These Finals
The Knicks’ New York and Meditations on Sports Fandom
Walking down Broadway in the early evening, the 8-year-old strolling in front of me shouts, “Let’s go Knicks!” at a few men smoking a joint next to the 103rd St. train station.
“That’s right,” said one of them. “That’s right, no more of that fly stuff tonight. Just business.”
The kid yells, “Everybody’s healthy!” over his shoulder, on his way to home to watch Game 4.
***
On the Monday morning commute, one out of seven people wears something Knicks-related. Many a hat with stickers still on the brim. T-shirts commemorating the Eastern Conference Championship with crisply cut-off shoulders and sleeves. New gear for new Knicks fans.
On the Tuesday morning commute, after the loss at the Garden in Game 3 the night before, I only see one person wearing a Knicks shirt.
On Wednesday, ahead of Game 4, the city is back in orange and blue, hoping to pull off the win that evening. Despite a 29-point trail going into the second half, they do.
I don’t know what the city wore on Thursday. I worked from home.
***
Washington Heights on a Friday evening, a slick glossy layer of sweat forms on my lower back while standing and mingling at a block party birthday celebration for our beloved bookstore. The afterparty is a Game 2 watch party in the shop. I’m opting out, I tell a new volunteer, a native New Yorker. I explain that we’re not Knicks fans and we’d rather watch at home. They tell us that they’re going and excited for the game, but they haven’t cared about Knicks or basketball until now. This is a common refrain in NYC right now. People who have never watched a basketball game until these finals--whether they’re from New York or elsewhere--have found an entry point into the greatest sport. On my block, a LinkNYC screen flashes a Lays potato chip ad that reads: “Everyone’s welcome to the bandwagon.” Branded as an ad for the World Cup, it feels much more appropriate for the Knick’s Big Moment, in which artists and bookstore volunteers throw their love behind a team that’s been here all this time.
***
The Knicks has its stars: Jalen Brunson, KAT, and Josh Hart, but the star for these finals is OG Anunoby, whose been consistently excellent and won Game 4 for his team by finding an easy path to the basket to tip in the winning shot.
In 2016, I watched OG and my brother Nick play as teammates at Assembly Hall in Bloomington, Indiana. The Hoosiers had a great season, even going to the Sweet Sixteen, in which the University of North Carolina defeated them by 15 points (UNC ended up taking the championship a few games later). My parents flew me to Philadelphia for the Big Game. While it was a thrill to see Nick and co. compete in the tournament we’d watched as kids, it SUCKED to see them lose. After the game ended and my family shuffled out of the arena with the rest of the crowd, I cried. My heart broke for the team, but mostly for my brother. Thanks to the nature of single elimination in March Madness, it was his last game as a collegiate athlete. The weight of my disappointment as a fan and sibling felt crushing--a kind of sadness that you cannot shake with an “oh well!” or “better luck next year.” It hurt to see him lose.
In order for his last game to be a winning one, Indiana would have needed to win the title, to go all the way.
There can only be one #1 and a whole bunch of losers.
***
Nick’s two-week old baby, Bennett, is currently our family’s MVP. With moments of sleep so scarce, my brother tapes the finals and watches them in the mornings while Bennett drifts between snoozing and consciousness on the couch of their calm, quaint home. Nick already knows who won the game, but plays it back anyways. (This is something that really dedicated [crazy] sports people do.) He wants the Knicks to take the title because of his old teammate OG, but also for Terrence, head of accounting at his job, who grew up in Manhattan.
***
I first became aware of Victor Wembanyama, the star of the San Antonio Spurs, when he led the French team to the finals in the Paris Olympics. On a laptop screen, I watched Wemby and France fall to good ol’ team USA, 98-87. Wemby cried after they lost.
During the game, I quickly learned that watching Wembanyama means you’re bearing witness to poetry in motion. He plays with tenacity, grace. An unselfish form of basketball for someone whose skills supersede most of the other players. After the Olympic game, I googled him. 20 years old. So young!
Watching him, I felt the 7 foot 4 inch hole fill up in my heart. Maybe my love for Wemby is because I feel bad for a loser but admiring him for crying and wanting it that bad.
Maybe I love Wemby because I love to see a winner and who has a lot of winning left to do.
***
Sitting in the second to top row of our high school gymnasium, my sister and I watched Nick play on a much smaller stage: Lyons Township High School in LaGrange, IL. Those winter Friday nights of my freshman and sophomore years were mostly spent at my brother’s basketball games since, usually, I didn’t have any plans of my own. If the Lions were playing at home, I was there in my LT sweatpants and Uggs. My sister and I made fun of the dads who got way too invested and yelled at the refs. I learned what the double bonus and goaltending were from my mom. Eventually, I started yelling at the refs myself for poor offensive foul calls.
LT was my team, then it was Illinois State, then Indiana, then whatever pro team or Euro team that Nick played on. My team was whatever his team was because I didn’t know any other way of investing in sports. I needed a personal connection. I needed the stakes. I still feel this way.
***
The other night after Game 2, reflections of fireworks glittered in the windows of the building across the street from mine. The Knicks won in Texas. A fire truck honked, people screamed, “FUCK YEAHH BABY” in street. New York was celebrating. I was not.
Remember, reader. I am not a Knicks fan. I have no team. Instead, I have players like my brother, now, like Wembanyama, whose finals run with the Spurs has given me mostly great agony and totally fucked up my sleep schedule. The moments he’s on his game, making the shots no one else can, I’m screaming and pounding the floors.
A fever has consumed the city. It’s Christmastime in New York and I’m Charlie Brown. The other kids (Knicks fans) are destroying property in midtown and pelting Wemby with eggs outside his hotel room.
To all the Long Island girlies shipping into Grand Central in cutoffs tees and glitter for the watch party. To every Brooklyn transplant who said they didn’t get sports last month but are heading to Baby’s All Right for Game 5. I can understand why this is so exciting. The fragrant optimism and joyous communal experience of a city rallying around their team is beautiful. For longtime Knicks fans, the success must feel so hard won. These are the people who I will be happy for if the Knicks bring it home.
If you’re from nowhere with a basketball team, or never had an exposure to sports as a kid, this could be a very exciting time to find a team. Or will it be a passing fad? Another New York moment lost to time, making way for more fro-yo and less culturally significant albeit trendy bullshit? Maybe the Knicks will lose their players and start losing again. Maybe people don’t care about sports in the first place because they don’t care for losing. Rooting for a historically losing team is like witnessing a bridge collapsing on loop, maybe even being on that bridge while it’s collapsing. Do you want to be on that bridge?
Everyone loves a winner. We all hate to lose.