Part 2: Come Back to What You Know/LET’S GO MAV-ERICKS, LET’S GO!

I cannot wait for Mavericks season to start. Seeing Shawn Marion and Dirk score more than 20 each in a preseason game? My tiny basketball heart is fluttering at the mere thought. And lucky for me, that money that I had been thinking about using to make the total ass-beating of a trip to Arlington to see the Cowboys will now be used instead to walk from work to the AAC to attend as many Mavericks home games as I can this season. I can’t remember the last time I was this excited about a Mavs season. And I don’t have much reason to be so excited, other than the addition of Marion and Gooden, the improvement of Barea and the continued work ethic of Dirk.

It’s weird because, even as much as I get frustrated with them (sample You Go Live in Utah blog post from the first-round playoff series with Golden State two years ago: “Fucking Mavs!”), I really really love the Mavs. And I’m not going to deny the fact that part of my Mavs enthusiasm stems from my Rangers boredom and my Cowboys anger. But here’s what I would like to remind everyone:

This summer, when at absolute best, the Rangers were neck and neck with Boston for the wild card…everyone was talking about the Rangers like they were Christopher Reeve doing a gymnastics floor routine at the Olympics. That’s not a diss on the Rangers or their fans. I understand the misery and desperate search for hope in the heart of every Rangers fan. But before too long, the Rangers did what they always do. They fell apart like a Forever XXI dress in a washing machine on the gentle cycle. And no one was too angry. “Hey, they were really on fire there for a little while! They are showing so much improvement! This is what we expected because come 2011, this team is going to be a monster.” All of this about a team whose owner is essentially digging his own gold fillings out with needle-nose pliers outside of a Cash America at this very second.

I really am not picking on the Rangers. I respect their fans. Now again, my Cowboys anger might be clouding my perspective on this right now. But let’s put it this way, if your child was born the last time the Mavs made it to the Finals, you would have a healthy, walking and talking and getting ready for preschool-aged toddler. If your child was born the last time the Cowboys made it to the Super Bowl, you would have a surly, acne-riddled, grunts-as-answers teenager. And if your child was born the last time the Rangers made it to the World Series, you would only have the glint in the traffic cop’s eye before he got an urgent call and let you off with a warning. So why aren’t people more proud of the Mavs? Yes, they took a record books season of 67 wins and fed it into the wood-chipper in the first round to the Golden State Warriors. Yes, the next year they went out in the first round again to the New Orleans Hornets.

But let me re-type that. In the past 4 seasons, they have made it to the FINALS once and to the PLAYOFFS every year. Last year, they made it to the second round of the playoffs. Imagine the size of the Cowboys logo that would be burned with lasers on the surface of the moon if the Cowboys could claim that in the past four years, they have made it to the playoffs each year AND even made it to the Super Bowl once! Try to wrap your head around the kind of frenzy, tears and pandemonium that would radiate from Arlington outwards if the Rangers could make that kind of claim. Is that a sad testament to the low standards we have set for our franchises in town? Quite possibly. Am I still more than happy to watch 82 games on the chance that the team might make it past the first round of the playoffs? ABSOLUTELY.

I want Dallas to remember what we have rooted for since I moved here as a wee baby. The reason we sit in leather-tanning heat in August to watch the Rangers. The reason we are willing to let Jerry Jones rape our wallets and embarrass our city and football legacy. The reason we will get behind a washed-up Dennis Rodman if it just means one more defensive rebound. It’s so we can ultimately have one team make it to the title game and win the big prize and we can bring the big prize home and all take the day off work and go to a parade and allow a modicum of martial law to prevent us from rioting, looting and then burning the entire city down in a fit of sports ecstasy. I’m putting my money on the Mavs and will decorate my riot gear accordingly.