I’ve said any number of times that if you had taken the game stories of the 1980 Kardiac Kids and turned them into the script for a movie, and then taken that script to Hollywood and tried to get somebody to buy it, you would’ve gotten laughed right out of town.
Too corny. Too cheesy.
Too unbelievable.
Nobody would want any part of that fairy tale.
Indeed, you can’t make up all the crazy stuff that happened in that roller-coaster ride of a Browns season.
And so it is with the 2016 NBA champion Cleveland Cavaliers, which makes what happened Sunday night when they edged the Golden State Warriors 93-89 in Game 7 of the Finals, all that more special.
Led by LeBron James, who was born to a teen-age mother and grew up in a single-parent house in the roughest part of Akron – a kid who returned home two years ago to bring his hometown team a title – the Cavs seemed dead when they lost Game 4 at home and fell behind 3 games to 1. To put it politely, they were hanging by a thread, so much so that head coach Ty Lue said openly as the team got ready to head back to Oakland for what could have been the series-clincher for the Warriors in Game 5, “If you don’t think we’ve got a chance, then don’t get on the plane.”
Golden State’s mindset was just the opposite.
“I like our chances,” Warriors head coach Steve Kerr said.
But the Cavs staved off the knockout punch, winning to send the series back to Cleveland for Game 6.
“I like our chances,” Kerr said again.
The Cavs, though, refused to go down, winning again to force a winner-take-all Game 7 at Oracle Arena.
“I like our chances,” said Warriors guard Steph Curry, who was born in the same Akron hospital as James.
The Cavs’ resilience finally wore down Golden State, and the team whose chances everybody liked for three straight games, and really the entire season – the team that was a heavy favorite – gave too many chances to LeBron and his guys.
No matter how hard the Warriors hit them in those last three games, the Cavs hit back even harder.
It took “the warrior” out of the Warriors, and the seemingly impossible became possible, ending a wait of 52½ years.
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Too corny. Too cheesy.
Unbelievable.
No movie producer would buy that kind of script.
Except maybe in Believeland.
In that regard, then, more on the Cavs and the Kardiac Kids tomorrow.
