Lakers-Celtics, Game Six, First Quarter: Can't Shoot Vs. Can't Care

We are 48 minutes away from the first Celtics championship in 22 years. It's been a good 22 years, on one basic level; it has been the only 22-year era in NBA history in which my Sixers have matched the Celtics in championships. Tonight, unless I miss my guess, that won't be true anymore.

Gasol wins the tip and draws a foul on Perkins, who doesn't have flash colored bandages. Kobe then makes a tough one. Good start for the visitors. Rondo misses and the Celtics scramble for o-boards and extra shots, but Odom eventually collects. Fisher draws a flop block call on Pierce, and the first Bull Shit chant happens with one minute of game play down. Fisher makes both, and we're at 4-0. Hyper Celtics passing results in a Rondo miss and a Rondo miss. The point guard swipes from Gasol on the other end after the Odom board, and feeds Allen for a 3. Fisher responds on the other end with another drawn foul, this one on Garnett. A Laker miss by Radmanovic, and Allen draws a shooting foul on the other end. Right now, the Celtics have more energy, and after two Allen makes, the lead, at 5-4.

Bryant with a 3 changes that; he's looking relaxed. Rondo misses a push shot but gets the o-board and a call on Fisher. After two makes -- rare for Rondo -- it's tied at 7. Bryant nails another long 3, and it's Game Four First Wyarter all over again. Pierce doesn't get the lean in call on Radmanvic, but Gasol turns on the other end. A defensive three on the Lake Show at 8:18 results in an Allen make, so we're at 10-8. A Rondo miss isn't converted by Perkins on the o-board, but the Lakers miss on the other end, and Gasol's flop on Garnett isn't called. Despite a 2 for 10 start, it's tied. Wild possessions back and forth with Kobe not getting a call and the Lakers doing weird passing; Gasol doesn't post Pierce, but Garnett misses badly in traffic on Gasol, and it results in a Rondo foul. Wildly ragged play right now.

Bryant turns on another too-cute Laker turn, their fourth. Rondo takes another and finally makes one, and it's 12-10 Celtics. He's 1 for 5 from the floor, and they've all been open. Bryant hits a tough 3 at the buzzer, and that's three in five and a half minutes, all highly contested. Wow. Pierce draws the second on Radmanovic, and while Kobe has 11 of the Laker points, if I'm a Lake Fan, I'm uneasy... because they've all been from distance, and he can't do that all night. 13-12 into the first unconscionably long commercial timeout.

The Boston celeb roll for the first quarter is Bill Belicheat and Stephen Tyler. And we care... why?

Gasol with 3 turnovers and not much help. Odom has rebounded reasonably, though. Pierce misses a tough 3 and Gasol boards; Fisher misses the three. Allen scores off garbage but gets hurt, and Ray Allen becomes Celtic Number Five to suffer grievous harm, this one on a no-call eye poke from Odom. PJ Brown comes in, while on the other end, Odom shoots free throws on Perkins' second; he also leaves, for Posey. Odom fulfills Basketball Divine Justice by missing the free throw. Call for Pierce's Magic Wheelchair! Odom makes the second, and the game is tied again at 14.

Garnett shoots over Bryant and scores; it's chippy. Gasol feeds Walton out of the double team for an easy one. Rondo can't finish at the rim. Walton does the right thing and drives, getting a Brown foul. After two makes, it's 18-16 Lakers, with the pace picking up and the locals getting nervous about the refs. Garnett makes again, and that's encouraging for Green. Gasol misses what will be one of his easier looks, and Garnett is feeling it at the other end, with some nice post moves and a good looking jumper. With the home team up by two, Jackson calls time, in the hope that the Garnett that has played most of these Finals will come back. Time for More Ads!

ABC feels compelled to tell us about Garnett's predilection for team-wide peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. And we care... why?

