Why do we love basketball? There’s plenty of sports out there, why this one? What makes this game so special?
To everything that is good in life there has to be a little bad. You can call it the yen and the yang or whatever you like. Whatever its name, the bad is the balance of the good.
In basketball, that’s especially true. For every 60 win team, there are two or three teams that are lucky if they can win a third of that total.
It’s the risk all players, coaches and in the end, teams face. We’re coming up on the new season, and the risk is approaching. There will no doubt be teams that succeed beyond the hype and expectations, but the opposite of that awaits the unlucky and unprepared.
This new season will be a career year for several NBA players, but it will be just the opposite for so many as well. The brutal path of a losing season lies ahead for 14 unfortunate teams.
For all the possibility of glory, there’s even more possibility for failure. Only a select few players end an NBA season being truly satisfied. It’s the way it should be.
When a player misses a game winning shot, sometimes, that’s how it has to be. If every buzzer beater that’s attempted goes in then the act itself loses all meaning.
The most precious thing about winning a championship isn’t born out of success, but out of the failures of seasons past. It’s why Michael cried when got his first ring and why KG tried to pretend the tears weren’t there when his moment came.
What made Kobe Bryant’s MVP win this year a little more special than most wasn’t because he had a superior season. No, it was because he’d failed to win the award so many other times. Ultimately, he did succeed. It’s a great story.
There is a flip side to the coin of achieving success out of failure, and that’s simply achieving failure. The picture on this page shows a team fully aware of that concept.
So many NBA cities have either gone totally without a championship or it’s been so long since they had one that the memory and feeling is gone.
The pain of fans losing is sadly what makes sports so interesting. If everyone was a winner there would be no point to it all. If one is to win, someone else has to lose.
It may be horrible to witness, but it has to happen. Your heart has to be broken. You have to be disappointed. Would you want it any other way?
No matter how awesome it may feel to see the team or player we love succeed, it’s equally important to see them fail. For if they don’t first fail, the success just isn’t as sweet.
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