Toronto Raptors and the benefits of caring

After 24 years, the Toronto Raptors have finally made the NBA Finals and reminded their tortured fan base why sports fandom is all worth it.

A little less than seven years ago, Bill Simmons wrote ‘The Consequences of Caring,’ which came to be my favourite column he’s ever written.

Say what you want about some of his outlandish opinions these days, but Simmons sure could write. Talk to ten professional sportswriters between the ages of 20 and 40, and six or seven of them will likely mention him as an inspiration.

Simmons perfectly described the emotional highs and lows of sports fandom, all the reasons why we, as sports fans, continue to care about the results of games that don’t affect our lives in any tangible way:

"Everything is black and white on the surface. You win, you lose, you laugh, you cry, you cheer, you boo, and most of all, you care. Lurking underneath that surface, that’s where all the good stuff is — the memories, the connections, the love, the fans, the layers that make sports what they are."

The irony here is that Simmons and I have seemingly had polar opposite experiences, as NBA fans.

Simmons grew up a Celtics fan in the ‘70s and ‘80s, watching his team win five championships over those two decades with some of the greatest players who’ve ever lived, including a top-10 player ever. His hometown team is the most historic franchise in NBA history, starting as one of the 11 original teams and winning a league-high 17 titles over 70-plus seasons.

I grew up watching the Toronto Raptors, one of the newest NBA franchises. I got hooked at seven years old, rooting for a team whose leading scorer was Mike James. My idea of a high-stakes game was a regular-season matchup against Public Enemy No. 1, Vince Carter. An entire fan base would hope and pray that Carter wouldn’t break its hearts again and then collectively lose its mind once he did.

Going into Saturday night’s Game 6, I was confident the Raptors had figured out Milwaukee, despite having picked the Bucks to win the series beforehand. I only had one lingering fear: The idea that Giannis Antetokounmpo would erupt the way LeBron James did in Boston in 2012.

James had been in the same situation, down 2-3 in the conference finals, playing for his team’s season in a road Game 6. The game that had inspired Simmons’ heartbroken column in the first place.

I knew the comparison wasn’t apt, as James was a better player in 2012 than Antetokounmpo is at the present moment. But I couldn’t help but think back to Simmons’ article. To his despair at flying across the United States only to watch his team lose its last chance at a title with its aging core.

"“He ruined what should have been a magical night,” Simmons wrote. “It was like being in a car accident. LeBron James ran over 18,000 people.”"

All this briefly crossed my mind going into Game 6. What I didn’t expect: The Bucks would start finally making their 3-pointers at a high clip (6-for-9 in the first quarter) and the Raptors would find themselves down 15 points late in the third quarter, despite a quiet scoring night from Antetokounmpo. Every time Toronto would begin to make a push, the Bucks would find an answer.

Until they didn’t.

The Raptors finally broke through with a 26-3 run in the third and fourth quarters, capped by a monstrous dunk by Kawhi Leonard that made the crowd go bonkers. It was a moment that every Raptors fan had waited for since the moment they started following the team – whether that moment was in November 1995 or April 2019.

For once, Toronto’s destiny wasn’t to get so close, just to watch things slip away. Maybe that should’ve been clear after Leonard’s game-winning shot against the Philadelphia 76ers dropped into the net after four bounces like a divine power had willed it to do so.

But as close as the series was, the Raptors were still favoured coming in against Philadelphia; it wasn’t supposed to be as difficult as it was. In the next round, most experts picked the Bucks, who were the favourites by all statistical measures. Many of them doubled and tripled down on their predictions once Milwaukee led the series 2-0, a deficit that so few teams in history had overcome.

Now, the 2019 Raptors are one of those teams.

Many newer fans, or even non-sports fans, in Toronto will remember tuning in for Game 6, which had the largest Canadian TV audience for a basketball game in history. For long-suffering Raptors fans, it was everything that truly matters in sports.

Saturday night was a reminder of why sports fandom matters. It was a reminder that the emotional investment in something that you shouldn’t really care that much about – and all the pain and heartbreak that comes with that investment – is worth it.

Raptors fans have often pondered ‘What ifs,’ from Carter missing a potential series-winning shot in 2001, to Jose Calderon’s errant pass to end a series in 2007, to the numerous missed chances in Game 1 of the second round in 2018.

On Saturday, there was no ‘What if.’ There was only ‘what is,’ ‘what will be,’ and a whole lot of cheers, claps, and tears.