Interesting Times

Thrilling Lakers comeback, and Chicago beats the odds to win the lottery. I feel torn about these developments. My fundamental perspective as a fan is that of the hater who likes to see the mighty brought low. I bonded with Tim Duncan, Manu Ginobili, and Tony Parker when they crushed the Shaq-Kobe juggernaut in 2003. By 2008, San Antonio has arguably become the evil empire. But despite enormous success since 1999, San Antonio still doesn't really rank up their as an "elect" franchise like L.A. and it rankles to see a team become so good thanks to such a one-sided trade.

In the short-run perspective, in other words, the Spurs are the juggernaut possibly unseated by an upstart Laker franchise. But taking the longer view, the Lakers are still the juggernaut. Chicago winning the lottery, meanwhile, just reeks of rigging. Sure, why not send the number one draft pick to Chicago, all we need to do is tweak the raffle! Now of course last offseason it seemed like the Bulls were going to be good and then, inexplicably, all of their young players regressed instead of progressing. Consequently, the franchise is basically impossible to project.