I have to be honest… The first time I saw that the Warriors were making “We Believe” the ubiquotous mantra for their current resurgence, I wasn’t exactly excited. It reminded me a little too much of the Red Sox World Series run from a couple of years ago, and while that turned out to be an incredible sports story, I definitely got tired of their “We Believe” theme. Personally, it just seemed way too corny to me, and almost a little desperate (like the BoSox fans really didn’t quite believe, but were all trying to convince themselves that they actually did).
So with that frame of mind, you can understand why I wasn’t too geeked to see crowds of Warriors fans waving “We Believe” signs during the team’s push to get into the playoffs. “Of course we believe we can make the playoffs,” I thought to myself, “why are we trying so hard to prove it?”
But that’s when it hit me… We weren’t proclaiming that we believed the Warriors could make the playoffs, we were proclaiming that we believed the Warriors would make the playoffs.
Then I came to the painful realization that I had hit my lowest point (in sports fanaticism) in my life. When I was younger (I’m talking early 90s), I didn’t believe that the 49ers could win the Super Bowl every year, I believed that the 49ers would win the Super Bowl every year. When the Giants made their run at the World Series, I didn’t believe that they could win it all, I believed that they would win it all. When Stanford went 32-2 a few years back, I didn’t believe they could win every game they played, I believed they would win every game they played. Regardless of what the “experts” said, or what “logic and reason” would conclude, or what anybody thought or said, I consistently believed that my teams would succeed.
I lost that somewhere… I think it was between the 13-year playoff drought for the Warriors, the steady nose-dive of the 49ers franchise, the last few dissappointing years for the Giants, or the fall to mediocrity for Stanford Basketball (I don’t even wanna mention Stanford Football….). Somewhere I lost my faith in the teams that I had always believed would win. I started believing that they could win, which means that I also started believing (and sometimes even expecting) that they could lose. So when the Warriors or the Giants missed the playoffs again, or the 49ers or Stanford Football team turned in another losing season, it was dissappointing, but not shocking, or heartbraking, or stomach-punching, etc. etc. etc.
Well… Over the last month, the “lowly” Warriors have brought me back from the dead. To be perfectly honest, I feel like they brought the entire Bay Area sports fanbase back from the dead. WE BELIEVE AGAIN. We don’t think that maybe, just maybe, we can beat the Mavs and make a run for the championship, we actually believe that we will. That’s why nobody can stop talking about the Warriors fans in the Oracle Arena. It hasn’t just been about them cheering on their team, it has been about them proclaiming their faith, and channeling that energy into the spirit of their team.
We Believe.
And that’s why the Warriors can’t wait to take the court tomorrow in Oakland, and why the Mavs don’t want any part of us…
