The Los Angeles Lakers will look to defend their title tonight in Game 1 at Staples Center against the Boston Celtics.
Yawn.
The NBA Finals have been played every year since 1947. Including this year, that leaves a total of 64 championships, of which the Lakers and Celtics will have combined to win 33. That translates to more than 51 percent! Not only that, but the Lakers and Celtics now have 52 total title appearances and 12 against one another.
The rivalry between these two teams has certainly provided the sports world with plenty of memorable moments though. Previous Celtics/Lakers matchups included many great Hall of Famers. Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Jerry West, and Bill Russell are a few of them. Now, in the third generation of the rivalry between these two teams, the series boasts an even wider group of potential Hall of Famers in Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol, Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, Ray Allen, Rajon Rondo, and Rasheed Wallace. Not to mention two future Hall of Fame coaches in Doc Rivers and Phil Jackson. Jackson himself has already won a record 10 NBA Championships with Chicago and L.A.
The Lakers are making their third consecutive trip to the NBA Finals. In 2008, they lost in six games to none other than the Celtics. Boston won their 17th title that year with the same starting lineup that will begin tonight’s series. Last year, however, Los Angeles managed to take down the surging Orlando Magic in five games to collect their 15th championship. So, in the last 3 years, Orlando had been the only team not named Boston or L.A. that ended up in the NBA Finals.
How boring can the NBA be? Is this all they have to offer?
Well, in terms of marketing and news, the Lakers/Celtics rivalry is the best the NBA has to offer. It is the only true rivalry that can be dispersed to a wide viewing audience and it includes two major television markets. To the fans outside of Boston and Los Angeles, on the other hand, this is just another series that includes the two franchises that everyone hates the most. Is there really no parity in the NBA that would allow for other teams to make it to The Finals?
12 of the 16 teams in the playoffs this year were also in the playoffs last year. The top four teams in the Eastern Conference, Cleveland, Orlando, Boston, and Atlanta, were the only teams remaining after the first round. In the Western Conference, no team has even come close the Lakers over the last three years. Furthermore, since their establishment in 1948, the Lakers have only missed the playoffs a total of five times! Kobe Bryant alone has been in the league for only 14 seasons and is already headed to his 7th NBA Finals. Sure, that proves that Kobe is one of, if not the best players in the NBA, but this is just getting old!
Understanding the history and magnitude of this rivalry is very important to the NBA in terms of coverage. It is the only Finals series that can be marketed as two historic teams battling it out for another championship, rather than just focusing on specific individuals. At the beginning of the playoffs this year, everyone was predicting Lakers/Cavaliers in the NBA Finals, but all that was talked about was Kobe vs. LeBron. Then, when the Celtics started making a run and upset the Cavs, the focus switched to a possible Lakers/Celtics matchup yet again.
Nobody wanted the other two teams, Orlando and Phoenix, making it to the Finals. That’s because on a worldwide scale, ratings would drop because not too many people would care to watch the Magic square off against the Suns. No matter how many MVP’s Steve Nash has won or how good Dwight Howard is in the paint, people just wouldn’t watch that series. Unfortunately, it’s all about ratings, and those two teams are from too small of markets. To the NBA, from a marketing standpoint, the Lakers and Celtics series is always above all. They make that very clear.
True, the Lakers and Celtics are two of the most storied franchises in all of sports. Their rivalry is comparable to the Yankees and Red Sox of baseball, and the Steelers and Cowboys of football. But what’s different about football and baseball is the variety of other teams that have won championships in their respective sports. Obviously, neither the Lakers nor the Celtics compare to the Yankees, who have won 28 World Championships, but baseball has been around for more than 100 years!
There is no doubt that the NBA Finals series between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Boston Celtics will be viewed all over the world. Tickets will be sold, stories will be written, and history will be made. Of course, that would be no different from any other year, no matter what teams made it to the championship round. It’s just unfortunate that the fans have to be subjected to the same teams and storylines over and over again.
With that said, Lakers in 6.
