I’m just unbelievably over-joyed right now. The Boston Celtics just came out and steamrolled the LA Lakers 131-92 tonight to win the team’s 17th NBA Championship and first since 1986. This not only ended their 22 year championship drought, but my own as a fan of professional sports, as the Orioles haven’t won since ‘83, the Flyers since ‘75 and the Dolphins since the ‘73 season (the Flyers and Dolphins have never won a title with me as a fan).

The best part about it was this didn’t seem possible even a year ago. We had just finished one of the worst seasons in team history where we tanked the last half of the season in the hopes of getting the 1st pick in the draft lottery to land Oden or Durant. Then the lottery balls don’t fall our way and we end up getting stuck with the 5th pick of the draft all but ending our hopes of building a championship team for years to come. But then Danny boy traded that pick for Ray Allen, which was universally DOGGED on draft day by all the experts, and then used the leverage of having Ray Ray convince Kevin Garnett to accept a trade to wear Celtic green. And, well, the rest is history. We’re the 2008 NBA Champions!

PS - I think this means that The Curse of Dave Z might be finally over!

Words can’t express how excited I am after watching the Celtics come back from 24 down to beat the Lakers tonight to take a commanding 3-1 series lead. We’re just one win away from my first professional championship in 22 years! I’m still in shock over us coming back and winning this game. I know it’ll suck for people looking for a good series, but I hope we can just go out and win this thing on Father’s day.

Even though Kobe was being his MVP self and Sasha played out of his mind, Game 3 was ours for the taking and we missed out on a great chance to take complete control over this series thanks to some horrible shooting and sloppy play from guys like Paul Pierce. He made some of the laziest passes that ended up being turnovers and was just throwing up bricks left and right while not taking it hard to the hoop. And what’s up with them not fouling when they still had a chance to win or not having a good play call to set up for a three after the time out? Doc Rivers is just retarded some times.

A lot of the credit goes to the Lakers’ D, but guys like Pierce and Garnett just needed to be more aggressive instead of settling for bricks from long range. The reason I thought this was ours for the taking was that despite Kobe’s and Sasha’s efforts, the rest of the team didn’t really do that well. You’re not going to get many games where Odom, Gasol and Fisher all play that poorly on the offensive end in LA. Not to mention the fact that Lakers tried to give it away by making only 61% of their foul shots. I still think we might be able to take at least one of the next two games, but if we don’t then this game will likely be looked at as one that we let slip away.

I don’t even know what to say after that game. The C’s just dominated the 3rd and the beginning of the 4th up until Kobe & The Kobbette’s started nailing three’s like they were going outta style. The weird thing is that even though the lead was cut down to 2 from 24, I never really felt like we were gonna lose this one. Luckily, my feelings held true and they held them off and are now up in the series 2-0. We can easily lose the next three in LA, so the series isn’t a lock yet. I am definitely happier being up 2-0 than I would if we were down 2-0, though. Go Celtics!

We’re just three wins away from an NBA Championship! I know Game 1 doesn’t a series make, but it’s much more important that we win these first two games in Boston than for the Lakers to win even just one so this game was extremely important to me. It was also an amazing game to watch as the series is looking like it could live up to all the Lakers vs. Celtics hype. Game 2 on Sunday will be huge, but I’ll worry about that when the time comes and just try to be excited about this win for the next couple of days. With the Flyers making it deep into the Stanley Cup Playoffs and now with the Celtics in the NBA Finals, this has been one of my best years of a sports fan for quite a long time. Someone needs to tell the Orioles that they ought to be winning more for me! Seriously, did they not get the memo??

Yessssss!!!!!!!! The Celtics are back in the NBA Finals after a 21 year drought and they’ll be in a dream match-up with the league’s MVP Kobe Bryant and his magnificent Los Angeles Lakers. I’m so fucking excited that my heart is just racing like crazy and I can’t help but grin from ear to ear.

To close out Detroit in Auburn Hills tonight in Game 6 was thrilling and I’m so proud of my boys for coming through with their 2nd road win this series. The best part is that it seems we’re getting big games from different people every night. Pierce and Allen came through tonight and so did did role players like James Posey who had a brilliant 4th quarter defensively. The three straight missed free throws definitely made my heart miss a few beats, but the bottom line is that they scored enough points and made enough shots to win.

I’m scared shitless of the Finals match-up with the Lakers and thoroughly believe we’re the underdogs, but, hell, that’s why they play the games. All it takes is another four more wins. It should be an amazing series and I would be beyond thrilled if the boys in green can pull this one out. Go Celtics!!!

