Open Letter to the 2004-05 Boston Celtics

Dear 2004-05 Boston Celtics,

I hate you. OK, not in the vicious, angry, vengeful sense. Not in the way the Serbs hate the Croats, or Darth Vader hates the Rebel Alliance, or human beings hate the Oakland Raiders. More like in the frustrated pre-schooler way. Which is to say I hate you, I hate you, I hate you.

I hate you because you’ve done the one thing I can never forgive. You’ve made me not care about you. Last week when you finally rolled over and died against Indiana, I was in Florida. I was with a group on a Disney World bus when we got word that you lost Game 7 (at home!) 97-70, and all we could do was laugh.

This is a big deal for me; I never thought I’d live to see the day that I’d be laughing at the tragic end of a Celtics season. In June of 1985 I was also on vacation, driving across the country, and the whole trip revolved around that season’s Celtics-Lakers Finals. It was a once-in-a-lifetime trip, but I basically ruined my sister’s day at the Redwood Forest (for those of you reading this while waiting for “Revenge of the Sith” tickets, picture the Moon of Endor) because I had to hurry back to the hotel to catch Game 2. But now you guys have done the impossible. You’ve taken the team I used to obsess over and made them irrelevant to me. Now you’re just punch line, the last chuckle after a long day of fighting crowds to see “Mickey’s PhilharMagic.”

Maybe I’m not being loyal. I don’t care. When I was a kid, I could love any team that had “Boston” (or “New England”) on their jerseys. Every team in the city (or Foxboro) could do no wrong in my eyes. It was a running joke among my friends. I’d refuse to criticize any Boston athlete, ever. Even when the Red Sox blew a 14-game lead in ’78 and a kid followed me home from school laughing at me and calling them choke artists, I never wavered. Hell, I never even ripped Don Zimmer, a man who was crying out to be made fun of.

Well I’m not 14 anymore. You grow up and you don’t have the time or the inclination to fall in love with every team in town. You pick and choose. Plus, I have a lot better things I can be doing with my free time than being loyal to a whiney, dour, underachieving ball club. If I have a choice between watching “Lost” or watching Antoine Walker clanging bad jump shots, I’ll take the option that has Evangeline Lilly running through the jungle soaking wet in High Def every time.

The “Banner 17” Project is now entering it’s 18th year, and I have to admit for most of that time, I’ve been rooting for the uniform, not the guys who are in it. Because it still reminds me of the glory years. But wearing the same unis as Bird, McHale and Parish doesn’t make you a Celtic. Dan Akroyd dressed like Bill Murray in “Caddyshack II,” but that didn’t make him Carl Spackler.

I admit it’s sad to still be reliving the 80’s after all these years. Being a Celtics fan the last 18 years has been like being a Burt Reynolds fan. You keep waiting for another “Deliverance” or “The Longest Yard.” Sometimes there’s hope, like with “Boogie Nights“ or “Mystery, Alaska.” But mostly you just get another car chase movie with Dom Deluise.

This year you offered us a lot of hope. There was a solid group of veterans. There was a promising crop of rookies. Antoine’s return was a shock, but be looked like the player we always thought he could be, tough, smart and unselfish. Once again though, when it looked like the team was turning the corner, there was nothing there. Like the line for Space Mountain, around the corner was just another corner, followed by more line. When the pressure was on in the playoffs, you went back to the old ways that always guaranteed failure in the past. You took bad shots. You stopped passing. You got baited into stupid fouls and then bitched about them, which led to more fouls.

Walker and Paul Pierce have the most ’splainin to do. Walker for forgetting that most of us aren’t interested in watching a bratty millionaire throw an old man to the ground (unless it’s Don Zimmer). Pierce for his general lack of clutch play and for that bizarre display at the end of Game 6 that was worthy of an Oscar, if not a Zoloft prescription.

There’s no question that Pierce is the one true star on this team. He is also it’s leader, which is unfortunate. The Patriots coaches coined a term to refer to Lawyer Milloy, they called him a “negative leader.” Which is one of the reasons they released him; his bitching hurts the team. I’m sort of an authority on the subject, since I myself have been a “negative leader” all my life. But unlike Pierce, no one’s shelling out $75 to watch me sit at my desk and goof off. And you can imagine how happy the Celt’s owners are at the thought of Pierce pulling Delonte West aside and saying, “Kid, let me show you some of the angry faces I like to make at the coach when he takes me out of the game…”

I hate to single out these guys, because so many of you covered yourselves in ignominy. Who knew Raef LaFrentz had the power to turn himself invisible? But special mention should go to Mark Blount, who after cashing in with a guaranteed contract that will pay him as much as Tom Brady (yikes), spent the entire season pulling the NBA equivalent of sitting at his desk and throwing pencils into the ceiling.

Last week, Danny Ainge said he’s working on changing the your team’s image and establishing a code of conduct. That’ll be interesting, since Danny himself was considered the biggest whiner in the league in his playing days. When I went across the country, anyone who found out I was a Celtics fan asked me how I could root for a crybaby like him.

I hope it works. I’d like to like you again. But it’s like the time LBJ asked one of his aides why more people don’t like him. The aide told him, “Mr. President, you’re not very likeable.”

Sincerely,
Jerry Thornton