Today’s lesson: Grit and desire > stats and replay. And, everything > Miami Heat
The 2011 Finals, strangely, is the most metaphoric series in years, not because the Mavericks, or even Dirk, carry any inherent meaning, but because something must stand in opposition to Team Villain. The stats-and-replay revolution has freed sport of much of its weight and cleared the way for a more rational, genteel discussion, but the heroic song of Dirk versus the Heat — the one starring the blonde, bedraggled gunslinger and the three severely talented villains in black-and-red — has wormholed us all back to the 1950s, when every blade of grass on every field was idyllic, when every football game was won on abstractions such as “grit” and “desire,” when the outcome of a boxing match might tell something about ourselves and how we might get along.
