Now that the Heat are champs, let us review the dumbest "fan opinion" article ever written

Deadspin is generally fucking worthless, but it does a good job of dumping on the silliness that is ESPN First Take.  Not that First Take is hard to dump on (although let us never forget that Skip rules all shit), but I appreciate the way Deadspin covers it. For example, on Tuesday, they posted this.  It's a great demonstration of the absurd contrarianism First Take tries to cultivate, while looking incredibly silly in the process.  So you think that with as good as they are at pointing out that First Take is idiotic, they would never publish something like what you're about to read.  But you'd be wrong.  It is the most embarrassingly bad "Hey I'm just a fan and this my opinion on what it means to be a fan" piece I have ever read.  I'm sure you could pick up the topic from the title or first couple of sentences, but I'll just let you know that it was posted Wednesday morning in response to the (rightful) laugh America had at the expense of "fans" of the Heat who headed for the exits when Game 6 was still well in question.

In Defense of Leaving Early

by Bobby Big Wheel

I do not want to put on my Bill Simmons hat (fortunately I don't even have one) and try to write my own little manifesto about when it's OK to leave a game early and when it is not.  Instead, before we get into the substance of the article, let me just address Tuesday night's situation with as much tact and sophistication as I can muster: If you are a Heat fan (as opposed to some lucky piece of shit who doesn't care about the Heat or Spurs and just stumbled into Finals tickets and decided to go on a whim--this is not addressed to you) who was not having a medical emergency and you left that game early, you're a fucking idiot.  A fucking.  Idiot.  Period.  You deserve to be laughed at forever.  Now, let's give Bobby the floor, to explain why what I just said is wrong, because something Hartford Whalers something traffic.

I always hated leaving Whalers games early. 

Someone has their communications degree, or at least a minor.  "Establish credibility with the audience by acknowledging the validity of the opposite viewpoint of the one you're about to take.  If possible, connect with that opposite viewpoint via a personal anecdote or story so as to make your acknowledgement more authentic."  You're welcome, I just saved you $500 in devry.com online lectures.  

Maybe if they were down three goals I could be coaxed out of my seat when the PA announcer said, "Oooooooone minute left in the period." But it would take all of my father's cajoling to get me to leave the Hartford Civic Center before the crush of 10,000 people parked in the same three garages made his trek home a nightmare. He didn't spend five minutes backing a Mercury Grand Marquis into a too-small parking spot just to get stuck afterward in a 15-minute line of cars crawling toward a cash-only booth.

Surely that anecdote is very relevant to the way parking is handled at American Airlines Arena in Miami in the year 2013.

I won't pretend he had to clock in at the steel mill the next morning. He had a white-collar job at an insurance company, one that paid well enough for him to afford Whalers season tickets. 

Simmons, if given the chance to write about that same situation: "My dad was barely making ends meet!  He thought about selling our playoff tickets to put bread on the table for another week, but he just couldn't do it. Those moments are too special.  Later, he was fired from the steel mill for consistent absenteeism.  Fortunately he also had a job as an investment banker, so we ended up doing fine."

But he faced the same problems the rest of the 99 percent faces. Nobody has a pension; 

What?  Please get back on topic.

nobody has a guarantee; and raising three kids takes a big bite out of your nest egg. He had to be in the office the next morning around the same time that I had to be at the bus stop, and getting home at 11 p.m. would've just made everything even more of a hassle. So fuck it, we were going home, even though we were down only 3-1 to the Penguins.

That's fine.  It's worth pointing out that the difference between getting home at 10:45 and getting home at 11:00 is really pretty tiny, but I will honor his point and acknowledge that his dad did save some time in this madeup story.  On the other hand, here's something pretty fucking important to consider: the Whalers never met the Penguins in the playoffs, nor did they ever play any NHL team (other than the Canadiens, in 1986) in any round of the playoffs other than the first round, so the above anecdote about leaving during the 3rd period of a 3-1 game most definitely did not happen during the Stanley Cup finals.  Say, in game 6.  Say, with the Whalers down three games to two in the series and down by a single goal in the game.  So really, Bobby Big Wheel's attempt to establish credibility regarding the Heat's game six early exiters has failed miserably, because: it's not even close to the same fucking thing.

It's easy to make fun of Heat fans for leaving Game 6 

Oh yes, it's very easy!  I'll even link to Deadspin without making fun of them again, to prove my point: look at these people!  They look (and sound) like fucking assholes!  It's hilarious!

when it'd looked like all was lost. 

Oh, but here's the thing.  To a fan with any knowledge of the game, as well as the knowledge that this is a "win or season over" game, all was never lost.  They were down five with 0:28 to go, but had the ball.  Then they were down three with 0:19 to go, but again had the ball.  Neither of those are "whelp pack it in, it's over" moments.  Maybe down seven with 0:19 and without the ball, having just fouled.  At that point I'd say all is almost lost.  Other team makes the free throws, pushes it to nine, all is lost.  You are free to go.  But where the Heat were on Tuesday night before Ray Allen's big game tying three?  Nope.  

Even local TV reporters, a class of professionally unembarrassed people, said they were embarrassed, that the stereotypes about Heat fans were true, that Miami was a Bad Sports Town. 

All of these things are true.  Doesn't make Miami a bad city, but they are definitely true.

