Like I said yesterday, this is a great time to be a Memphis sports fan. Even the Grizzlies pulled one out of the hat and shut down Kobe last night. And sure they only won by a point, but it still counts as a win.
In my humble opinion, the Memphis Redbirds are the ones to thank for all of this. It was them building a state of the art baseball stadium downtown, and putting fans in the seats with great games that got the attention of the sports world. They put pride back into the city’s sports fans, gave us all a sense that the Tigers could win too if we rooted hard enough. And their success showed the NBA that Memphis would support a professional team.
Of course the NBA raped the city on the new stadium deal. In the process setting up an unheard of first-refusal clause that allows the Grizzlies to control every entertainment event that comes to town, and leaves the city with two mostly vacant, mostly worthless arenas; the Mid-South Coliseum and the Memphis Pyramid. The Grizzlies only guaranteed they would be in town until the first set of bond payments come due. After that they can leave, and not pay the city enough to cover the light bill on what would be empty arena number three.
Still, the Grizzlies have a winning record and FedEx Forum no longer gets my tax dollars. It’s all good for me.
More later.