I was right and… wrong

By Jesus A. Garcia Jr.

I KNOW that you sports fanatics like-me, especially the basketball aficionados, followed the NBA playoffs and all the way to the finals. We had our own fearless forecasts before the playoff games and most especially during the best-of-seven championship series. Miami followers (including this writer) were saddened and some even dismayed by the lackadaisical performances of the Heat’s Big 3, especially Lebron James. My ‘partner’ here at The Punch, Rod Ibasan, who lost two thousand bucks in a bet could hardly believe how poorly James played, simply below his super aptitude. He suspects that the six-foot-eight power-forward of the Heat might have been paid by Mafia gamblers to play tentatively and pathetically. That sentiment was echoed by Mangaldan cager Antonio Jimenez and Jerry Casanova of Manaoag.

“In every defeat there’s always an alibi” as the maxim goes and I agree with that.

That’s their belief and they could be right or they could be wrong. My guess is they’re wrong. But, well, let’s give them the benefit of the doubt.

Before the playoffs, I told my close friends in my village and some media colleagues that it will be Miami against Dallas in this year’s title battle. And I was right. But despite being a Texan and have visited Dallas once and never seen the Miami ground, I picked the Heat to capture the tiara, at 55-45 or a close clash and surmised that the two titan teams will reach the seventh game. I picked the Heat because of its Big 3 players namely: James, Wade, Bosh and the last but not the least, the intelligent Fil-Am coach Erik Spoelstra. But I was wrong. The result turned out to be the opposite, 4-2, Dallas. Well, nobody is perfect ‘ika nga, except the Creator.

The Mavericks were really marvelous this year. They deserved to win because they defeated the defending champion Lakers by a sweep, 4-0, during the playoffs. When they beat the Lakers, I realize now that that was already a sign that they will become champions. To beat the Lakers was a tough task.

“Viva Dallas, Texas, el ciudad, estado y casa de los Chicanos.” Ariba.

What happened to the Mavericks also happened to a professional player named Li Na of China. The Chinese lass captured this year’s French Open by dethroning the defending champion Francesca Schiavone of Italy in the finals. Like our very own boxing icon Manny Paquiao, the first prized fighter in the world to bag eight different world crowns in different weight divisions, the unheralded Li Na is the first Asian tennis player to win a grand slam that’s dominated mostly by the Europeans, Americans, Latinos and the Australians. I’m sure that the victory of Li Na will pave the way for other Chinese athletes and some other Asian countries to seriously get involved in lawn tennis. This is a game where height is not might. Remember, China, once the sleeping giant, for the first time topped the overall championship in the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games as far as gold medal harvest is concerned. They are expected to duplicate that feat in the coming 2012 London Olympic Games. Threatening them for overall title are the crafty Americans, the 2004 Athens Olympic overall champions.

Let’s wait and see.

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QUOTE OF THE WEEK: He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his God and he shall be My son. But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death. REVELATION 21: 7-8

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