http://www.sacbee.com/351/story/165501.html
Ailene Voisin: Warriors seduce Kings' faithful
By Ailene Voisin - Bee Columnist
Last Updated 12:02 am PDT Thursday, May 3, 2007
In the bars and restaurants. In the cafeteria at the workplace. In the neighborhood. People are crowding around televisions, monitoring the scores and screaming at the outcome.
Kings fans.
Screaming for the Warriors.
For a smorgasbord of reasons -- including that Dallas-Golden State has developed into a wildly improbable and entertaining series that continues with Game 6 tonight, with story lines galore -- Kings fans are masquerading as Warriors partisans, overcoming their own postseason blues and supporting their long-suffering neighbors to the west. And we mean long-suffering.
Sacramentans, in fact, are being awfully good-natured about this. The Bay Area has all that romance and all those beautiful sights, all those restaurants and five-star hotels, and now its upstart NBA franchise ends a 12-year postseason drought? How fair is that?
Meanwhile, Geoff Petrie is searching for more athletic players and a more forceful head coach. The club's marketing officials are enrolled in an introductory course -- Season Ticket Sales 101 -- and relying on Petrie to provide the new identity and new direction. The Maloofs are swallowing $5 million of Eric Musselman's salary and staring at a roster dominated by aspiring retirees. Sneaking a peek at these Warriors doubles the dose of pleasure/pain: Younger and faster, ball movement and body movement, representing the wave of the future and somewhat reminiscent of the old Kings.
Might as well jump on. Everyone else is.
"It's nice to watch the playoffs and not be in agony," Sacramento City Councilman Rob Fong suggested. "If (the Warriors) lose, it's not like we're going into mourning like we would if it was the Kings. But me and all my friends are on the Warriors bandwagon. It's great to see a team that's athletic and small and fun to watch. Plus, Matt Barnes grew up here. Don Nelson wanted to coach here, and we never called back. And Mark Cuban, well, we hate the Mavericks."
At least one of the Maloofs has emerged from his spring funk long enough to appreciate a series featuring one of his archrivals. "It's been great for the league," Gavin Maloof conceded, "and that Nellie's a great coach. In hindsight ... would he have been the right coach for us? Probably. But you never know for sure. You can't look back. The human element isn't an exact science."
No, but Petrie probably regrets not returning Nelson's phone call. Nellie's outsized personality would have squeezed nicely into our small city. Instead, he is guiding a Warriors team that is gaining admirers some 85 miles to the east.
Probe the minds of these sudden Warriors supporters, and you hear similar reasons for the infatuation. There is the proximity between franchises and number of Bay Area escapees in the area. There is the underdog, we-know-suffering-too factor. There is the shared taste for fine food and fine wineries, and the outright sharing of the A's and Giants, the Raiders and 49ers, and the Sharks. There also is a degree of separation anxiety: Whom do you root for with the Kings on the sidelines?
Further attempts to explain this latest basketball buzz took me to several places the past few days, culminating in a final stop late Tuesday night at Biba's Tavern. Diners were overheard exchanging comments like, "How about those Warriors?"
Several crowded around a television at the bar and yelped in disgust when the Mavericks prevailed. One patron hated sports but couldn't stand anything related to Texas. A bartender cited Nelson's job inquiry. A UC Davis student connected the dots to George Bush. "California is mostly Democratic, so people are like, 'Boo, Texas. Go Warriors,' " Squaw Valley native Callie Ewing said.
There are additional reasons to like these Warriors, who probably need to clinch the series tonight if they expect to advance (a seventh game would be in Dallas). Baron Davis has been sensational. The style of play is particularly pleasurable after watching the Kings plod through the 2006-07 season, and that Nelson-Cuban feud is sizzling again. As longtime fan John Seiter noted: "I have used the term 'depressed' to talk about how I felt when the Kings lost to the Lakers and Mavericks, so I'd like to see the Warriors win. And it would be great to see Mark Cuban with egg on his face."
About the writer: Reach Ailene Voisin at (916) 321-1208 or avoisin@sacbee.com.
