Today is an odd day to be a Seattle sports fan.
To embrace a Seattle team is to embrace a constant tease with little redemption. It feels helpless. As fans we try our best to collectively will these teams to the ultimate prize, championships.
Seattle has great fans when our team is winning. Yet, when the chips are down and most of the fan base fades away, they casually complain about that seasons' mistakes as easily as they do about our fickle weather.
In my lifetime I have witnessed the Mariners, Seahawks and most recently, the Sonics threaten to leave town. Each threat revolved around building a new stadium/arena. It was never about a lack of fan support.
SafeCo Field set Mariners average attendance records at over 3 million per season starting the 2000-01' season. Those ticket sales led baseball through the 2004 season.
Qwest/CenturyLink Field regularly sells out Seahawks and Sounders game.
Key Arena rose out of the previous Coliseum ashes in 1995. In 2007, the NBA said a completely new arena was necessary. The Sonics lived there till 2008. You know the rest.
Tonight, I plan on being conflicted. The Oklahoma City Thunder will host the Miami Heat in Game 1 of the NBA Finals. No, these are not the SuperSonics. They are the Thunder. Two players were drafted a Sonic (Kevin Durant and Nick Collison). Those two men are their last remaining connection to Seattle.
Seattle drafted Collison in 2004. Durant was drafted in 2007. Russell Westbrook was drafted (but never played) by a team dressed as a Sonic but secretly was a Thunder. What the hell is a singular Thunder?
To begin the season, I confidently predicted that the last two teams standing would be the Heat and Thunder. It wasn't that hard of a choice. They are easily the most athletic, talented and exciting teams in the NBA. Period.
My rooting interest is for the Miami Heat to silence the Thunder in seven games. Politics aside,it will surely be a fantastic series for all basketball fans. Ideally, if OKC is ever going to have a shot at a ring, it will be in a future time when Seattle is an NBA town again. That way the Thunder will have to "compete" against them to earn a title.
Until that day, most Seattlites agree, we need to turn up the Heat.
