However, someone ingeniously came up with a website specifically for hypothetical needs. This site is whatifsports.com. It uses statistics from basketball-reference.com to match up any team from any era against any other team. It covers the four major sports plus college. Really cool site to kill one hour (OK two hours).....(OK three).....OK half a day. Being the basketball weirdo that I am, I decided to do a fake oral history of a fake series (I will probably start talking about actual basketball once the season gets going a bit more). ESPN and Grantland(RIP) do/did some good oral histories of games, but never for fake series'. What match up would I do?
96 Bulls vs 85 Celtics? Bad Boys Pistons vs Lebron's Heat teams? Nah, those would be too obvious. Instead I decided to put one of the crazier modern teams against a team from the 60's.
The team representing the 21st century: 2006-2007 Denver Nuggets. (45-37) Why? Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, they had Carmelo, Marcus Camby, Allen Iverson, Andre Miller (he was traded mid season for Iverson but the websites includes him so I will too), Earl Boykins, and wait for it..... JR Smith. How many ball stoppers can you fit on one team? They also represent what was wrong about mid 2000's basketball, the me over the team mentality. Here's one of this teams biggest moments:
What happens when these two styles clash? Find out.
The following is a fake oral history. None of this actually happened, and everything said is false.
New Orleans Coach Babe McCarthy (I am not making his name up): Going into that series, I told my men to buckle down and play their hardest. They have fight. They have courage. They have each other. And at the end of the day, that's all that matters.
Denver Coach George Karl: I told my guys, well actually I didn't tell them anything. The only players who showed up on time to the mandatory meeting was Earl Boykins. The rest of team was either an hour late or didn't show up at all.
Denver Point Guard Allen Iverson: I just arrived in Denver, and they tell me we are playing a team from the 60's in a best of five series?
New Orleans Forward Ron Franz: I was focused. These kids now days are ruining the game. We had to teach them a lesson, so to speak.
New Orleans Center Red Robbins (real name): I look at this series like I look at a burger, you have to put everything you have into it.
Fake TV Network play by play commentary Al Michaels: They called me up and said: Al, the Nuggets from ten years ago are playing the Buccaneers. And at this point I was only doing football, so I thought they were doing some cross sports game. But no, I was later told (after I agreed) that it was the 1968 New Orleans Buccaneers.
Fake TV Network color commentary Reggie Miller: I said yes right away, I knew these dudes couldn't shoot like me.
Game one and two were in the Pepsi Center.
McCarthy: This arena was huge. But I measured the hoops and said men, these hoops are ten feet, just like back at home. (The producers of Hoosiers would later sue McCarthy for using that strategy without permission) We walked into the arena, and two players vomited, that's how different it was than what my men were used to.
Robbins: I'll admit it, I vomited as if I ate a bad burger.
Karl: Before the game I sat down the team and said you have to play 48 minutes. These guys don't know the modern day rules, we have that to our advantage.
Michaels: There was speculation they might remove the 3 point line to accommodate the Buccaneers, but JR Smith said he refused to play if they did so.
Game one begins.
First possession of the Game, Iverson hits a fade away two.
McCarthy: My men had never seen that type of shot or that type of speed before.
Jimmy Jones: I was used to guarding the likes of Mack Calvin and Darel Carrier, see.
Iverson: These dudes were slower than kids at my basketball camp.
With the game tied at 23, Buccaneer Lee Davis dunked it at the buzzer.
McCarthy: You better believe I chewed him a new one! He dunked it?! FUNDAMENTALS!
Nugget guard Steve Blake: And I thought my dunks looked dorky.
Michaels: So you had this team that had no business being there, up after one. You could tell they were in it to win it, while Denver looked like they could not care less.
Carmelo: We couldn't care less.
With about 8 minutes to go in the second, Mike Butler swats a Carmelo jumper. The next Denver possession Jack Moreland stole the ball from Carmelo.
Miller: Melo just didn't respect these guys. After those two plays, he looked angry.
Moreland: It's all about what coach taught us, I was just honored to have the chance to steal the ball.
McCarthy: Fundamentals!
At halftime the score was New Orleans 56-Denver 51.
Michaels: You could hear a pin drop in the Pepsi Center. Marcus Camby tossed a chair onto the floor. Emotions were running high.
Miller: JR Smith didn't play a single minute in the first half, and he was not happy about it.
