You all know what “this” is. My most dazzling friend and colleague, the magnificent Kyrie Irving, is out for the year. The knee he hyperextended is now infected because the doctors may have been double agents for the Cavs and put dirty screws in during surgery. He’s finished. Done. Boned. Whatever you wanna call it, it stinks to the high heavens. Not only is the Celtics’ season basically over with Kyrie and Marcus Smart out, but now the haters have some serious ammo against Kyrie. He’s hurt that knee too many times now. I’m not saying he’s injury-prone, because a couple of them were freak injuries that nobody could avoid, but it definitely isn’t good for him to need a second surgery on this one. Put me down as someone who is assuredly not a fan of repeated knee injuries.
Did I mention that this really stinks? I have absolute confidence in Scary Terry Rozier to hold his own going into the playoffs, but they have no shot at the Finals now. Zip, zero, zilch, nada, no chance they get past either the Cavs, Raptors or Sixers without their two best players (Kyrie and Gordon Hayward) and their best defender in Smart, as well as a key bench piece in Daniel Theis. Unless they luck into playing the Heat, there’s a decent shot they don’t even make it out of the first round. The Wizards and Bucks are both probably just as good as, if not better than, the Celtics minus Kyrie, Smart, Hayward and Theis. I feel like I’ve been riding in a hot air balloon since mid-November and a fighter jet just flew right through it and sent me tumbling back to earth. Total ball-buster. They lose Hayward and then rip off 16 in a row, are the best team in the East for the majority of the season, overcome Kyrie and Smart being hurt to make a late run at the No. 1 seed, and then it all goes away in a two-day span. The Raptors blow them out and Kyrie is out for the year. I guess I’ll take this year as a bonus?
This also renders the Eastern Conference playoffs pretty much over. No team has a chance at the finals other than the Cavs, Raptors or Sixers, and including the Sixers might be pushing it. Until LeBron loses, I’m not gonna bet against him. He’s made it eight years in a row for a reason, and the Raptors always choke. I’m just hoping the C’s draw the Heat in the first round and can make it competitive against the Cavs for a few games in the second round. If they get the Bucks or Wizards, forget it. The Bucks would dominate inside with Giannis and Jabari and the Wizards would run the Celtics out of the building.
I’ve been trying to go about my day as usual, but it’s hard. A part of my life was just taken and put in a blender right in front of my eyes. Maybe not a blender, actually. Perhaps they laid it down on the table and inserted bacterially infected screws into my ailing knee, ensuring that King James returns to the Finals for the 375th year in a row. Perhaps. It’s just a theory.
