The most dishonest motivation tactic in sports
Even the worst sports team in America has a party plan
One of the beautiful imperfections about sports is the lengths some team leaders are willing to go to get their constituents fired up. And the stuff people come up with spans the whole spectrum. The cringe. The petty. The bizarre. The … whatever you call Dan Campbell’s soliloquies.
There’s a lot of bad motivation tactics out there. But this takes the cake:
Ever since Bill Belichick used the “party plan” motivation brilliantly a few times in the early days of the Patriots dynasty, this has become a thing in the postseason. One team’s hotel plans for the next round, post-game party plans, or even parade route gets leaked out. The other team’s fans go nuts at the audacity of someone calling their shot before it’s lined up. Weird hot takes ensue, and we’re all worse off because of them, because these leaks never come with context.
Look, even the worst team to ever play in the NBA Finals had a plan lined up in the event of victory. This isn’t a VFW potluck. The amount of logistics that go into putting on a party for a team’s players, staff, administration, etc., is massive and necessitates that you get out well ahead of it. Literally, months, if you can.
Would you like to know what would happen tonight if the Warriors showed up unannounced at Royale with the trophy?
And what San Francisco nightclub have the Celtics picked out for their Game 7 victory? Because I guarantee you someone in the building made reservations as soon as this was a possibility.
When you see these types of stories leak out, do yourself a favor and take a deep breath, then keep scrolling. It’s not worth it.
Besides, Draymond Green himself should be enough to get any Celtics fan bleeding mad.
Boston in 7.