June
24, 2005
KHTK At It Again
By Ahchie
Last
time it was Tom Abetamarco (“Why do we need
this guy?”). The time before it was KHTK's inability to broadcast
any Major League Baseball playoffs games on the first day of the playoffs
(Open Letter to KHTK). And the time before
that was KHTK’s decision of leave the
final moments of a tie game between the Raiders and Steelers in the first
week of the football season so that listeners could hear the opening tip of
a meaningless Monarchs game. This time it is Grant Napear's sidekick, Mike
Lamb, who is drawing the ire of BMTG Nation. He had the noxious idea that
the Detroit Pistons coming back from being down 2 and 0 to the San Antonio
Spurs to force a game 7 in their championship series was similar to the Boston
Red Sox comeback from being down 3 and 0 to the Yanks in the American
League Championship Series. Lamb said, on the eve of game 7, that if the Pistons
were to win the NBA Championship, their accomplishment would be like what
the Red Sox were able to accomplish in 2004’s ALCS. His reasoning was
that after they lost the first two games, everyone counted Detroit out and
figured they had no chance to win the series, just like how everyone had counted
Boston out. His reasoning is egregiously flawed and is an all too familiar
example of the mindless drivel that is routinely spewed out of the guts of
sports talk radio.
Consider that Detroit lost the first two games of the series on the road and were coming back home. What is there about that situation that would indicate that Detroit has no chance of winning the series? In the NBA, the home team usually has a significant advantage, so it should be no surprise that San Antonio won the first two. This Detroit team is essentially the same team that won the championship just last year, and they promptly (why are they still playing basketball in late June?) won the next two on their home floor. Suddenly, in a shocker, the two teams were tied at two games each and we had a brand new series that was now the best of three. San Antonio still had the advantage because two of those three games would be held in San Antone. If not for another final possession of the game where Robert Horry was inexplicably left unguarded and wide open in three point range, allowing him to make another of his patented miracle shots in game 5, Detroit would have continued the home-team-wins trend and gone into San Antonio needing to win one of two. Instead they came in with a much more difficult task, needing to win both games 6 and 7 in San Antonio. The only similarity to the World Champion Boston Red Sox is in Detroit’s attitude, which is to take the series one game at a time, one quarter at a time, one possession at a time.
Now
consider the situation Boston had found itself in. Boston was not down two
games to none – no, they were down three games to none, which is a huge
difference. Not only were they down three games, they were down three games
to their most bitter and hated rival. A rival, it should be noted, that always
seems to get the breaks in the big games. A rival that always seems to find
a way to win no matter what the situation. This is a Boston team that found
a way to give away a three run lead just five outs away from beating a weaker
Yankee team in 2003. In that infamous game 7, Derek Jeter knew the ghosts
of Yankee Stadium would stir and something freakish would happen. The freakish
thing that happened was that Grady Little left Pedro in after he was physically
spent and a previously lights out bullpen was left to wonder why they were
even there. Now, just one year later, they were down three games to the same
hated rival and were battling an 86 year old curse that hung over their heads
year after year. To make matters worse, they had just been beaten down 19
to 8 in a merciless game three in their home pahk. At the end of that game,
you would have to be as low as you could possibly go. This is a series in
which your best pitcher, Curt Schilling, was battling an ankle that made him
ineffective in game 1 and a big question mark as to if he would even be available
at any point in the series, if they could somehow stay alive until his next
start. This is a series in which Boston, in game 4, was down to its final
three outs against one of the best closers of all time. In game 5, Boston
was down to its final six outs before tying the game to force a second consecutive
extra inning marathon. This is a series in which games 6 and 7 would have
to be won in the haunted ballpark of the hated rival. There has never, in
the history of sports, been anything more improbable than coming back to win
that series. How can this situation in any way compare to losing the first
two games on the road in a sport where home court is a huge advantage?
Lamb would probably point to the numbers based on how many teams have actually won in the history of the NBA after losing the first two. And while no team in the history of any major sport had accomplished what the Red Sox did last year, two teams in the history of the NBA have in fact come back from being down 0-2 to win the championship. While it is true that no team has ever won a game 6 and game 7 on the road in the NBA Finals, that is still a far cry from the incredible odds overcome by the Sox. Consider these numbers related to being down three games to none: Before the Red Sox series, in the history of the major sports leagues, twenty-six times a team had lost the first three games of a postseason series. Twenty times the team that lost the first three went on to be swept. And no team down three games to none had ever won the next three to take it to game 7. Not until the Red Sox did, and then they went one step further and won game 7.
The purpose here is not to lessen the accomplishments of the Detroit Pistons. They have proved that they are still a championship quality team, win or lose in game 7. They have overcome the odds and are still standing. But Mike Lamb’s decision to compare their situation with that of the Red Sox, and to stick by that assertion, is just ignorant of the place the Sox hold in the history of sports.
In every playoff series, in every sport, there will always be at least one analyst who will feel the need to go over the numbers of how often a team wins the title based on each and every game. After game one, the numbers are shown of how hard it is to overcome losing the first game. Coming back to tie the series after being down two games brings another set of numbers showing how the odds are against one of the teams, even though the series is tied. Every combination of how a series got to be where it is will have some numbers to show that one team now has an advantage over the other. Some of these numbers can be interesting, but we are force-fed the numbers whether they are interesting or not. It is Boston’s very victory that should eliminate these proclamations and allow the teams to just play until the series is over.