Atlanta's victory over Washington in Game Three of the Eastern Conference Semifinals was personally satisfying to me as an Atlanta Dream fan for a number of reasons. Most of those reasons have to deal with various arguments asserted that since:
* Atlanta is a "bad sports town",
* Fred Williams is a bad coach,
* Angel McCoughtry is cranky/crazy, and
* Atlanta hasn't had good playoff attendance, that, therefore:
* Atlanta doesn't deserve a WNBA franchise.
To which I reply, "Suck it haters, PTHBTHBTHBTHBTHB." This might not be seen as a deserving counter-reply, but the arguments above aren't very good either.
* Even if Atlanta is a bad sports town - and I think this is true - who made you the boss of whether or not Atlanta "deserves" a team?
* If Fred Williams is such a bad coach, then how did such a bad coach win this series? (Unfortunately, this is the kind of question where haters will just move the goalposts. Even if Senor Fred is holding up the Silver Boob at the end of the season, the haters will just figure out a way to avoid giving him any credit for it - See: Meadors, Marynell.)
* As Charles Barkley might say, "Who made me your role model?"
* Okay. The playoff attendance hasn't been good. Even so, looking at attendance in isolation from a host of other factors - civic culture, sports history, attitudes, psychology, etc. etc. - is not the best approach.
I had a chance to chat with Mike Thibault before the game. Not all of the stuff we talked about made it into the article, but that was to keep the article from going to 4,000 words. He told me something interesting - namely, that going into this season, he was more interested in seeing what kind of team he actually had than setting a playoff appearance as some kind of arbitrary benchmark that would make or break the Mystics season. After 11 wins in two years, he certainly couldn't expect to go there and it would have been unfair for him to make it as a demand. His goal was to teach the team a winning culture; a playoff appearance is just icing on the cake.
Not that Thibault doesn't like winning. Far from it, he expects to win. He was very disappointed after the game because this was a "winnable" game and the Mystics lost it. The players were disappointed, too. Ivory Latta could barely speak after the game.
Yes, the goal is to Win The Whole Damned Thing. But Washington's accomplishments should not be overlooked, they are clearly a Team on the Rise.
I asked him if he would rather have Latta overseas or coaching at North Carolina. His reply is not that one was necessarily better than the other, but coaching will teach Latta a few things. He stated that the point guard is the representative of the coach's philosophy and in efforts to teach others, she'll have a few "aha!" moments about why he can be so frustrated sometimes. He joked that he plans to call her some time during the season if there's a rough patch and ask her, "See what I mean?"
He also liked the energy that she brings to a team. Latta brings energy. Everyone loves Ivory Latta. *I* love Ivory Latta, and she's not even my team and for Meadors's purposes I thought that Lehning was better than Latta. If you talk to Ivory Latta, you either fall in love with Ivory Latta or your heart is made out of granite.
(* * *)
I also had a chance to talk to Senor Fred. One of the topics was Erika de Souza. Even though Erika's English is a lot better than five years ago, she still needs her translator so it's not perfect. But she can understand basketball terminology, or as Williams put it, "coach-speak".
(* * *)
When I got home, I missed Phoenix @ Los Angeles - all but the last play of the game, after I had settled into bed with Bunny and I said, "Flip over to the Phoenix @ Los Angeles game." The only problem with Phoenix winning is that it will make some of Phoenix's fan base more insufferable than they already are.
Then again, it could just be the five percent rule in action. During a graduation ceremony, a police commissioner told his newly graduated cadets that out of the entire class, five percent exemplified everything that a policeman should be. An additional five percent would turn out to be nothing more than criminals wearing badges. "An entire squad, an entire precinct, an entire force will go in the direction of whichever five percent turns out to have the most influence."
The message is to give support to good behaviors. A lot of Phoenix Mercury fans are nice people. Ben York is a mensch. Seth Pollack is cool.
I like the Mercury. Brittney Griner seems sweet. I like Diana Taurasi, we were going in opposite directions under Philips Arena and she made the briefest of incidental contact with me. She apologized immediately, even though it wasn't the kind of contact - a mere brush in close quarters - that even deserved an apology; if she said nothing I wouldn't have thought any worse of her. Russ Pennell is a hoot to talk to. Not only do I like the Mercury, I respect them, I love their history, I loved the old Michelle Timms-Mercury.
Some "trash talk" however, belongs right in the sewer.
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