A Celtic cry

The Celtics are slumping. And I'm still playing and re-playing the same old tapes: game 2 and 4 of 1984 Finals and game 5 of the 1987 Eastern Finals. Heck, "Someone" dared to say that the Celts once "played like sissies": and that was a Team of champions... Now we are building excuses for our Celts. Injuries, tough schedule, bad referees, an incoherent coach, everything is good to heal our fans conscience. The truth is that I can't smell the scent of the Pride anymore. Maybe that's because the Garden "tumbled down" (I rather prefer to imagine it passed this way), or the original parquet was removed from the Fleet Center, or Larry Legend went back to his Indiana to collect a Red Auerbach Trophy... I don't know. I'm just an Italian fan who cannot avoid to follow his team buying tapes: but when I see'em playing like sissies I ask to myself if wouldn't it be better for me to spare some bucks for the next season. Maybe a lottery pick... an Auerbach-esque trade. Ok, ok, Fabio, wake up to reality. Those old beautiful tapes are more dangerous than drug, and the The Big Three addiction is not a disease curable with medical treatment. I really can't unriddle this one, but a team with so much talent should win at least half of the games without any problem. Perhaps Ron Mercer was a one-dimensional player, but when PP played 3 and Toine played 4 the Celtics scored from outside and from the paint, and this has always been the recipe for winning in basketball. And with Walker going back and forth from the key to the rim, the big men could play two on two and have easier looks to the basket (like they used to do sometimes during the strike shortened season). Perhaps, perhaps.... we sometime criticize Pitino's choices and decisions: are we so sure we could do better trading places with Rick the Slick? I mean, I've been playing basketball here in Italy since 1975 (I was eleven), and one thing I learned is that the greatest team, with the smartest coach, with the best organization still can lose if the chemistry is not adequate. Auerbach chose his men between the players who didn't bother about statistics or personal accomplishments, but who felt their fulfilling in the purest definition of the Celtics Pride: winning as a team. I'm not sure that our players today are eager for sacrifice: the Iversons, the Sprewells, the Webbers have underlined that this is the future of the league. But maybe Pierce, Walker, Battie and the others have been intoxicated by the old smell of the recently dismissed parquet, and that they can still see the difference between Robert Parish and Alonzo Mourning, between John Havlicek and John Starks. Maybe, maybe, maybe....