It's finally over. LeBron James promised the city of Cleveland that he would bring the NBA title home, and he did just that. After 52 long years of misery from Cleveland sports fans, they could finally celebrate the end of their championship drought. LeBron James put on the show of his career throughout these playoffs, and was announced as NBA Finals MVP. By defeating the Warriors, the Cavaliers ended what could have been the greatest single season in basketball history. Throughout these playoffs, there have been different levels of affection for both teams. Now the question is, why is it that people hate success for sports teams?
Throughout these playoffs whenever I was watching GSW, people that I am watching the game with always wanted them to lose. Why so? Their reasoning behind this is more often than not, “They’re just too good”. Now this team has been up and coming for a few years now, and now they are a championship caliber team. It is understandable to not like them from a few viewpoints, such as their cockiness at times along with the emotions Draymond Green can display on the court. But to not like them simply because they play the sport at a high level and they’re good at it?
Now take a look at LeBron James. One can say he is the most polarizing athlete of our time. You either love the guy, or you despise him. Some people didn't want the Cavaliers to win simply because LeBron is on the team. Now most of his hate comes from joining up with Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh in Miami back in 2010 through the infamous “The Decision”, but to this day people still hold hate for him because of that, or for some other miscellaneous reasons since he has stepped onto the court. Despite all of this, he has been the face of the NBA for years now making six straight NBA Finals appearance, being rivaled only by Stephen Curry nowadays.
What about other sports you may ask? Take a look at a successful sports franchise such as the New England Patriots. They have a consistent brand with being successful every year, and some people can despise a team for this also, look at what the San Antonio Spurs have done since 1999 in the NBA. Sure, you can bring up Spy Gate, most recently Deflate Gate as well as other possible cheating scenarios on their end, but why hate the consistency?
You could also look at the Chicago Blackhawks in the NHL, winning three out of the last five Stanley Cups in the past five years. This success has brought some bad taste in people’s mouths. One person who spoke on this matter said this, “When you have successful sport franchises, you are always going to get those fans who are complete bandwagon fans. They’ll try to argue the game with you and make absolutely no sense, and sometimes these arguments become full-blown screaming matches. That’s what makes success annoying at some times”.
So, it can be understandable that you don’t like a sports team because of their personalities, suspicion of cheating, bandwagon fans and etc. But, as alluded to earlier in this article, why hate a team just because they’re too good? Why do some people go out of their way to trash talk a team that sometimes really doesn’t deserve the insults? It’s time for some fans to step back and just appreciate the moment, respect the greatness that you witness when these star players/teams go off and rewrite the history books with accolades or championships. These people are living their dreams and playing the sport at the highest level possible with tremendous talent, let them enjoy it. They are people too.
So whether it was Stephen Curry’s unanimous MVP season, or LeBron James’s dominant NBA Finals performance these past two years; let’s sit back and enjoy what we are witnessing. Success shouldn’t bring about the hate that it does.