Rondo with his third steal, but Pierce can't finish. Neither can Kobe, and Pierce misses his fifth on the trip back. Another Laker turn is answered by a Garnett slam, and if it weren't for Bryant's threes, this would be a blowout. Farmer can't get the roll. Walton steals a bad entry pass while guarding Garnett, and Rondo picks up his second foul on Farmer. It's clearly Garnett's best game of the series to this point; he's got 10 and 3. Farmer makes both, and it's 22-20, Celtics, with less than 50 seconds left. Pierce finally gets a make on a very open drive and pop. Bryant shoots from forever, just a terrible decision, and misses. Pierce holds for the last, crosses Walton, and with 1.8 left, Walton makes the heady play of giving the foul. Nice minutes for Luke's kid tonight; he's certainly been better than Gasol. Can the Lakers get a stop on the inbounds? Yes, as Powe doesn't get it off in time. Celtics 24, Lakers 20, and we've got a game, even if it doesn't seem like we should.

Everyone in for the double jinx

So in my preparation -- yes, I do prepare -- for tonight's Game Six diary, I've been going all over the Interwebs, reading the game previews. And the only thing that everyone is sure of is that neither of these teams are very good, in a good situation, or can win.

Boston? No chance. They've played 107 games this year, traveled to Europe and back, been taken to the edge by Atlanta and Cleveland, and everyone's hurt. Kendrick Perkins is all kinds of messed up with the ankle, but dammit, he'll go. Paul Pierce has Tiger Woods' knees -- which guy has milked his condition more in the last week? -- but dammit, he'll go. Rajon Rondo has an ankle problem that would have euthanized a lesser man, but dammit, he'll go. Ray Allen's kid is being tortured by Eurotrash terrorists that look like members of Vladimir Radmanovic's extended family... but, dammit, he'll try. Try, I tell you. It's a miracle, that so many obscenely wealthy men could have so much to overcome, isn't it? And such a coincidence that all of the Good Character Guys play for a media market that mouth jobs its athletes with both lips and hands while wearing frilly little costumes, isn't it?

Meanwhile, the Lakers? No chance. There's no injury problems to deal with -- being from a warm-weather site, they get *all* the breaks -- but since they are Euros and gutless and have the world's worst MVP ever in Kobe The Unpalatable, no one in their right mind can imagine them coming up with a big win against a hostile crowd. (A crowd that's so hostile, they've got thousands of dollars to spend on basketball tickets. Dammit, why are obscenely rich people so angry?) I picked them to win this series in five, and even I want them to lose at this point, even though it's going to make me do something horrible as a matter of my wager with The Truth.

Of course, this being the NBA, we have the counter to the Lakers Can't Win Argument... mainly that the Vast Right Ratings Conspiracy will use their wiliest, most dastardly, most nefarious referees this side of Dangerous Danny Davis (yes, that geek reference is both check and mate) to make sure that the Lake Show forces a Game Seven on the world.

And well... all I can say is... Jesus Shuttleworth with a Rambis, can you all just please get over yourselves?

As a Sixers fan, I knew that both franchises and media hordes were going to make everything but the ball regrettable in the Finals; that's increasingly true of all championships in every sport, but especially one that rolls out over as long a time period as the NBA's brouhaha. You've got Coke vs. Pepsi here, Yankees vs. Red Sox, Patriots vs. Cowboys -- in other words, the most regrettable fan bases and teams, with the most time and space to blather. (And no, this is not a posthumous fever dream for Spurs-Pistons. Yet.)

But y'all have well and truly outdone yourselves.

Imagine, just for a moment, that we can focus on the game. If you're a Laker fan, you're hoping that Bryant can finally get untracked, as James did before him in the Cavs series; good defense can stop a great offensive player from exploding, but he'll eventually figure out a plan of attack and adapt in a way that the defense can't correct. If Perkins is hobbled, Gasol has a chance to be more effective on both ends. Phil Jackson has won some games and rings in his life; maybe he'll finally try the novel approach of pressuring the Celtics' ballhandlers, the way that the Sixers, of all people, crushed the C's on their home floor in March, back when everyone thought they were invincible.

If you're a Celtics fan, you've got the same thoughts about Kevin Garnett that Laker Fan has about Bryant. You also have two chances at home to get one game, and to date, a far more effective bench. The smart money is with you. You might have been considered the underdog coming into this series, but you've been the better team for most of the 240 minutes played so far. You're up 3-2 for a reason. You're good, especially on defense, and even more so because Paul Pierce has been the best player on the floor in four out of five games.

That, really, is All You Need To Know. The rest of it is just noise, and despite all of the poor mouthing and my most fervent prayer, one of you has to win tonight. It might even happen without a Conspiracy.