I wish my Boston Celtics could’ve just held on to that 15 point lead or even increased it, but the bottom line is that they withheld the Pistons’ mighty 4th quarter charge and came out victorious in Game 5 tonight. It was a must-win game because there’s no way they could’ve rebounded from blowing this one to win Game 6 in Detroit and then Game 7 back in Boston. Now we’re only one win away from a dream match-up with the Los Angeles Lakers (Yes, I’ve already given them that series). Go Celtics!

It was most likely a boring game for pure fans of NBA basketball that didn’t have as stake in either team, but I enjoyed the crap out of it. I just needed a game where the Celtics came out strong and just held the lead throughout, so yesterday’s 94-80 victory over the Pistons in Auburn Hills was a Godsend. I just hope that they can bring the same intensity in Game 4 because just getting back home court advantage doesn’t mean shit against a team like the Pistons. I’m just praying we can somehow end this thing quickly because my stomach wouldn’t be able to handle the stress of this thing going too deep. Detroit’s too good and too experienced for my liking and even though a Game 7 would be in Boston, you wouldn’t be able to count them out, as the Spurs showed against the Hornets in the last round. Monday’s game in Detroit is gonna be huge.

I’m not really all that surprised and knew coming in that we’d have to find a way to win a game on the road this series. Getting a split in the upcoming two games is now an absolute must after losing tonight in Boston. It looks like we’ll get to see what KG, Pierce, Ray Ray and the rest of my Celtics are made of.

Pierce played out of his mind today and practically carried the Celtics to this game 7 victory over the Lebrons. It’s fitting since he’s the Celtic with the longest tenure and the one that probably had it the hardest during last year’s horrific season. He came through in spades today, as did role players like PJ Brown and Eddie House. I’m very proud of the way the team hustled and just threw their bodies around, it was Celtics Pride at its finest.

The Detroit series will be a beast, particularly because of Boston’s road woes. However, I have faith in my boys and am hoping that they might just match up better against Detroit than they did against Atlanta or Cleveland — meaning that while Detroit is by far a better overall team than the Hawks or Cavs, they don’t have any scorers in the vein of a Lebron or Joe Johnson that really gave Boston problems. Nevertheless, I’m both nervous and excited. It should be a fun and hard fought series that will hopefully end with the C’s in the NBA Finals.

Even though I’m happy that we’re up 2-0 on the Lebrons, I more relieved than ecstatic because a home loss might have been disastrous. The real test is coming with the next two games in Cleveland because if the Boston Celtics can’t come together on the road then our NBA Championship hopes might have to wait until next year. My fingers are crossed that the Hawks series was a nice kick in the butt for them and we’ll be able to keep up the intensity shown in defending Lebron & Co. in the first two games of this series.

I keep reading comments and posts on ESPN.com saying that Boston sucks and that Celtics fans should be embarrassed that the lowly 8th seeded Hawks took them to a game 7. What the fuck ever. The team was 24-58 last year and had the 2nd worst record in the league. They added Allen, KG and a slew of other players, dominated the regular season and are in the process of humiliating the Hawks in Boston (currently up 36 points with 2:24 to go in the 4th). I’m proud of the  team and will be even if they don’t add another banner to the rafters in the Garden this year. I’m looking forward to an extremely difficult challenge going up against King James and Cleveland, as it should be an amazing series reminiscent of the times the Celtics took on Jordan’s Bulls in his early years. It should be FANtastic.

Speaking of fantastic, I’m even more thrilled by the fact that the Flyers finished off the Canadians last night putting them into the Eastern Conference Finals of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. They finished 22-48-12 last season, which was dead last in the NHL with only 56 points, so making it this far has been a fun, albeit stressful, ride. I can’t wait to see them take on Crosby, Malkin and the Pens (assuming they don’t collapse against the Rangers).

Still riding on the high of having 8 vials of blood siphoned from my body (and the subsequent replacement of it with new and completely fresh blood not yet tainted by my devilish habits), I was given more to be joyful about in the form of a Flyers 4-2 win over the Canadians and a Celtics 110-85 throbbing of the Hawks.

The Flyers, as per form, got a 2-0 lead only to blow it and make things interesting before finally coming out on top. The finish is all that matters in the end, but if I start getting gray hairs or have a stroke the blame is going to be put on them. I’m really hoping they can close it out this weekend. My fingers are crossed and a blade isn’t coming anywhere near my playoff “beard” (if you can call the long scraggly hairs hanging under my chin a beard).

The C’s did exactly what they did in the first two home games — blow out the Hawks — so now it’s time to see if they can pull things together in Atlanta’s raucous arena to finally close out this series on Friday. I don’t want to see it go to a game 7 in either series, because I’m not sure if my heart could take it.

