In a year still filled with hardships brought about by the pandemic, the NBA has churned out incredible hours of escapist entertainment in the last month with thrilling playoff basketball action boosted by arenas filled to capacity once again.
Over the succeeding weeks, predictions were thrown out the window as multiple early favorites were booted out of contention like the 2020 champion Los Angeles Lakers, 2020 runner-up Miami Heat, the Brooklyn Nets super-team, and other safe picks like the Philadelphia 76ers, Boston Celtics, Utah Jazz, and the Los Angeles Clippers.
Now, two teams are left for Game 1 of the finals on Tuesday, July 6 (Wednesday, July 7, 9am, Manila time), the Phoenix Suns and the Milwaukee Bucks.
On the surface, it just looks like two new teams got their turns to fight for the elusive NBA title, but the numbers show that their stories back to the top are much, much more than that.
103- Suns and Bucks’ combined years of waiting for the next NBA championship
Since the Suns’ inception as a team in 1953, the franchise has never won the big one, and only came close with finals appearances in 1976 and 1993, led by Paul Westphal and Charles Barkley, respectively.
The Bucks, meanwhile, struck gold just three years into its existence when lanky sophomore center Lew Alcindor, now known as the legendary Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, helped Milwaukee win the 1971 NBA title.
In a nice twist to the narrative, the Bucks won the 1969 pick they used to select Alcindor in a coin flip against none other than the Suns. Phoenix settled for big man Neal Walk, who only played seven seasons in the NBA before settling in Italy.
Playing alongside the original triple-double king Oscar Robertson, Alcindor and the Bucks reached the finals one more time in 1974 representing the Western Conference, but lost in a grueling seven-game series to John Havlicek and the Boston Celtics.
Since then, the road back to the top has been long and lonely for the two franchises, but one team will finally end its title drought this year no matter what.
32 – Suns and Bucks players making their NBA finals debuts
To say that the Suns and Bucks are finals newcomers is an understatement. Out of 33 combined players in their rosters, only Suns forward Jae Crowder has had finals experience, which he earned just last year as a starter for the Heat.
Even 16-year veteran and future Hall of Famer Chris Paul only made it this year.
Backing up even to the Conference Finals field, only the Clippers’ Kawhi Leonard, Serge Ibaka and Rajon Rondo, and the Atlanta Hawks’ Solomon Hill have reached basketball’s biggest stage in their careers, with the LA trio also having rings to show for it.
Regardless of who wins, the league just raised the mentoring value of 32 more players in its ranks.
301 – Devin Booker’s career season losses before reaching the NBA finals
Paul has jokingly called teammate Devin Booker as “the oldest 24-year-old” he has ever met, but there is a reason for that jab.
In his six-year career, the two-time All-Star guard has tallied 301 regular season losses, including two-straight seasons with more than 60.
To put that number in perspective, the Clippers’ Leonard, a two-time Finals MVP and the league’s winningest active player with a career 74% win rate, has only lost 264 times in a whole decade of regular season competition.
At the win rate he is going with right now, Leonard will need two more seasons’ worth of losses by his 12th year to reach what Booker has gone through in half the time.
Long story short, Booker endured the face of defeat for far too long, but has insisted to fight it out with the franchise that drafted him. Now, in his first-ever playoff run, Booker has a chance to finally reap the rewards of his and his team’s loyalty to each other.
2 – Suns head coach Monty Williams’ playoff wins before this season
Bucks head coach Mike Budenholzer is an established name in coaching circles, and for good reason.
Since leaving the San Antonio Spurs’ assistant coach den led by the legendary Gregg Popovich in 2013, coach “Bud” has earned 32 playoff wins to his name with three conference finals runs.
Suns’ shot-caller Monty Williams, in contrast, has won twice prior to this season, despite having a two-year head start to Budenholzer’s career.
Due to his poor coaching record with a New Orleans team that once featured both the Suns’ Paul and the Bucks’ Jrue Holiday at certain points, the 49-year-old Williams was out of a head coaching job for four years before the Suns hired him in 2019.
Personal playoff record comparisons aside, this is the first finals for both Budenholzer and Williams. In a matchup between two teams pegged as relatively even, fans will now see who can utilize his pieces the best to win one more series of hardwood chess.
Practically a clean slate
More significant numbers will certainly pop out as the 2021 finals move along, but the most important figure right now is zero.
In a 50-year time period that saw the rise of dynasties like the Lakers, Celtics, Chicago Bulls, and Golden State Warriors, the Suns and Bucks have been watching, just biding their time for that one title they can finally claim as their own, but they got none.
At least for one team, the time for waiting is over. Fans just need to sit back, and once again watch history unfold. – Rappler.com
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