in the Western Conference Finals, his second-seeded team suffered another first-round upset, having lost to the seventh-seeded San Antonio Spurs in a similar sequential route as the Warriors series; the Mavericks lost home-court advantage in one of the opening-two home games, and they never regained it as the Spurs went on to win in Game 6.
Jason Terry:
The only remnant alongside Dirk to have experienced the devastating 2006 NBA Finals loss, the Jet had the same demons to slay as him.
The outspoken former Sixth Man of the Year awardee went as far as to imprint a championship-trophy tattoo, and the bold move was eventually dignified at the end of the season.
Jason Kidd:
Already established as one of the greatest Point Guards of all time, the Mavericks' then-starting Point Guard was on his last legs, and while it was clear that he no longer had the physical faculty to be the prime mover of a championship-caliber team, it wouldn't make a championship any less gratifying to such a selfless player.
After landing in New Jersey, he plunged the franchise into relevancy with a track record of deep playoff runs—including back-to-back NBA Finals appearances in 2002 and 2003—but left that success empty-handed. In 2008, he rejoined the team that drafted him in the Dallas Mavericks, joining a syndicate of veterans that were also ring-deprived and hoping that their best chances weren't left in the rear-view mirror.
Peja Stojakovic:
Another ringless veteran. While many still respect him as a should-be champion after the controversially officiated Game 6 in the 2002 Western Conference Finals—a victory therein would've sent his team to the finals against a Nets team led by his Mavericks teammate in Jason Kidd—realists aren't going to treat a single game as a be-all, end-all determinant—especially as they had other games to overcome the Game 6-officiating, including a heartbreakingly lost Game 7 at home.
Regardless of one's stance on it, Stojakovic remained just as hungry for a championship. He even managed to return the favor to the Lakers franchise by hitting crucial three-pointers late in the stretch in a pivotal Game 3—a win that ensured a 3-0 win that virtually sealed the series, as far as history predicts—and he contributed to the exclamation-point win in Game 4 with 6-6 three-point-shooting in the onslaught.
Shawn Marion:
Another multiple-time All-Star who partook in his own championship-contention teams, having played as one of the better defenders on the D'Antoni-coached Phoenix Suns teams, he was another veteran eluded of championships.
All in all, the team reaffirmed that it was no fluke that they ended my team's three-peat quest; and while a Lakers three-peat obviously would've been my favorite end result, I would be lying if I stated that I'd feel bad if these Mavericks ended up ringless—which was more than a possibility, as the team itself did not even register a single playoff win since.
Honorable mention: 2014 San Antonio Spurs.
However, whenever our team is mathematically out of the hunt for the title, it's not uncommon for even the more devoted fans to look for consolatory aftereffects—that is, the next-most optimal outcome.
More retributive fans may hope for their team's eliminators to be avenged by a later opponent, whereas the less antagonistic fans may hope for damage control in the sense that their team lost to the eventual champions; we may also root for whichever players on other teams that we want to see succeed the most.
Regardless of where we're predisposed, we most likely have varying levels of predilections for other teams' chances and thus stronger gratification for other teams than others.
Aside from your own favorite team, which team were you the happiest for when they won a championship?
My own favorite:
The 2011 Dallas Mavericks.
It's the team that thwarted my Lakers' chance for a three-peat—which we all knew was the last chance for Kobe to lead his team to the feat in his career—and ended the Phil Jackson era on a sour note. Once again, my Lakers failed to take a loss honorably, as they not only succumbed to another emphatic blowout in an elimination game; two of its players, Andrew Bynum and Lamar Odom, classlessly committed frustration-driven flagrant fouls, which opened up the floodgates for revilement against this once-dynastic franchise.
As embittering as the loss was to me, I once again philosophized the platitudinous but consolatory adage: "Everything happens for a reason." The only chain of events that'd require a Lakers loss in the fold was for their eliminators—the Mavericks team—to go on to win it all themselves.
And there were more than enough positive reasons to find from it.
This is a Mavericks team that comprised a glut of ringless veterans who were possibly playing for their last plausible chance to win one:
Dirk Nowitzki - easily the greatest Germanic player of all time, and his devastation over his then-failure to have won a ring up to that point in his career was the most transparent.
After squandering a 2-0 lead in the 2006 NBA Finals to land the franchise its first ring, the road to redemption for the then-32-year-old has been a rocky one up to that juncture.
He was on the agonizing end of what's considered the biggest first-round upset in playoff history, having lost to the 8th-seeded Warriors after leading his team to the league-best record. Rather than availing from the home-court advantage his team clinched in later rounds, he would receive his MVP award that season in a press-conference room, lamenting over the fact that he was one of the rare MVP awardees that couldn't accept it in a pre-game ceremony in the second round.
In 2010, rather than expectedly matching up against the previous-year Lakers in the Western Conference Finals, his second-seeded team suffered another first-round upset, having lost to the seventh-seeded San Antonio Spurs in a similar sequential route as the Warriors series; the Mavericks lost home-court advantage in one of the opening-two home games, and they never regained it as the Spurs went on to win in Game 6.
Jason Terry:
The only remnant alongside Dirk to have experienced the devastating 2006 NBA Finals loss, the Jet had the same demons to slay as him.
The outspoken former Sixth Man of the Year awardee went as far as to imprint a championship-trophy tattoo, and the bold move was eventually dignified at the end of the season.
Jason Kidd:
Already established as one of the greatest Point Guards of all time, the Mavericks' then-starting Point Guard was on his last legs, and while it was clear that he no longer had the physical faculty to be the prime mover of a championship-caliber team, it wouldn't make a championship any less gratifying to such a selfless player.
After landing in New Jersey, he plunged the franchise into relevancy with a track record of deep playoff runs—including back-to-back NBA Finals appearances in 2002 and 2003—but left that success empty-handed. In 2008, he rejoined the team that drafted him in the Dallas Mavericks, joining a syndicate of veterans that were also ring-deprived and hoping that their best chances weren't left in the rear-view mirror.
Peja Stojakovic:
Another ringless veteran. While many still respect him as a should-be champion after the controversially officiated Game 6 in the 2002 Western Conference Finals—a victory therein would've sent his team to the finals against a Nets team led by his Mavericks teammate in Jason Kidd—realists aren't going to treat a single game as a be-all, end-all determinant—especially as they had other games to overcome the Game 6-officiating, including a heartbreakingly lost Game 7 at home.
Regardless of one's stance on it, Stojakovic remained just as hungry for a championship. He even managed to return the favor to the Lakers franchise by hitting crucial three-pointers late in the stretch in a pivotal Game 3—a win that ensured a 3-0 win that virtually sealed the series, as far as history predicts—and he contributed to the exclamation-point win in Game 4 with 6-6 three-point-shooting in the onslaught.
Shawn Marion:
Another multiple-time All-Star who partook in his own championship-contention teams, having played as one of the better defenders on the D'Antoni-coached Phoenix Suns teams, he was another veteran eluded of championships.
All in all, the team reaffirmed that it was no fluke that they ended my team's three-peat quest; and while a Lakers three-peat obviously would've been my favorite end result, I would be lying if I stated that I'd feel bad if these Mavericks ended up ringless—which was more than a possibility, as the team itself did not even register a single playoff win since.
Honorable mention: 2014 San Antonio Spurs.