An Ode to IT

Kevin Doherty
Aug 23, 2017 · 4 min read

Three years of love, life, and adoration

To “The Little Guy”,

I get it. It’s a sport. It’s a game. It has no actual impact on my day to day life. I can’t control it. Nothing I say or do will affect the NBA. Even the trade makes sense. Kyrie Irving is a young star and the Celtics are a serious threat for the Finals.

But this effing hurts.

I know, I know. Basketball is a business. Kyrie Irving is and can be really good. Isaiah is going to be a 5'9", 29 year-old free agent with a hip injury demanding a max contract. Yet sometimes being a fan is about so much more than wins and losses and logic and making sense. We are fans, we root for sports teams because of moments. Isaiah Thomas gave us moments.

I remember where I was when we traded for him, scrolling through Twitter at the desk in my brother’s room, disappointed at a quiet trade deadline. 3:05 pm the trade came in, the tweet from Woj: Marcus Thornton and a 1st rounder for an undersized point guard named Isaiah Thomas. Then came his first game as a Celtic, getting thrown out against the Lakers. A run to the playoffs. A scrap against Cleveland. His size drew lazy but lovable comparisons to a leprechaun. He attacked the basket with a certain fearlessness. He got to the free throw line. He got knocked down. He got up, like that cheesy cliche. He was our man.

That step back game-winner against Kent Bazemore and the Hawks. 29 points in the fourth quarter to get a win against the Heat. Combining two of my loves, Game of Thrones and basketball, into one nickname: The King in the Fourth. That stretch in December/January where he refused to score less than 30 points a game. His sister’s death. Getting a tooth knocked out. Closing out the Bulls’ series on a Friday, flying home after, giving the eulogy at his sister’s funeral, getting back to Boston at 4 am, putting up 33 in a Game 1 win against the Wizards while losing his front teeth, 12 hours of dental surgery, and, as if that weren’t enough, 53 points against the Wizards with a dagger free-throw line jumper over the Lesser Morris Twin. He gave us everything.

In many ways, Isaiah was Boston. We’re small, but we think ourselves toe-to-toe with Los Angeles and New York. What do they have that we don’t, anyway? We’re the Davids to everyone’s Goliath. We’ve been counted out at every turn, but that just makes us better. We innovate, find new ways to get to the basket. We love the tough guys, the ones with chips on their shoulders. Isaiah made me identify with him and I’m a 6'5" manchild who’s been granted every privilege known to man. But something about Isaiah made you feel like that we were all in this together. That there was a strawman army of haters out there and were were going to work our butts off to prove them wrong. We know how great we are, we just have to show the world.

We loved him. And he loved us.

Being a sports fan doesn’t make sense much of the time. It can brings a lot of pain sometimes, depressing winter months with few wins and fun in between. Arguments. Countless hours are squandered on weeknights watching meaningless games or scrolling through twitter. My girlfriend can attest that I slammed my fist against a wall after an excruciating loss against the Suns. I’m not one to do something like that. Even now, I’m writing an article at midnight that nobody will ever read, on something I have no control over, about a man I’ve never met who’s never heard of me. I subscribe a lot to the Serenity Prayer, and this flies in the face of that: “Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change.” No serenity here.

Why do we care about sports?

Because it makes us feel alive. Fully, unabashedly alive. The whole cocktail of emotions. Anger, pain, sadness, joy, euphoria. Because it feels so nice to care so deeply about something that is always there. Players may come and go, but the team is always there. (Sorry, Seattle…the team is usually there). They’ll win some, they’ll lose some. They will rip your heart out and throw it on the ground to only then give you some of the greatest bliss you’ve ever felt. It’s an exercise in near unconditional love. That no matter what your teams record is or what some players said or done, you’ll still tune in. Maybe the capitalist machine has got a hold of a consumer held captive. Or maybe there’s something to the hope. That this prospect is the next MJ. That this trade will put them over the top. That this year’s the year.

I’ve gotten dangerously off topic. But what I mean to say, what I mean to thank Isaiah for, is that he’s given me the full experience of being a fan, of being acutely alive. Far more happy moments than sad. Far more smiles than tears. Far more moments than malarkey.

Thank you, IT, Isaiah, the man, the myth, the legend, and a Celtics legend you truly are. It’s about more than sports, and I hope happiness finds you wherever you are.

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Kevin Doherty
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