I’ve been busy both at work and at home, so the updates have been thin of late. Here’s a quick re-cap of what’s been going on. I’m honestly shocked that Atlanta was able to even up the series at 2-2 with my Boston Celtics. I knew coming in that they had some phenomenal young players, but I figured my boys would be able to turn it on in the playoffs after being in 2nd gear for the past two months and just roll them in four. While I’m still confident we can win this series, it looks like it’ll be a fight to get out of it and a mighty struggle to get out of the supposedly weak East.

The Philadelphia Flyers have been a welcome surprise, though I don’t want to get too confident because a 2-1 series lead doesn’t mean it’s a lock, particularly after they almost blew the 3-1 lead against the Caps. Still, it’s been awesome cheering them on and I’m hoping they can continue to play great and make it to the Eastern Conference Finals against Malkin, Crosby & the Pens (assuming they continue to dominate their series).

On a more personal note, I’ve been experienced what I’ve self-diagnosed as kidney pains. It might just my back muscles, but the signs and symptoms point more to the kidneys. I have a doctor’s appointment today, so I’ll find out more later this afternoon. Shit hurts, though, and really makes it hard to concentrate.

Luckily, amid the kidney pains that started Saturday afternoon after downing 12 diet Pepsi’s in 10 minutes and the struggles of the C’s and the stress of watching the Flyers get big leads, blow the leads, then either win or lose at the end, it was really nice to be able to release some stress killing random people in GTA IV. God, I love this game and this series.

I’ve only played a couple of hours of the single player (going through some really boring parts) and had a lot of fun playing with other 2K guys online multiplayer, but I can see why it’s gotten all the 10s. There’s just so much good too it. So much that you can forgive all the flaws such as the horrid animations, sloppy camera angles, god-awful AI, fucked up targeting issues, etc, etc. It is easily the most-flawed “best. game. ever” that I’ve yet played. I could probably write an IGN-esque 25,000 word review just bitching about the game. Then again, I could write as many praising the hell out of it. In the end, I’m sure the good will mightily outweigh the bad and I’ll love this as much as the previous games in the series and quite possibly more.

The weekend was a blur and came and went like a cloud of smoke. I apologize (cue the Timbaland song now) for the lack of updates because I’ve actually got quite a bit I could’ve posted. There’s plenty for me to share with you, such as the week 1 Extenze results, the first weekend of the NBA playoffs, the current state of the NHL playoffs, the NFL draft less than a week away, a “Dear Dave” update and the state of my overall health and current masturbatory fantasies. But, I’ve been busy doing absolutely nothing except being chill on a joyous holiday weekend.

I’m a Boston Celtics fan so I’m not complaining, but I’ve been saying from day one that I wouldn’t be surprised if the NBA very strongly urged, if not forced, the T-Wolves to make the Kevin Garnett trade. My reasoning was that the NBA was facing a marketing nightmare because of the Tim Donaghy scandal and needed something to excite the fans. And what better way to do this than giving the C’s KG and making one of the most storied NBA franchises relevant again.

Why do I bring this up again? Well, the Memphis Grizzlies recently completed a trade of its superstar Paul Gasol that looks infinitely worse than the one Kevin McHale got lambasted for when he traded KG to the Celts. Oh, and guess who the trade was with? Yeah, the Los Angeles Lakers. Kobe’s team gave up some scrubs and netted a bona fide stud in Gasol (who debuted with LA tonight scoring 24 pts and pulling down 12 rebounds). It’s as if the basketball god’s (or the NBA front office) is looking for a classic Lakers versus Celtics NBA final to help up its ratings after way too many piss poor draws thanks to teams like the San Antonio Spurs being dominant. It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out.

Whilst the football teams haven’t done their part to help curb my alcoholism, my hockey and basketball teams have made great strides after horrid seasons last year. The Flyers have gotten off to an excellent 15-9-2 start to lead the Atlantic after finishing last season as the worst team in the league by a whopping 11 points. The acquisition of Daniele Briere has been paying off mightily, Biron’s been strong in the net, and they’ve just been a lot more fun to watch than they were last year. I’m not a fan of the dirty hits and all the suspensions, but am liking the team’s chances at making a run at the cup.

The Celtics are doing even better thanks to the trades for Garnett and Allen, plus the signings of a bunch of key role players that have been exceeding initial expectations. At 15-2, the green are already more than halfway to their win total for all of last year and are showing that they have a legit shot at representing the Eastern Conference in the NBA Finals and possibly even winning it all.

I’m just thrilled that they’re relevant again and so damn fun to watch. I haven’t really enjoyed watching them play much since Reggie’s death, except for maybe brief spurts during the Pierce/Walker days, but this C’s team is as fun to watch as the ones in the Larry Legend days.