The 1974-1975 Golden State Warriors were surprise winners of the NBA crown.
However, only in the finals against the favored Washington Bullets were they sans home advantage.
Additionally, they got to play games 2 and 3 at home which especially after they won game 1 on the road gave them a huge advantage not in correlation for a team with the inferior regular season record.
Yet that should take little, if anything, away from their incredible season which was culminated with a 4 game sweep of the K.C. Jones coached Bullets in the finals.
The fact that a different schedule helped them is a mere footnote to the Rick Barry then Keith Wilkes, deep title team story written that glorious 1974-1975 season, under coach Al Attles.
The great K.C. Jones, pictured above, may have lost in that 1975 NBA final, but he was part of 12 NBA champions, 8 as a player (all in consecutive years 1959-1966), 2 as a head coach (1984 and 1986) and 2 as an assistant coach (1972 and 1981). All but the 1972 title were with the Boston Celtics.
The 1972 title was with the Los Angeles Lakers, who set a then NBA record going (69-13) and still hold the major sports league record of 33 consecutive victories.
The defending NBA champion Golden State Warriors go to the All-Star break with a sensational (48-4) record.
That is the best record in NBA history at this point in the season/the All-Star break.
They have achieved this record under two coaches, Luke Walton and Steve Kerr.
Kerr is the coach. He guided them to the title last season and played on 5 NBA title teams as a player.
Actor Timothy Hutton consulted Coach Kerr regarding his coaching for his role as a basketball coach on the fine show “American Crime” which airs Wednesday nights on ABC.
Luke Walton, pictured above, guided the Warriors for most of the first half of the season.
Tom Brady’s New England Patriots have won 4 Super Bowl titles but never in a game telecast with CBS’ Jim Nantz as the announcer.
Conversely, the Pats have been eliminated in “Nantz games” 7 times.
Meanwhile Peyton Manning’s teams have won 2 Super Bowls, one with the Indianapolis Colts in 2006 and the one 4 days ago with the Denver Broncos.
Also Manning’s teams have been eliminated in “Nantz games,” only 3 times.
I did know all this and saw it coming. Oh well!
Slightly paraphrasing what was said on “The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show,” here’s someone I respect who gets so little publicity.
He is the great, retired NHL goaltender, Martin Brodeur, who just had his number retired by the New Jersey Devils.
All one has to do is look into the rafters where Brodeur’s retired number now “resides” and notice the three Stanley Cup banners, that Martin “backstopped.”
He was one of the best to ever play the position. How little publicity he sought. How little he received.
This was a true great.
While the NHL got back to its regular schedule just two days after its All-Star Game, the NBA, which I just wish would go away, will wait four days.
Despite the greatness of Golden State and to show I still respect the game of basketball, Steph Curry is my choice as Athlete of the Year, only the playoffs matter and the sickening thought of LeBron James riding the weak Eastern Conference to a title looms.
Why didn’t he have the guts to play in the West?
Also how far “you know where” is ESPN regarding James, whom they have hyped, sometimes unfairly in a negative way, but for the most part in a ridiculous positive way, to put him third among all time NBA players.
James better than Wilt Chamberlain or Earvin “Magic” Johnson, are they kidding?!!
Why do I care so much? Also I “feared it” concerning Peyton Manning, who did next to nothing, but won a second title.
Now I truly fear it regarding James, who of course is a great player, but not anywhere near as great as he is perceived by a lazy, always looking for hype, media especially ESPN.
Cleveland is a three and a half to one favorite to win the East. Likely, not definitely Golden State and San Antonio will meet in what should be the final and really push each other. You know the rest.
Surely I will “start in” with James and the East many times before this NBA season is over, largely because so little in the regular season matters. Yet I do and must realize it is a business, and while titles are important and integrity/balance should be, money and opportunity remain dominant.
Perhaps Mr. Greeley above, would have changed his famous suggestion to “Go East, young, gifted, man.”
