The Mr Tony Show
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by user Barkingclam
It wasn’t even as close at the box score will say, not even by a mile.
San Antonio is, and already was, the NBA Champion for the 2007 season, making this game four a formality. Granted, it was a fairly good one - finally, a fourth quarter that was exciting - but it was pretty much a formality just the same.
In fact, it could be argued that the Finals was really the second-round series between the Suns and the Spurs, an instant classic that was by far the most interesting, the most fun and the most talked about series in these playoffs.
Even then, when Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland and New Jersey were all still in the playoffs, nobody thought that the East would have a chance; although, nobody thought the Mavericks would have lost to the Warriors either, so take from that what you will.
Either way, these finals seemed to be quite anticlimactic. There was no drama, no excitement and - perhaps most heinous of all - no interest. Ratings for the Finals were lower then they have been in over 25 years, even though they featured one of the best players in the game (Lebron) playing the team of the decade (The Spurs).
It should have been something worthwhile, not the slow, low scoring and just plain bland finals that they were. It should have been The Lebron Show.
So what happened to these finals? Where did they go wrong?
I don’t think they did, really.
To put it simply, the focus shifted. These finals were a coming out party, but it wasn’t for who everybody thought it was going to be. Everybody - myself included - thought that Lebron James was going to steal the series, maybe winning a game single-handedly, just as he did against Detroit.
But he didn’t. This was not The Lebron Show, it was the Mr. Tony Show - Tony Parker, that is.
Mr. Tony, whose career shooting percentage was less then .500 coming into these finals, shot over 53%, including clutch three-pointers when his team needed them the most. His playing time got a huge boost, increasing by almost five minutes. His scoring went up, peaking with a 30 point masterpiece in game two.
And he exited the finals with the MVP trophy.
All things considered, though, this has turned out to be a pretty okay finals. There was the non-call in game three, when Lebron could - should - have gone to the line for three free throws, and maybe sent the game to overtime. There tonight’s game, when the Spurs and Cavs traded leads in the fourth. And this game actually went down to the wire, although like I said before, it wasn’t as close as the score says.
Sure, it’s not ESPN Classic, but I’ll take it.
