04-24-2024, 01:38 AM
1. MOMENTUM!!
The sound bite is inevitable, in a 7-games series. Sooner or later we will hear "Team X won this game, and now they have the momentum!!"
But it's nonsense.
Instead, while every win seems to have created a direction for the rest of the series, it doesn't -- that next game is a start over which will have its own player battles which can turn out any number of ways this time. Every next game ends up as a war unto itself.
And ultimately that next game will create a new narrative that will be based on the way THAT game ends, not on what came before.
Old mo' always looks like it's owned by the last team that won a game. "Team X has it figured out now!!" Don't believe it.
2. GAME 3
We will also see a strange thing happen as each series goes to game 3. All of a sudden, weirdly it may seem, the underdogs who flailed in games 1-2 might play way better. That change of location - and home court - is a funny thing in how it can make a playoff series look different.
Be ready.
The sound bite is inevitable, in a 7-games series. Sooner or later we will hear "Team X won this game, and now they have the momentum!!"
But it's nonsense.
Instead, while every win seems to have created a direction for the rest of the series, it doesn't -- that next game is a start over which will have its own player battles which can turn out any number of ways this time. Every next game ends up as a war unto itself.
And ultimately that next game will create a new narrative that will be based on the way THAT game ends, not on what came before.
Old mo' always looks like it's owned by the last team that won a game. "Team X has it figured out now!!" Don't believe it.
2. GAME 3
We will also see a strange thing happen as each series goes to game 3. All of a sudden, weirdly it may seem, the underdogs who flailed in games 1-2 might play way better. That change of location - and home court - is a funny thing in how it can make a playoff series look different.
Be ready.