Alas history and perspective is not some ESPN poll. Thus James’ real greatness while substantial, is relatively tarnished by twice picking his team and staying in one of the most pathetic entities, within which one’s team could gain a finals berth.
The Colorado, specifically Denver area, won its 5th pro title with last Sunday’s Broncos victory vs the Carolina Panthers.
Both its first and fifth came vs teams in two different sports, with the nickname, Panthers.
The first Colorado title was achieved by the NHL Avalanche, vs the Florida Panthers in the 1996 NHL finals.
Now this Broncos title, vs the Carolina Panthers.
Off the top of my head, only two other cities/regions have won titles in a final in two different sports, against teams with the same nickname.
Chicago did so vs “Giants” teams, each from New York.
The White Sox beat the New York Giants in the 1917 World Series and then did not win another title for 88 years.
The NFL Chicago Bears are (4-2) vs the New York Giants in games for the NFL crown, winning in the first title game in 1933 and also in 1941, 1946 and 1963.
The city of Philadelphia beat teams with the nickname “Cardinals” for titles in two different sports. A great Philadelphia Athletics team beat the St. Louis Cardinals in the 1930 World Series before falling to the Pepper Martin led Cardinals a year later.
That denied the A’s a third straight title, something the franchise, still the Athletics ,did achieve 40 plus years later in Oakland. No other non Yankees team has ever accomplished that feat in baseball.
The Philadelphia Eagles also beat a “Cardinals” team for a title.
That was a reverse ,in a sense, of what happened in the baseball finals in consecutive years between Philadelphia and the Cardinals.
In 1948 the Eagles beat the Chicago Cardinals for the NFL crown after losing to them the year before.
Write in with any other examples.
Pepper Martin had 12 hits as the St. Louis Cardinals dethroned the two time champion Philadelphia Athletics in the 1931 World Series.
Oh the sloppy lack of editing and fact checking that goes on.
Three of what could be many examples will follow.
In John Feinstein’s book about the great NBA coach Arnold “Red” Auerbach, titled “Let Me Tell You A Story,” Mr. Feinstein supposedly a basketball expert states the Celtics’ 7th game win in the 1966 NBA finals was in overtime.
He should have known that it did not go into overtime, but failing that, why not check the facts?!!
On “Decades” a newer channel, Kerry Sayers stated that Vince Lombardi, the great NFL coach died in 1971. “Vat” you couldn’t do a bit of research/fact checking and get it correct. Coach Lombardi died in 1970.
Then I witnessed Elle Pai Hong saying, in referencing Don Meredith, that the famed cold title game in Green Bay which was played on the last day of 1967, took place in 1966.
That augurs well for Ms. Hong, as I heard Joe Buck in honoring his father Jack Buck, an announcer on the famed game in question, state the game was played in 1969.
The way things work with lower standards and shoddy, mistake filled reporting maybe Hong, as was/is the case with Joe Buck, will call World Series and Super Bowls in the future.
The famed Ice Bowl/1967 NFL Title game played not in 1966 (Ms. Hong) nor in 1969 (“Emperor” Joe Buck, though right now Jim Nantz’ power is through the roof) but on the last day of 1967.
Green Bay quarterback Bart Starr (# 15 above), a true great, scored the winning touchdown. Sadly he probably does not remember that. He was the MVP in the first two Super Bowls but did not attend the most recent one when the former MVP’s of the game were honored.
We all forget and certainly err but a record of truth and correct is important. Thus I perhaps, disproportionately cringe at the sloppy reporting cited above that believe me, is so prevalent today.
The recently played 50th Super Bowl in which the Denver Broncos defeated the Carolina Panthers, was the fourth match up of teams that both had lost in the divisional round of the NFL playoffs in the previous NFL season.
It marked the third time Denver quarterback Peyton Manning was involved in such a situation and the second time his team emerged as NFL champion in that scenario.
The situation, again a Super Bowl pitting two teams that had each lost in the divisional round/quarterfinals the season before, had involved the Panthers and a Peyton Manning team once before.