Karl: JR comes into the locker room and is fuming. I thought he was mad about the score, no. He was mad about not playing. He said put me in coach, I got this.
JR: Did he put me in? No.
Michaels: The 3rd quarter defined the game.
McCarthy: In the locker room you better believe I ripped them a new one for being so bombastic and cocky in the first half. They needed to be FUNDAMENTALLY sound.
Jimmy Jones: Coach really let us have it, see. We couldn't let him down.
Karl: When the 3rd quarter was over, JR walked into the locker room. That's how upset he was.
At the end of 3, the score was 83-69.
Andre Miller: They just outplayed us that quarter. To be honest, we just didn't respect them.
Michaels: In the fourth quarter, with under two minutes to go, Red Robbins made two of the most spectacular plays I have ever seen. The Nuggets had cut it down to 105-100 and had the ball. But then Robbins picked off an Andre Miller pass, drove down the court and got fouled by Carmelo, it was his sixth foul!
Carmelo: These refs were awful. Half of them were modern refs, and half were ABA. When I fouled out all I was thinking was I need to get the hell out of Denver.
Iverson: For him to foul out at such a crucial point, that was devastating
Michaels: So Robbins hits both free throws and then comes up with another steal!
Robbins: It's like a well priced burger, it was a great steal.
Miller: So the Buc's were up six with about ten seconds to play, and for whatever reason, Ron Franz dunks the ball as time expired. The Nuggets were not too happy about that.
Karl: Camby threw a chair at Franz and chased him down. The weird thing is, the rest of their team ran to the locker room, poor Franz was left by himself.
McCarthy: I immediately tried to kick him off my team. There is no room for that kind of nonsense. Unfortunately we were not allowed to make any roster changes between games.
Karl: After the game we looked at the numbers...Iverson was 14 of 30 from the field.
Miller: AI was off and Melo was 0-4 from three? Something wasn't right.
Iverson: You miss every shot you don't take.
JR: At least I didn't miss any shots.
Miller: The amazing thing was, New Orleans won the game after only making two 3's, out of 4 attempts. You know what their coach says...
McCarthy: Fundamentals!
Red Robbins was named Player of the Game with 19 points, 13 rebounds, 4 blocks, and 4 steals.
Game TWO ( I have decided to cut this best of five short by summarizing the non elimination games)
New Orleans came out and outscored Denver 35-25 in the first quarter, but Denver was not having it this time.
Denver outscored New Orleans each of the next three quarters to win 113-104.
Karl: Melo carried us.
Carmelo: One game closer to getting out of here.
Iverson: We walked into this arena and we all started laughing.
Karl: This place looked like a high school auditorium.
McCarthy: We sold out. All 6,500 seats were full. It was a beautiful sight.
Carmelo: I had more people at my middle school games.
McCarthy: None of my men could stop that Anthony kid, they were all too slow. They also got away from the FUNDAMENTALS!
Melo: One game from booking my flight outta here.
Game FOUR
McCarthy: I told my guys before the game, this what there last chance to make their fans proud. I told them when they go home tonight, and have to look their wives and kids in the eyes, they need to be proud! Proud of what they have done tonight! That is all they can ask for! Most of these guys have other jobs, their basketball salaries aren't enough to support their families. So, when they go back to those jobs, I want them to tell their co-workers about what they did here today, about what it meant to be a New Orleans Buccaneer!
Karl: I told my guys to finish this thing.
Moreland: I was nervous. This could be the last game for us, we knew we had enough to force one more game.
Steve Jones: I needed this game. My law firm Jones and Jones with Jimmy was tanking. I didn't have no where else to go.
Jimmy Jones: Jones and Jones had hit the rails running, see. We needed to keep this boat a float, see.
Carmelo: I came in with one mindset: Drop 30 on em, and get the hell outta here.
Iverson: As much fun as it was running circles around these slow dudes, I was ready to end this series.
First Quarter:
McCarthy: We started the game on an 8-2 run. Ron Franz hit a nice fundamental 5 footer to get us to 8.
Franz: I just practiced what coach preached, so to speak.
Denver rallied back to tie the game at 8.
Michaels: You see, we only had the broadcasting rights to game one and four. The middle two games were on NBA TV.
Miller: I had forgotten this series was still going, and they called me and said hey Reg, game four is tomorrow.
