Coach's Corner

So, I'm leaning on some sort of barricade in downtown Austin, trying to decipher the sporting event unfolding over and over and over again in front of me. It's a ghastly, hot, muggy, smoky night, in a hideously hot, muggy, and smoky "spring," at the start of a summer which never really ended. My girlfriend, who rarely wants to go out and has never asked to go anywhere near Sixth Street, has already been here for hours. Affecting the air of a longtime European cycling enthusiast, she's discoursing on her sightings of "Greg" and "Miguel." Heretofore unheard-of foreign words like peleton spice up many sentences. Like many citizens, I became caught up in the sea of colorful spandex and well-chiseled calves which invaded the suffocating city. For a night and a day, I became a biking, or cycling, or riding, or whatever they call it, aficionado. We were watching something called a Criterium. It's a difficult name to remember, Criterium, not exactly an intuitive description of this thing - guys racing fast around city streets - that's going on. Anyway, I'm trying to figure out what's going on in front of me. Kelly doesn't know much more than I do, so our conversations went something like this: Question: "What...?" "I don't know." Question: "How...?" "Uh, I don't know." Question: "Where...?" "Why don't you get us a beer?" Finally, apparently tiring of this uninspired discourse, a big fellow leaning on a bike joined in.

On this weekend, four out of seven people on the street claim to be personal riding buds with Lance Armstrong. Our new friend was no exception. He did seem to know the answers to all my questions. Impressively, he claimed to know exactly where Frankie and Lance and other guys were each time they whizzed by. Given the speed and mass of the colorful pack, this seemed impossible. "Which one's Lance?" I asked 46 times. "There he is right there, next to Frankie." "Oh yeah, I see," seeing nothing. Once I heard a metallic click as the peleton flew past. Our new friend leaned over and whispered conspiratorially, "Somebody missed a gear." With my arms folded, in what I hoped to be a position implying wisdom, I nodded knowingly.

I'm not familiar with biking clichés, but I'll bet European journalists are no better than their American counterparts in overusing clichés. (It's difficult to avoid the use of clichés, because human beings are, more or less, consistent folk. I'm certain there were nine cave people out of 10 who were sure that their neighbor's cave was dryer and warmer than their own. Indeed, the grass always is greener... And when one of these cavefolk was cornered by a saber-toothed tiger, I'm sure he understood the reality of "there's nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.")

Clichés are particularly hard to avoid in sports, because identical situations keep repeating themselves. It's do or die for a team down 3-0 because their backs are against the wall, there are no more tomorrows, and taking them one game at a time is the only way for a team to survive.

For an NBA team, the playoffs will expose, to even the most casual fan, a team's flaws. Each year, teams with impressive win totals in the regular season are ushered unceremoniously toward summer vacation. In a seven-game series, there is indeed nowhere to hide. A nice-looking record on the sports page can be quite bogus. There is such a wealth of awful teams in the league - teams like Dallas, who have virtually no chance of winning most nights - that an organized team with a little talent should win 30 games just by walking on the court. From there, they just have to scratch out a couple of extra wins a week to get to the not really so impressive 50-win mark.

Atlantic Conference winner Miami is exposed as a pretender with average talent, a better football team than basketball team, by their mirror image, the number seven-seeded Knicks. The flashy Sonics, a 60-win-per-year team, often struggle in the playoffs. The lowly Timberwolves, and then the taller, stronger Lakers, exposed luridly the soft underbelly of Seattle: no rebounding, no toughness, and thus, too much reliance on outside shooting and trick defenses. The Baker for Kemp trade, which looked so good in January, didn't look so hot in May. A youthful, talented, athletic L.A. bared Seattle as a badly aging, one-dimensional team. Conversely, the Lakers, whose weakness is youth and a lack of on-court leadership, were undressed by Utah, a band of determined, icy professionals. At this point, the Laker parts are clearly greater than the whole. San Antonio won 56 games in the regular season. That's impressive, but deceptive. A grinding series against the Jazz glaringly showcased the Spurs' astonishing lack of depth.

The three teams still playing, Indiana, Chicago, and Utah, don't need anywhere to hide. They're solid, deep, veteran squads with an abundance of on-court leadership. Here the differences are more subtle. Chicago will beat Indiana, because the Bulls can take away an opponent's strengths. Utah will beat Chicago, because they have home court, better quality depth, and two superstars who won't get another chance. Two superstars for whom, if you will excuse the cliché, there is no tomorrow.

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