So, game on. And from the other NBA fans out there, noting that the series has fair to middling ratings despite being the Biggest Thing In The History Of The Association / Universe? Um, OK. Whatever you little dears need to get you excited...

Gotta go to... somewhere else

Currently running on this site... ads for Modell's Sporting Goods, who would like you to know that they are the official sporting goods supplier of the Boston Celtics.

Which makes me feel a lot better about my frequent shopper card for Dick's, which is where I bought my poker table, chips, golf balls, golf umbrella, club for my kid to go with me to the range, and, well, everything else that I could possibly buy in sporting goods for the theoretical rest of my life...

Epic Drop: Top 11 Signs That NBA Fans Are Becoming Cynical

Frankly, the Ad Age survey struck me as kind of sad... but also inevitable. Given the political climate in this country, where 3 out of 4 people disapprove of the President, 3 out of 5 oppose the war, and over half of the people in New York City think 9/11 was either aided or abetted by US authorities... well, why would you think the NBA is on the up and up? Or, well, anything?

My Winning Fantasy

Since it's mid-June, and fantasy sports leagues start earlier every year (it's getting as bad as retailers with Christmas and other holidays -- watch your circulars for back to school, which will probably happen right after the Fourth of July), league sign-ups are starting now. I'm no different, and this year, I'm starting my own league.

Which leads me to following strong annoyance point... if we're going to the trouble of drafting defenses, why don't we care whether they win or lose the game?

In the Yahoo pre-sets, which is the dominant format, you can adjust for points for blocked kicks. Safetys. Get points for a botched running play by the QB where he's tackled, or runs out of bounds, for a one yard loss that's called a sack. But whether or not the defense manages the game to do what football teams are constructed to do -- win? Nope. Not at all.

(A similar grievance happens with quarterbacks who rack up 300 yards and 2 touchdowns in garbage time against scrubs, after their own backbreaking turnovers caused the game to be long out of reach. I call this the Aaron Brooks Effect, after the worst real-life and best geek-life QB in roto sports history. Brooks was on the champion roster in my total redraft league for three or four years straight, because the man was born to deliver points that meant nothing in reality, but everything to us. You could, if you had the balls, spend nothing at QB and load up on the other positions, and routinely fight the guy with Peyton Manning to a draw on touchdown passes to Joe Horn that changed the final score from 28-10 to 28-17. In his honor, I will now back this column up for ten yards under no real pressure, and throw my point backwards like a special needs child that's not getting milk before nap time. There's a good long pointless parenthetical digression. Brooksie would be proud.)

Anyhow, my fellow nerdlings, how many times has this happened to you? You select a defense on a good team. They contain the opposition and build up a lead -- maybe even with sacks and a turnover or two. Their offense then puts the game out of reach. And then, whether through an obvious letdown, a fluke play, or the game management mode that kicks in for every team once the magic "well, we can't get a shutout" play happens... and by the final gun, you are looking at 14 to 21 meaningless points against prevent, including ones where the offense has totally screwed you with a red zone turnover, or auto points from point after touchdowns on defense or special teams. It's the worst way to lose.

Meanwhile, the guy over in the corner who picked up the freaking Bengals has outpointed you, because while they are a terrible, terrible defense, they score more because they gamble constantly. So they've given up more points and lost, but had a pick and lateral play that got them in the end zone. In the immortal words of Derrick Coleman, whoop de damn do.

Now, if we're able to give the defense some points -- not a ton, mind you, just say, five to cover for the letdown touchdowns that happen in the 14 to 20 points range -- well, I don't see what that hurts. Maybe it makes the defenses a little more important in drafting, or adds an amount of extra (but fairly cool) complexity in the waiver wire strategy of adding and dropping defenses by match-up. Maybe, and this is the best thing of all, it makes all of us nerdlings not stick out like sci-fi conventioneers in Wookie costumes at the sports bar, since we'll be cheering and groaning over the outcome of the game. That'd be nice.

So have a heart, Yahoo Honks. Give us defensive wins as a point option, and do it in time for this year's leagues, so that I don't have to keep it by hand. You'll strike a small blow for making fantasy football more closely resemble what it really is -- gambling on the outcome of NFL games. (Shhh....)