We don’t do patience very well in this country. Instant coffee takes too long. We ride around with today in our rearview mirror, already worried about tomorrow, next month, next decade.
Regardless of what we print on bumper stickers or hear at self-help seminars, we’re all about the destination rather than the journey, which is both odd and sad, given that we’re all going to end up at the same dark place.
But all you need to understand the old adage about patience being a virtue is to take a look at the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks. After Tuesday night’s 96-86 home playoff victory over Milwaukee, the Hawks are up 2-0 in their best-of-seven Eastern Conference opening-round series.
That alone is not exactly shocking. The Hawks are in the playoffs for a third straight season. The Bucks are just getting back there under underrated coach Scott Skiles.
But once upon a time Atlanta coach Mike Woodson was about as highly regarded around the Big Peach as road construction. He went 13-69 his first year and 26-56 his second. That he was kept for a third was almost universally viewed as the biggest Atlanta sports mistake since Braves reliever Mark Wohlers hung a pitch to the Yankees’ Jim Leyritz in the 1996 World Series.
But then an amazing thing happened. The Hawks improved slightly to 30-52 in 2006-07, then reached the playoffs the following season, losing to the eventual world champion Boston Celtics in seven games in that year’s opening round.
That stunning performance was followed by a 47-35 record a year ago and a second-round playoff loss.
Now comes this year’s model — a 53-29 regular-season mark, a 4-0 regular-season sweep of the Celtics and a probable second-round playoff series against last year’s NBA runners-up, the Orlando Magic.
That’s clearly not a good thing, since the Hawks were 1-3 against the Magic during the regular season, those three losses by an average margin of 22 points.
But that’s not the point. The point is that the Hawks organization had the patience to stick with Woodson against all odds and that patience has been rewarded with an improved record each of the past five years.
Moreover, if the Hawks front office hadn’t made the dumbest decision in NBA draft history this side of Portland choosing Sam Bowie over Michael Jordan in 1984 when Atlanta turned down point guards Deron Williams and Chris Paul in favor of forward Marvin Williams in 2005, the Hawks might have already reached the NBA finals.
Still, what both Woodson and the Hawks are accomplishing is the way sports is supposed to work. You develop a team over three or four years. The core of the Hawks (point guard Mike Bibby, wings Josh Smith and Joe Johnson and center Al Horford) is now wrapping up its third straight season together. You add a part here or there (super sub Jamal Crawford, for instance). You develop chemistry and trust and familiarity, then hopefully ride those traits to a deep playoff run.
We repeat: Five straight seasons of improved regular-season records. A veteran squad now no more than an overpowering center away from the NBA finals. A coach who doesn’t panic in the face of adversity, instead sticking to the tried and true formula he repeated Tuesday night — “We’ve got to keep defending and rebounding the basketball.”
Is there not a lesson in there somewhere for every college and pro team that feels need to make a change at the first disappointment?
This doesn’t mean the Hawks will go further this year than last. Especially if they meet the Magic, which has the NBA’s best post player in Atlanta native Dwight Howard, who was just named the NBA’s defensive player of the year.
Superior post play almost always makes the difference in the postseason, which is why Shaquille O’Neal has four rings and Tim Duncan had three.
But Milwaukee’s Skiles said a lot in Tuesday’s postgame when he said of his squad, “Most of these guys haven’t been here before. We need to get it right, but we need to have some patience, too.”
The Bucks need only look as far as the opposing locker room to see the reason why.