Jack Moreland hit a shot to put the Bucs up two, and then Franz tipped in a Jimmy Jones miss to put the Bucs up 4.
Franz: Coach taught us to never give up on a possession, so to speak.
Jimmy Jones scored 6 unanswered points for the Buccaneers to close out the quarter ahead 32-22.
Melo: I look up at the scoreboard and thought, oh man, there's going to be a game five if we keep playing like this. I also remembered all the negative attention we got after losing game one. Skip Bayless called me the worst player the NBA has ever seen. I didn't want that attention again.
McCarthy:: Two of my players high-fived after the quarter, and I benched them. They lost their focus.
Jimmy Jones: I felt good going into the second. The ball was being put in the basket, see.
Franz: We were riding a momentum wave, so to speak.
Michaels: You could see the Nuggets wanted no part of a game five. They came out on fire. In hindsight, it was probably best for the series, since game five was also on NBA TV.
The Nuggets tied the game at 36 after a Carmelo jumper.
McCarthy: I called timeout and told my men, this is it. If we don't turn it around here, we may never being able to look our wives in the eyes ever again.
The rest of quarter was back and forth. Jimmy Jones hit a jumper with 15 seconds left to tie it, but Iverson hit a runner with a second left.
At the half Denver was up 55-53.
Here are the respective halftime speeches, according to sources close to the situation:
McCarthy: Men, this is it. If we come out there flat, we are done. Great moments are born from great opportunity. And that's what you have here tonight, men (McCarthy was later sued by the producers of Miracle. He lost both suits and worked two jobs to pay off the fees).
Karl: 24 minutes, then we can all celebrate.
JR Smith: Coach knew what we wanted to hear.
Michaels: The third quarter turned out to be a wash. So at the end of three the score was 86-84 Denver.
McCarthy: I told my men, we have them right where we want them.
Michaels: With three minutes left, Iverson hits a shot to put Denver up 110-101.
Franz: Coach called a timeout, and what coach told us in that huddle inspires me to this day. I can't say what he said as he is afraid of more legal ramifications, so to speak.
Michaels: New Orleans goes on a run, and all of a sudden the score is 114-111 with under a minute left. With about 40 seconds left, Iverson inexplicably throws the ball out of bounds.
Iverson: Just wanted to see if they were clutch.
Micahaels: So, the Buccaneers have a chance, and they went with their man, Jimmy Jones. But he missed.
Jimmy Jones: I have made that shot thousands of times in practice. It just didn't go in, see.
Carmelo: And then Jones or whoever fouls me and I drain em both. There was so much relief after those shots went in. It was finally over.
Michaels: There just wasn't enough time for New Orleans.
Final Score: Denver: 119, New Orleans 113. Denver wins the series 3-1.
Final thoughts: Denver:
Carmelo: I got my 30. Goodbye Denver.
Carmelo was eventually traded to the Knicks, which turned out to be just as ridiculous as this series was.
Iverson: Game.
Iverson went on to play over-seas but never captured the success he had in Philly and in this series.
JR Smith: I only played in one game. One game!
JR Smith also ended up on the Knicks (see above)
Coach Karl: I was kind of relieved, there were a lot of me first guys on that team.
Karl went on to become the coach of the Kings, built around me first guys.
New Orleans:
Robbins: It was devastating. It was like getting a cold burger.
Red Robbins went on to start a successful burger chain.
Franz: We got outplayed, so to speak.
Ron Franz went on to open up a frozen yogurt stand in Raleigh, North Carolina.
Moreland: This was the end of basketball for me. I didn't know what to do next.
To this day, Jack Moreland is still contemplating what to do next.
Steve Jones: No one remembers my series, they all talk about Jimmy. And that's fine with me. I have a lot of respect for him.
Jimmy Jones: I played really well, but it didn't matter in the end, see.
Jimmy Jones rode his wave of "fame" and started his own law firm called Jones. Steve Jones was not involved, much to Steve's disgruntlement.
McCarthy: My men played their hearts out. But I guess now days heart means nothing when facing superior talent.
Babe McCarthy continued to fight the movie producers lawsuits, eventually settling in court for an undisclosed sum. He keeps busy by coach the local middle school team.
Al Michaels: I have called many snoozers in my day, but that series....well, yeah, it was a snoozer.
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