The Reason I'll Be Crying Like a Baby on Friday...

I'm a simple guy.  For as opinionated as I am, I have very few actual "beliefs."  I think that a public option on healthcare reform would help increase competition and improve the availability of quality care, but I don't believe it because a belief requires so much more conviction than a thought or an idea.  A belief requires undoubting faith, and at this point in my life, I really only have three actual beliefs...

1.  There is a God.
2.  Education can fix anything.
3.  I've seen crazier stuff happen in my life.

One and two are conversations for another time.  Today, I want to discuss number three, something I'm sure many of you have heard me say before in my life.  Anytime I face the improbable, I've got a go to phrase...

"I've seen crazier stuff happen in my life."

What's that, you might ask?

Once upon a time, there was a scrawny boy born in southern California.  He was born with hip deformities and told it would be a miracle if he could walk...

Fast forward to May 7, 1995, and this little boy scored eight points in nine seconds to propel the Indiana Pacers to the most improbable comeback in NBA history.  To this day, he is mentioned among the legends.

Little Timmy Hickle was four years old at the time, and while I may not remember much about 1995, that's something you never ever forget.  This man is proof that impossible truly is nothing.

Friday is still three days away and yet my inner four year old is jumping for joy.  For those of you who don't know, Friday is the early release party for Winning Time:  Reggie Miller vs. The New York Knicks at Conseco Fieldhouse.  I'll be there, Reggie will be there, it will be a fantastic time, but the reason I'm most excited isn't to get an autograph, but rather to relive one of the greatest rivalries in basketball history.

Today, the Pacers are abysmal.  I love them, but they lost to the Timberwolves.  'Nuff said.  The issue, however, isn't that my team isn't winning.  Rather, the game as a whole has changed so dramatically from the game I fell in love with.  No longer are there rivalries so intense that the very mention of the opposition makes the hair on the back of your neck stand up.  The game has been like this since the early 2000's, but I never noticed because of the renewed rivalry between the Pacers and the Pistons, culminating in the brawl and subsequently ending after the Pacers' elimination in the 2005 Playoffs, marking the end of the Miller era.  We had Reggie and Ron-Ron, two guys who are both extremely capable of getting into the opponent's head and destroying them psychologically.  Now players are quieter, nicer, not trying to gouge out Michael Jordan's eyes or being head butt by John Starks.  This game is less dramatic, and the drama is exactly what I miss the most.

Look at the NBA Finals last year.  Boring.  No smack talk, no bad blood, no excitement.  I miss Reggie for the clutch shots, but even more for the theater he created.  Dan Klores, the director of Winning Time has compared Reggie's story to an operatic comedy.  I couldn't have put it better.

"What if I told you he was the reason the city never slept?"  -Dan Klores

"To Reggie, Pacers versus Knicks was more than a basketball series.  It was a battle of Biblical proportions.  You had Indianapolis, the Holy city, and you had New York, Sodom and Gomorra." -Cheryl Miller

It's beautiful... I can't wait for it... and for those of you going with me, don't be surprised when I cry, because I will... a lot.  Not because I'm sad, but at the beauty that is this epic tale.

Additionally, this is a reminder that we face our own "New York Knicks" every day.  We all face insurmountable odds from time to time.  We all have our own miracles to preform.  I can think of half a dozen miracles I need over the course of the next five days.  The one thing that Reggie reminded us, however, is that a miracle, at any point in time, is only nine seconds away.

Nine seconds is all I need.  It's Miller Time.


I'd like to leave you with this... To quote Reggie in the clip "Game over, bitch."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ICBGQXbft8