NBA: The end of an odor

Secretly, in the deepest corner of his soul, Mike Dunleavy is happy today.

Yeah, that's no misprint.

For a basketball lifer and gym rat who certainly knows how to bring out the best in an NBA team (in '91 with the Lakers and last year with his Blazers, before the fourth-quarter choke at the Staples Center), the extent to which his 2001 Portland team drowned in egos, whining and gutlessness must have been overwhelming and then some for Dunleavy.

After seeing the fine young man he raised--Mike Jr.--emerge as the hero of the NCAA national championship game on April 2, Dunleavy can take pride in the fact that he knows how to be an authentic parent, even when being a surrogate babysitter/psychologist for NBA prima donnas doesn't bring success.

Dunleavy can now spend more time with his family, not have to return to the Blazers, and ditch a whole league whose problems all became embodied in the Portland team this past year. If you want to know what is wrong with the NBA and with pro sports in general, it's the Trail Blazers. The complaining over playing time. The lack of respect for the coach, even an accomplished coach. The whining at the refs. The lack of togetherness. The lack of mental toughness. And all this while making way more money than what they're worth, and even more money than what their playoff performance merited this season.

It's incredibly important to emphasize the best of sports whenever it emerges, to focus on the beauty and goodness amidst a backdrop of mediocrity and wretched excess. Yet, in order to re-emphasize how great sports can be on occasion, the disgusting elements of the games people play--and which fans pay significant money to watch--must also be brought to the fore, reminding us of the negativity and nothingness that great sports events and remarkable sports figures manage to overcome.

In the Trail Blazers, a team with the highest payroll in the NBA and the most combined years of experience in the league, managed to become the only team in the ultra-competitive Western Conference to get swept in the first round of the NBA Playoffs. The undermanned Phoenix Suns won in Sacramento. The Dallas Mavericks shelved their immature play and responded with a clutch win over Utah. Even the Minnesota Timberwolves, led by a no-name hero named Reggie Slater--what if guys like him were on the Portland roster?--managed to win a game against the mighty 1 seed, the San Antonio Spurs.

But Portland? The Blazers went gently into that good night, losing by double-digits in all three of their games against a team--the Lakers--whom they played dead even in last year's playoffs and this year's regular season series.

Quitters.

Whiners.

Selfish, overpaid brats.

These aren't the rantings of an average fan on Portland's sports talk radio airwaves today. These aren't the ventings of me as a fan of basketball and of sports played well.

First and foremost, those three labels are merely cold statements of fact.

Out of my sight, you abominations in Portland!

Think about it: Mike Dunleavy must be, should be, overjoyed to be through with this bunch of losers, losers in the classic sense of the term. I'm sure a nice college program--though one not in the ACC--would be glad to acquire Dunleavy's services. He should be glad, maybe after a year to recover from his case of Trail Blazer contamination, to coach the college game to youngsters without "veteran playoff experience," but who already know a lot more about how to live and get along with others.

One can only hope that Dunleavy, the NBA and our whole sporting culture will be able to learn from the disgrace that is and was the 2001 Portland Trail Blazers. Thankfully, they're gone.

The stench of death in Portland is overwhelming right now. Hopefully, that smell will give way to future seasons at the Rose Garden filled with a sweeter aroma of teamwork and harmony--and few, if any, of this year's selfish destroyers of sport.