Dallas Mavericks, World Champions.

The media will try and make you forget about this championship. They’ll make you wonder what lebron is doing next and they’ll debate his postgame press conference in an attempt to save any spec of grace the guy has. Afterall, he is the face of the networks in a NBA perspective. Of course he is, why should they talk about Dirk? Hes foreign and he actually had to work for 13 years before a title………BOOOORING! Lebron was the annointed “King” in his first year of the NBA. Why? Because he dunks hard? He’s a freak, I'll give you that. But the focus is on the wrong King. ESPN and the major media will want you to forget all of this. But we’re mavs fans, and we wont forget.

Anything before 2003 is important, but I wont get into it. You all know that we were the laughing stock of ALL professional sports in the 90’s. I don’t have to get into the 11 and 14 win seasons. No need to talk about the Dennis Rodman experiment. 2001 was great in that we beat the Jazz and there was a Calvin Booth sighting, but the spurs instantly smashed that little dream in the next round.



The magic/terror started in 2003 (in my opinion). Thats when my passion for the Mavericks got to an unhealthy level. This is when i realized I could no longer watch the mavs in a public setting where the "beast" comes out. Im an easy going guy until some spurs fan opens his mouth. Then rage comes out to play. It was in this year that Dallas met San Antonio in the Western Conferance Finals. I never really cared one way or the other about the spurs, and I actually like David Robinson. But after this series, I HATED them. With a passion. I watched as Dirk and his buddy Steve Nash worked the spurs defense and took them by surprise. Michael Finley was at the party and streaky Van Excel kept us alive too. Then Dirk got hurt, and Steve Kerr and the spurs moved on to the finals. From this point on, it was Mavs or bust. Cowboys and Rangers were on the back burner.

Its June 20, 2006. My roomate and best friend Rio is on the couch shaking his head in disgust. Im laying on the floor watching Jason Terry miss the game tying 3 pointer in the nba finals. My head goes face down in the carpet, misty-eyed. Just 4 minutes later, a pair of Ferragomo sunglasses are smashed against my bedroom wall. We had blown a 2-0 lead in the NBA finals. We lost to a team with Antoine Walker. Miami Heat were world champs. Only the mavericks would do this. Only the mavs would be the first team to blow that lead. It was heartbreaking. But little did we know, it wasnt over.



2007 was a dagger no other NBA fan base has suffered outside of the 94 sonics. (lost to the 8 seed nuggets). But im sure ours was worse. Mavs lose to #8 seed Golden State in 6. The mavs had the leagues best record and league MVP. This meant smooth sailing through the playoffs right? Nope. Little did we know that Baron Davis would shoot 127% from the field.


2008, yada yada, CP3 alley opp x24, yada yada
2009, yada yada, Denver Thuggets, yada yada
2010, yada yada, George Hill, whos he? yada yada

Hold on......im watching the last 3 minutes of game 6 of this year's finals on NBA TV's playoff replay. Will i cry again? Its possible.

Damn it, i did.

Anyway....

Its not major news to mavs fans that we were picked to get bounced out in the first round of the 2011 playoffs to the Blazers. Actually a prominent NBA writer for Yahoo Sports, Adrian Wojonowski, picked Portland in 4, LA over Dallas in 5, OKC over Dallas in 5, and Miami in 6. Naturally, he lost his prominence. And coincidently enough, he just wrote an article about the mavs and congratulating our efforts. I scanned the article looking for the part where he eats crow. Of course, no crow insight. There’s Chris Webber, Mr Timeout himself, who said before game 6 that “The Mavericks are not a good defensive team, and have never been agood defensive team”. Webber’s just sad because we put up 84 points in one half against his Kings in the 2003 playoffs. Theres Colin Cowherd and Skip Bayless. These guys deserve to be in the same sentence because theyre just media blow-hards that are always looking to shock an audience. Bayless to this second hasn’t given the mavs credit and we don’t need him to. Dallas kicked him out of town in the 90’s for starting the “Troy Aikman is gay” rumors. Bayless has an agenda and Cowherd only picks the big city/bigmarket teams. He represents all that is wrong with ESPN. Last but not least, the ABC crew of Mike Breen, Jeff Van Gundy, and Marc Jackson were bad (understatement of the year). These guys were infatuated with every opposing player on every opponents roster. Van Gundy wanted to marry Jeff Harden, Marc Jackson wanted to have D Wade’s baby, and I'm pretty sure that Breen had a Heat jersey on under his suit.. Ive never witnessed such bias in-game announcing in my life outside of Sean Elliot (Spurs play-by-play guy).. Im still not sure how these guys have a job. “BANG”. I've come to realize that analyst know nothing. The truth is that the Mavs will not get as much credit as expected. We’re all learning together how it feels to be the champs in this age of TMZ and manufactured drama. Ive already read the headlines 2 days after our title, "Can the Mavs repeat”, “Did the window open and close in the same year”, “The Heat are the favorites to win in 2012”. And the ole, "did the Mavericks win it, or did the Heat lose it"?. Interesting how the media loves the Cowboys but it treats the Mavs like some small market, Cinderella franchise. Although both share the same city. I just don’t get it.

Charles Barkley is THE only media personality that believed in Dallas and saw our strengths as a team. He was the only analyst that wasn’t wearing Lebron glasses and knew that with our style of basketball and a team full of hungry vets, we could take down the 3 headed circus side show. Barkley called our win over the Lakers too. Get the guy a parade float.



But as fans, we have to block out all the negative publicity. Focus on what just happened. The Dallas Mavericks won it all, they’re WORLD CHAMPIONS. It happened so quick, so stressful, so magical, and so perfect. It couldn’t have happened a better way. Blowing it in Portland and thinking the same ole mavs were back, then winning that series. Sweeping the Lakers, how huge was that? (again, the media said that the Lakers werent "themselves". Theres no way the Mavs could actually beat their precious Lakers right?). The comeback over OKC in game 4. The Dirk-walk-off at the WCF ceremony. Then theres the comebacks vs Miami and ultimately the win on THEIR home floor in game 6. We returned the favor and then some. We pimp-slapped EVERY hater there ever was.

We’ll never forget this team and the way in which we accomplished this. Even if we reach the finals again next year and win, it wont be as gratifying as this one……ever. What we just witnessed was basketball at its finest. Not just basketball, but all of sport. It was perfect, seamless teamwork. It was guts and heart and eventually it paid off for the glory. The media can try and rain on our parade, but the forecast says sunny with 100% chance of awesome.

The mavericks did it. They finally did it. We can all sleep easy.