Ailene Voisin: Warriors seduce Kings' faithful
By Ailene Voisin - Bee Columnist
Last Updated 12:02 am PDT Thursday, May 3, 2007
In the bars and restaurants. In the cafeteria at the workplace. In the neighborhood. People are crowding around televisions, monitoring the scores and screaming at the outcome.
Kings fans.
Screaming for the Warriors.
For a smorgasbord of reasons -- including that Dallas-Golden State has developed into a wildly improbable and entertaining series that continues with Game 6 tonight, with story lines galore -- Kings fans are masquerading as Warriors partisans, overcoming their own postseason blues and supporting their long-suffering neighbors to the west. And we mean long-suffering.
Sacramentans, in fact, are being awfully good-natured about this. The Bay Area has all that romance and all those beautiful sights, all those restaurants and five-star hotels, and now its upstart NBA franchise ends a 12-year postseason drought? How fair is that?
Meanwhile, Geoff Petrie is searching for more athletic players and a more forceful head coach. The club's marketing officials are enrolled in an introductory course -- Season Ticket Sales 101 -- and relying on Petrie to provide the new identity and new direction. The Maloofs are swallowing $5 million of Eric Musselman's salary and staring at a roster dominated by aspiring retirees. Sneaking a peek at these Warriors doubles the dose of pleasure/pain: Younger and faster, ball movement and body movement, representing the wave of the future and somewhat reminiscent of the old Kings.
Might as well jump on. Everyone else is.
"It's nice to watch the playoffs and not be in agony," Sacramento City Councilman Rob Fong suggested. "If (the Warriors) lose, it's not like we're going into mourning like we would if it was the Kings. But me and all my friends are on the Warriors bandwagon. It's great to see a team that's athletic and small and fun to watch. Plus, Matt Barnes grew up here. Don Nelson wanted to coach here, and we never called back. And Mark Cuban, well, we hate the Mavericks."
At least one of the Maloofs has emerged from his spring funk long enough to appreciate a series featuring one of his archrivals. "It's been great for the league," Gavin Maloof conceded, "and that Nellie's a great coach. In hindsight ... would he have been the right coach for us? Probably. But you never know for sure. You can't look back. The human element isn't an exact science."
No, but Petrie probably regrets not returning Nelson's phone call. Nellie's outsized personality would have squeezed nicely into our small city. Instead, he is guiding a Warriors team that is gaining admirers some 85 miles to the east.
Probe the minds of these sudden Warriors supporters, and you hear similar reasons for the infatuation. There is the proximity between franchises and number of Bay Area escapees in the area. There is the underdog, we-know-suffering-too factor. There is the shared taste for fine food and fine wineries, and the outright sharing of the A's and Giants, the Raiders and 49ers, and the Sharks. There also is a degree of separation anxiety: Whom do you root for with the Kings on the sidelines?
Further attempts to explain this latest basketball buzz took me to several places the past few days, culminating in a final stop late Tuesday night at Biba's Tavern. Diners were overheard exchanging comments like, "How about those Warriors?"
Several crowded around a television at the bar and yelped in disgust when the Mavericks prevailed. One patron hated sports but couldn't stand anything related to Texas. A bartender cited Nelson's job inquiry. A UC Davis student connected the dots to George Bush. "California is mostly Democratic, so people are like, 'Boo, Texas. Go Warriors,' " Squaw Valley native Callie Ewing said.
There are additional reasons to like these Warriors, who probably need to clinch the series tonight if they expect to advance (a seventh game would be in Dallas). Baron Davis has been sensational. The style of play is particularly pleasurable after watching the Kings plod through the 2006-07 season, and that Nelson-Cuban feud is sizzling again. As longtime fan John Seiter noted: "I have used the term 'depressed' to talk about how I felt when the Kings lost to the Lakers and Mavericks, so I'd like to see the Warriors win. And it would be great to see Mark Cuban with egg on his face."
About the writer: Reach Ailene Voisin at (916) 321-1208 or avoisin@sacbee.com.
