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All aboard Sports wouldn't be sports without bandwagons
Updated: Tuesday June 12, 2001 2:52 PM
Sports Illustrated senior writer Jack McCallum touches on a Hot Button issue each Monday on CNNSI.com. After you read Jack's take, give us yours. Shhh. Put your ear to the ground and listen. Because they're . . . rolling, roll-ing, ROLL-LING! Come on, jump on board. Pick your bandwagon, sports fans. Lord knows you've got your choice. Never followed the NHL? Think a faceoff is something that happens only in a Hannibal Lecter novel? Hey, don't worry about it. Stand up, bang your kid's stick on the kitchen floor and shed a manly tear for 40-year-old Ray Bourque! Good ol' 77. (That is his number, right?) Played the role of solid warrior for 22 seasons. (See, I kind of knew him when he was in Boston.) Finally got his just desserts on Saturday night when his Colorado Avalanche beat the New Jersey Devils in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals. (Which, according to reports, were terrific.) Or, are you looking for something younger with fewer dental difficulties? Try that Jennifer Capriati bandwagon. Thought she was still in a detention center dying her hair and listening to old Nirvana tunes? Haven't followed the women's game since Martina and Chrissie stopped swapping backhands and compliments? No problema. Raise a glass to that gutsy 25-year-old (she's that old?) who beat Kim Clijsters (sorry, can't help with the pronunciation) in the French Open (is that the one Pete Sampras annually exits a few minutes after the draw?). Or maybe the biggest vehicle steaming down the pike is the one for you. Get out of the way! The Philadelphia 76ers bandwagon is crowded but still accepting straphangers. What's that? Until these playoffs you thought all those NBA guys were punks with tattoos and criminal records? Until these playoffs you hadn't watched an entire game since Jordan stopped wagging his tongue? Don't be ashamed. Stick out your thumb and climb on. The ancestral home of Magic, Michael and Larry is back, baby! Don't you just love those scrappy 76ers? (They actually play defense!) And, hey, that Iverson's not a bad kid -- he was just misunderstood. (I know somebody who knows somebody with cornrows.) This past weekend was a glorious one in sports, with Bourque getting, at long last, his lifetime achievement award; with Capriati continuing her long comeback from seeming oblivion in a sport where being 25 is like being 75; with the Sixers battling the big, bad defending champion Lakers with one superstar and the cast of The Dirty Dozen. And, man, I heard so many conversions I could have been on the Road to Damascus. Somebody called me, emotionally spent, with a paean to "this guy Bor-kay." Another person stopped me to talk about the wonderful story of "that girl who got in trouble, that Caprinetti." And living as I do near Philadelphia, I couldn't get away from the new members of the Iverson-NBA Fan Club. I have two sisters-in-law who, having been unsure last month of whether basketballs are round or trapezoidal, now wanted to talk about "why they never call a foul on Shaq" (actually, he had six on Sunday) and offer their opinion that "Eric Snow is every bit as good as Kobe Bryant." Well, bless their hearts, because sports wouldn't be sports without bandwagons, new blood and generous infusions of ingenuousness. But this column is dedicated to the diehards and the loyalists. It's for SI's Kostya Kennedy who five years ago wrote how nice it would be if Bourque met Lord Stanley up close and personal. It's for Capriati's family and friends who didn't think she was finished when, as a confused teenager, she got in trouble for using drugs and shoplifting. And, most of all, it's for fans like my friend, Reds Bailey, who faithfully made the 150-mile roundtrip to watch the 76ers even when they occupied the basement, who waited hopefully for Clarence Weatherspoon to develop, who never thought Iverson was a punk, who even has patience and tolerance for Matt Geiger. Folks, as you jump on these bandwagons, Reds and others like him will be on the inside seats -- please extend them every courtesy as the numbers grow. Sports Illustrated senior writer Jack McCallum writes about a Hot Button issue every Monday on CNNSI.com. The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer.
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