Thursday, December 2, 2010

And back again...

8 years ago, I was a sophomore in High School and I had this feeling.  Not quite eight years really.  It will be 8 years in March.  But it's close enough.  Eight years ago, this basketball season.  In many ways, eight years ago, tomorrow night.

8 years ago this past spring, the Ottawa Glandorf (my high school) boys basketball team lost two rounds before the championship round.  LeBron James was the reason.

This past spring, the Cleveland Cavaliers, the NBA equivalent of my high school when it comes to rooting interest, lost, two rounds before the championship round.  LeBron James was the reason in a different way, but he was on "our side" this time.

But now, tonight, the eve of the Ohio high school basketball season, I find myself in a similar sort of mindset I had going into the season my sophomore year.  LeBron James is the reason.

For the past 7 years, the man that stood in the way of a title for my high school (we won it during his first year in the NBA) was the sole reason I had any hope my NBA rooting interest had any hope of a title.  I was a turncoat, so to speak.  He was the enemy while I was in high school, but he was the King as soon as he left.  I have friends I graduated with that never liked him in the pros thanks to high school.  I bet they feel vindicated now.  Because I've turnedcoat once again.  You could say he did too, but while I disagree with his decision that he can win better in Miami, if he believes that he can, I can't blame him. But I'm most severely the turncoat again.

I know what it's like to root against LeBron and his team from high school and today, that's where I am again.  I thought, I think, I'm basically positive it will feel weird to see him on the other side, to see him going against "our guys."  But really, there's nothing new about that at all.  It's how I met him and it's how I'll leave him.  He entered my life as the villain, with his team of tattooed superstars with names from literature (Romeo, Scion, Joyce), and he's become the villain once more.

I never felt guilty about my turning-coat.  For 7 years, "we" had the best player in the world on our side and we had a shot.  It seemed personal poetic justice then, that he'd redeem himself by bringing Cleveland NBA glory.  But it was never to be.

There is still something poetic though, in his return to the other side.  It's somehow more orderly, somehow more normal for Cleveland to be on the other side after all of this. .

But even then...

It was a good ride.

-Zack

"you got that big fame homie, and you just changed homie"
-Kanye West

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