If There Is A God He'll Give Me A Token Playoff Appearance

The last time the Golden State Warriors made the playoffs, or finished above .500 for that matter, I was 7 years old. My basketball fandom at the time involved asking my dad if Michael Jordan was chocolate and Larry Bird was vanilla while we watched the NBA on NBC (complete with Marv Albert's sweet beautiful voice and that fantastic intro music they used to play). (true story.)


i miss nba on nbc

I started truly appreciating the Warriors right around the time Latrell Sprewell decided it'd be a good idea to choke P.J. Carlesimo. The year before the incident I went to my first Warriors FanFest (I think they actually called it an "Open House" but I can't really remember and I don't think they really do it anymore) where a certain accident (I was supposed to play with the players on the court in one of those "HEY WE GONNA PLAY WITH THE KIDS" type games, but apparently they ran out of time for it) which resulted in a Latrell Sprewell autograph for me and tickets to my first Warriors game. (Against the Nuggets. We sat in the top row, and they lost. It was fantastic.)

Since then, I've been treated to, well, the Warriors. We drafted Todd Fuller ahead of Kobe Bryant. I was made to believe Jim Jackson was a superstar. Jason Caffey started for us. I've rooted for Cliff Rozier. For the latter half of the 90's Donyell Marshall was like our best player. We traded Antawn Jamison for Vince Carter on draft day only to see Vince Carter go light the league on fire. We traded Chris Webber for Penny Hardaway on draft day, ruining forever my chance at calling Lil Penny my own. To make a long story short, this has been a miserable franchise.


can't even find a proper todd fuller picture through image search. curse you.

Yet, here we are. Tonight, that could all end. We could finish above .500 with just a win over the lowly Portland Trailblazers. We could play a meaningful game in May. Jason Richardson deserves this. The fans of the Golden State Warriors deserve this. Hell, even Adonal Foyle deserves this.

Tonight is the single most important game in this franchise's last 12 years. In all of my meaningful years as a basketball fan, tonight, against the Trailblazers, means more than any of the rest of them. I'm about as nervous/excited/wtf? as you can be for a team that's trying to secure a meaningless 8th seed. I only wish I could watch this live. Curse you, Boston.

Go Warriors.


(And if that's not enough, the A's are about to face off against the hated Angels and the Sharks have Game 4 of their first round series with the Predators tonight. This very well may be the most loaded day of sports all year for me. Whoo doggy.)