Sam Cassell-Cuttino-Livingston-Maggette-Kaman 2006 Clippers Baby. Playoff series vs Suns was the first time I watched those underdogs and love still goes.

Nope I don’t remember any #42

So much of this rings true for me. I was dragged in to the fold at the tail end of the Sports Arena days by some buddies who were largely in it for two things- being counterculture, and ticket prices. I embraced the Clippers for those same reasons, and still well remember paying $10 at the door on game night to go sit in the nosebleeds and watch Darius, Lamar, Q, etc put on a hell of a show. You’d usually get waved down to the 100 section before halftime because they didn’t want the arena looking so empty on TV.

And that was it. We were in it for the love of the game and to feel like we were a part of something a little more ownable and relatable than the exhausting Laker bluster and self-righteousness that every Clipper fan is all-to-aware of. Where’s the fun in rooting for the team that’s SUPPOSED to win? It’s something that’s continued to today. I had WAY more fun watching last year’s team over-perform than this year’s team not live up to our expectations.

And while we’re chatting, can we all agree to stop accepting the term “bandwagon” with anything to do with the Clippers? To be a bandwagon fan is to join in to the expected winner. For all of our history, even for the last decade when the Lakers sucked, that has always been the Lakers and their ringzzz. Every Laker fan CHOSE to root for the expected winner, and somehow think that makes them special. They got their win this year. Good for them. I hope it fills that dark pathetic hole in their heart. I, for one, can thing for myself and am a part of a team that I’ve fought and cried with for more than 25 years, and when we get there, oh man it’s going to be something special.