But fandom isn't the same thing as slavish devotion. 

/watches Bobby Big Wheel climb onto rickety soap box

Your favorite team doesn't pay you, and it doesn't owe you anything. 

And how do you know this?  Please stay on topic.

I learned that lesson when the Whalers left for North Carolina. 

/rickety soap box collapses, leaving Bobby Big Wheel bleeding on the ground

Let's be very, very clear about this: realizing that pro sports owners are assholes who will sell out fans to make a buck has goddamn nothing to do with whether or not you, if you are a real fan of a team, should leave a playoff elimination game while the outcome is still in question.  Fuck you.

Sportswriters easily forget that for most people attending a game is a hobby, a fun diversion, not a job.

That's fine, I agree that you don't have to be a diehard to attend a game, but to get tickets to a possible championship deciding game, you're either a rich prick or a very devoted fan.  I didn't look at the prices on StubHub on Tuesday night but I'm sure the cheapest nosebleed seats were hundreds of dollars.  There were no groups of friends there who said on a whim "Hey I know none of us care about the Heat, but let's go to the game anyways, could be a fun evening!"  Everyone who was there was, again, either a rich prick who can handle being mocked, or someone who had one of the most telltale signs of ostensibly serious fandom: spending gobs of money to see the team play.  Spare me your pathetic sermon about how IT'S JUST A GAME PEOPLE SHEESH LIGHTEN UP.  Yes, it is just a game.  Doesn't change the fact that the people who left early are bad fans and complete tards.

Expecting fans to stay until the end of a game reeks of the same fogeyism that bemoans kids checking their phones all the time. 

In fact, I AM a kid who checks his phone all the time.  The people that left are still fucking assholes who deserve to be mocked.  I am repeating myself, but one more time, just to be clear: game 6 of the NBA Finals with the Heat down three games to two and down five points with 0:28 left is not on the same fucking planet as the Whalers trailing the Penguins 3-1 with four minutes left during regular season game #19 in December 1991.  

Maybe in the '50s—when we all had pensions 

Why again with the pensions?  Stop it with the pensions.

and a union, and the day could more easily be carved up into eight-hour blocks of sleep, work, and leisure—maybe then sports fans could be expected to devote four hours to watching a game in-person. 

It would be much easier to do it then, I agree.  It's still very possible to do it now, ESPECIALLY FOR GAMES LIKE THE ONE IN QUESTION.

But this is 2013—the friction of everyday life is far too great to expect total devotion from all but the obscenely wealthy or the totally unemployable. 

Here's the coup de grace, folks.  While I earlier noted (correctly, I would think) that everyone who could afford tickets to Tuesday's game was probably rich or a serious fan, here is Bobby's knockout punch: in fact, the only people who should bother with staying until the end and dealing with traffic are those same richie riches and people who are really dumb.  

Fans already endure the indignities of wretched traffic, overpriced concessions, and the potential for heartbreak when they attend a game in person. 

You know why they do it, or at least why I do it?  Because if the team wins, it's awesome!  And if they win a historically great game, like game 6, it's even more awesome.  And if you leave when they could still win because you feel like beating traffic, you deserve to be mocked.  Not too hard to figure out.

Don't they at least deserve the option to look away when things go sideways and maybe get a good night's sleep, too?

Down twenty with three minutes to go is sideways.  Down five with 0:28 to go is not.

At least some of the Heat fans who left the game early were doing the same back-of-the-envelope math that my father used to do. 

When he made you leave a meaningless regular season game early.

(Down 5 + 58 seconds left) x (10 minutes to the car + 30 minutes of traffic) / (Joey's math homework + an 8:30 conference call) = we're headed for the exits. Look again at the fans leaving early. 

Thanks, I will!  What a bunch of bozos!

You don't see a lot of the chinstrap beards and glass earrings we expect of our Heat stereotypes. I just see a bunch of weary-looking people who were at a basketball game less than nine hours before they had to leave for work the next morning. It's like they don't even listen to Pitbull.

The Pitbull line is actually pretty good.  Unfortunately the sentence before it is one of the most idiotic in this post.  Less than nine hours!  Why, some of them probably only got six hours of sleep!  What is this world we live in???????

As last night reminded us, sports are fun. At least, they're supposed to be. But you have to fit them into an already cluttered life, and sometimes the fit isn't perfect. The Heat fans who left the game early were playing the percentages. They surely regret their decision today, but it's not an indefensible one. 

Your attempt to defense it looks like the Hindenberg landing right now.

Sports intrude on everything now—on your workday, on your mood, on your taxes, on your cable bill.

Uh... if you let them, I guess?  A lot of people don't, but they're still going to get fired the fuck up if they pay big bucks to see their team in person in a championship round game.  And most people who do let sports intrude on everything are the kind of people who would kill to be at a game where their favorite team won the way the Heat won on Tuesday.

Nothing wrong with fans exercising their diminishing prerogative to check the fuck out. 

If you were in attendance on Tuesday night, and are a Heat fan, and said to yourself with 0:28 to play, "Eh, you know what, I've followed the Heat closely all these years, but I'm so tired of sports being such a big part of my life.  Now is the exact correct moment to fight against that trend.  I think I'll leave right now", then I hope you get mangled in a parasailing accident.  The end.