Mike Monroe: Attempts at mental manipulation are a playoff tradition
Web Posted: 04/20/2007 11:02 PM CDT
San Antonio Express-News
Mind games seldom work in the NBA playoffs, but that doesn’t stop coaches and players from playing them.
Remember Kobe Bryant dismissing Suns’ guard Raja Bell during a playoff matchup that turned nasty by saying Bell must not have been hugged enough as a kid?
Bell had the last laugh when the Suns advanced.
Now the Suns and Lakers are matched up in another first-round set, and Bell has the mental edge over Bryant.
Nuggets coach George Karl freely admits he wanted only to get in Manu Ginobili’s head two years ago when, after Game 3 of the Nuggets-Spurs first-round series, he called Ginobili’s style “ugly … and hard to watch” and said it was ruining the game.
Then, the Spurs won the next two games from Karl’s Nuggets and went on to their third NBA title.
Karl promises he won’t say anything nasty about Ginobili this go-around.
“He’s one of my favorite players,” Karl said Wednesday night after his bench players beat the Spurs’ bench players in a meaningless regular-season finale. "Is that nasty?
“Manu was one of my favorite players when I said what I said two years ago, too. I was just trying to shake him a little, and I picked the wrong guy.”
Ginobili grins his sheepish grin at the memory.
“I remember the George Karl deal,” he said after the Spurs practiced Friday. "Every time I played there the fans were getting a little crazy and going at me, but I just didn’t mind it.
“That’s what made that series different. The rest was just one tough series.”
Ginobili, whose competitive spirit is unsurpassed in the NBA, admitted Karl’s barb stung for a brief moment. Then he turned it to the Spurs’ advantage.
“It worked out good for us,” he said, “so I just didn’t care … Coaches do whatever it takes to try to win, so I understood it.”
Spurs fans, as well as Nuggets’ assistant coach Doug Moe, won’t forget the mind game Bullets coach Dick Motta employed in the 1979 Eastern Conference Finals. After Moe’s Spurs won Game 4 to take a 3-1 lead, Motta stole Express-News sports columnist Dan Cook’s line that went “the opera ain’t over 'til the fat lady sings,” and turned it into his team’s rallying cry.
The Bullets won the next three games.
As playoff mind games go, Motta’s and Karl’s ploys were minuscule compared with the greatest playoff mind game in league history.
No coach ever will top Red Auerbach’s gambit in the 1966 NBA Finals against the Lakers.
Los Angeles was trying to break through the vise grip the Celtics had established on the championship since getting Bill Russell in 1956. They had won nine championships in 10 years, including eight in a row.
The Celtics defeated the Lakers in five games in 1965, but had finished second in the East, behind Philadelphia, the next season. Then they beat the 76ers in the Eastern Finals and once again had home-court advantage in The Finals.
The Lakers, though, won Game 1 at Boston Garden, 133-129, behind some clutch overtime shooting from Elgin Baylor and Jerry West.
After the game, Auerbach — for whom the Coach of the Year trophy would be named — announced he was retiring after the series and would turn the team over to Russell, who would be player-coach.
The Celtics, even with home-court edge gone after Game 1, rallied to win the title and send Auerbach out in style, puffing on another victory cigar.
No wonder coaches continue to look for that mental edge, anywhere they can find it.