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WHAT’S UP!

The Los Angeles Lakers lost Game 5 of the 2024 NBA Playoffs against the Denver Nuggets on Tuesday morning, and effectively their season is over. They have now lost 12 of the last 13 games against the Nuggets, so nobody gave them much of a chance. Some silly pundit even suggested they should have cancelled the series after Game 3, the Philistine!

The Nuggets might have won 4-1, but the series were close. The Lakers should have won Game 2, if only Anthony Davis had not gone to sleep in the 4th quarter. After scoring 32 points over three quarters (I was sure he would get 40 and the Lakers would win), he scored zero points in the 4th, and that slippery character called Murray nailed a buzzer beater and the Nuggets won by two. On Tuesday morning, again Murray nailed a buzzer-beater, and again the Lakers lost by two points.

So the Lakers’ season ended on Tuesday morning, as did mine. I won’t watch any more playoff games, I’m done. And, God forbid, those pesky Boston Celtics might even win the whole thing! Right now we (yes, we) are tied with Boston for most championships, at 17. If they win this they will go to 18, and I know some guys I will have to shoot because they would not shut up about it for the whole year.

Elsewhere, luckily Liverpool will not win another Premier League title this year to equal the record 20 top-tier titles that Manchester United has, although Liverpool actually has only one Premier League title. The rest were won in pre-historic times.

So, this year’s title race is now a two-man race, between Manchester City and Arsenal. For all the noise coming from the blue side of Manchester, they have only won six titles, and Arsenal just 13.

Who do I wish wins it? I only know about two or three people who support Man City (shout out to Jimmy Byagagaire), so if they win it, nobody of note will notice, or make noise much. But if (again God forbid) Arsenal wins it, they will have to call out the riot police and the National Guard (do we have a National Guard in Uganda?) because those hooligans will take to the streets, and no one knows where it all will end.

And the misery of the sports fan that I am does not end there. After my girls the Williams sisters dominated women’s tennis for decades, they have left the scene. Serena retired and is a full-time mother, while Venus should have retired by now. A spate of black girls has tried to replace them, but without much success. One of them, Sloane Stevens (a really nice person) even won the US Open at one time, but has been average at best since then.

So in came teenage sensation Coco Gauff, and we were convinced we had the next black girl to rule them all. It took her a while, but she finally got going. Or at least it seemed so. When she won the US Open last year at 19, we said yes, this is it.

But since then the now no-longer-a-teenager has been less than seismic. Although she ranks a career-high #3 in the world, she has not won a title since the lowly Auckland in January. She has reached the semi-finals only once, at Indian Wells in March.

There was a lot of talk about how clay is Gauff’s best surface, ahead of this year’s French Open. But of all the tournaments she has played on clay, she hasn’t even reached the semi-finals of one, and on Tuesday she was beaten by fellow American Madison Keys in the Round of 16 of the Madrid Open. Did we ask too much of her? Maybe, but anyways we await the French Open and hopefully she will give us something to smile about.

They say misery loves company, right? Another sports team I support is Ferrari, in Formula One. But it seems the heyday when Ferrari ruled the tracks is long gone. Two years ago the team seemed to have the best car on track, but in classic style, they somehow grabbed defeat out of the very jaws of victory.

Every year is supposed to be the one when Ferrari finally challenges pesky Red Bull, but every year it goes out with a whimper.

What is a long-suffering sports fan to do? Manchester United is now fighting to play in the Europa League next season, how is that even possible? At least the much-cursed Glazer brothers have left centre stage, and we await the spring cleaning that will remove all the chaff from the club.

I think it is time LeBron James left the Lakers, he is not going to win another championship at 40 years. Time to rebuild around Davis.

I also think it is time for Coco Gauff to grow some attitude, and go out and get them. And here’s wishing Alycia Parks, another black girl but with the right attitude, finally finds her tennis legs. I don’t know what to expect from Ferrari, but will watch and hope for the best.

Am I a sucker for punishment, or what? But I will be watching the WNBA this year, and hope Angel Reeves gets one over Caitlin ‘the great white hope’ Clark.

Lastly, women should stop complaining that guys don’t have emotions; all the emotional energy we have is spent in the trials and tribulations of being a sports fan. So there.