Then in the 2005 divisional round, on the same Sunday, the Pittsburgh Steelers handed Manning one of his 4 home divisional round losses when he was the Indianapolis Colts’ quarterback, followed by the Panthers winning in Chicago, vs the Bears.
In the 2006 season Supe, Manning was the Colts’ “QB” as they defeated the Bears in the Super Bowl.
In the 2012 divisional playoffs, the eventual champion Baltimore Ravens beat the Broncos and Manning in Denver while the Atlanta Falcons, favored by 2 and a fraction points, took the Seattle Seahawks by 2 points.
The next season Seattle whomped Manning and the Broncos in the Supe.
Last year, the Seattle Seahawks as with the Panthers and Broncos, involved in 2 of these scenarios, beat the Panthers in the divisional round. The Indy Colts beat Manning and the Broncos in Denver, in the same round.
Then the Broncos defeated the Panthers in the just completed Super Bowl.
The other instances in some of what was written above:
The other Supe clash between teams that had each lost in the NFL divisional round/quarterfinals the year before was 1989 and 1990.
In 1989, the “real” Cleveland Browns, who became the Baltimore Ravens, held off the Buffalo Bills in their divisional round game. The next day, Willie “Flipper” Anderson hauled in a Jim Everett overtime touchdown pass, to beat the New York Giants.
The next season (1990) the Giants survived, to beat the Bills in the Super Bowl.
The other Manning home divisional round loss, the other 3 all occurred in seasons cited above that preceded Super Bowl appearances, was when he could not produce on the last drive and they fell to the San Diego Chargers in 2007.
Knowing this “stuff” and the fare will get you aboard a New York City subway train.
I looked at a tape from May 6, 2004.
Some observations follow.
Least, the New York Mets beat the San Francisco Giants (2-1) in 11 innings. The game ended on a home run by now Hall of Famer, Mike Piazza.
Barry Bonds, who still is not in the Hall, an injustice not as terrible as Pete Rose being denied, but an injustice for sure, leaped for the ball but it was a home run.
That day Willie Mays turned 74 years old and it was the 50th anniversary of Sir Roger Bannister breaking the 4 minute mile.
Bannister did so on Willie’s birthday in 1954, Mays’ greatest and only world title season. Willie’s great catch and base running in game 1 of that year’s World Series followed.
Not aware of the time, I looked up and it was 5:06, a coincidence with 5/6 or May 6th
As I did, WFAN radio’s Mike Francesa correctly predicted a Denver outright victory as roughly 6 point underdogs in the recently completed Super Bowl.
Now Francesa, who claimed a (35-21), mark likely has it.
He did a good job forecasting this year and in remarking how CBS had so many promotions during the Supe that we/the viewers were denied replays.
Early on I could see the man behind the “shades,” Carolina coach Ron Rivera was out of it, running others than quarterback Cam Newton, on first down. He and offensive coordinator Mike Shula (the Shulas father Don and son Mike now have been a part of a total of three Supe losers who were favorites in the game) continued that horrible practice virtually the entire game.
Unlike another Rivera, New York Yankees pitcher Mariano and not heeding the loud, abrasive words of a character portrayed so well by actor, Alec Baldwin in the film “Glengarry Glen Ross” (ABC-always be closing), Ron Rivera and the Panthers, could not close an otherwise great season, with a title.
Of course, the great but over rated, reliever Rivera, failed on at least three occasions at different levels of the baseball tournament, in games in which his New York Yankees had a chance to clinch that “level.” Subsequently they lost all three games and in that “level” of the baseball tournament.
Unlike Mariano, Ron Rivera will not get many, if any chances, to rectify the “failure” to win it all. He certainly will not get 5 titles, 4 of which won by pitcher Rivera, came in the “closer” role.
Mariano Rivera played on 5 New York Yankees World Series winning teams.
ALEC BALDWIN GLENGARRY GLEN ROSS ALWAYS BE CLOSING FULL SPEECH
Click above to view a scene in which Baldwin’s skill as an actor makes me despise his character and all he represents.
Andy B Sports 