Tonight LeBron James will spend 48 minutes playing in front of the most pugnacious crowd in NBA history. With the sun down and a dark wind coming off Lake Erie, the Q Arena will become a raving tinderbox filled to the brim with booze soaked Clevelanders. They will be armed with vile chants, projectiles and the Midwestern disposition of having nothing to lose.
Bars are being filled as we speak. Already, office workers have slipped into utility closets to sip gin and sharpen the ends of broomsticks. In outer borrows, women are stitching together elaborate effigies while bearded men drink cheap beer and watch taped versions of The Decision. Ticketless suburbanites and hooligans are busy planning the nights activities; mainly jersey burning, looting and bus attacking. 'How to make a molotov cocktail' has likely been Googled.
An American city hasn't been so united in hate for years. For it to come together in a pulseless place like Cleveland will be a spectacle to behold. That its citizens suffered a half-century of sports failure only to be abandoned with such ostentatious disregard at a very real moment of hope has been compounded by years of economic hardship. Cavalier fans are not only feeling hurt and angry, they're feeling helpless.
Except for tonight which makes it so dangerous.
The NBA's going to wish they scheduled this one for a Tuesday night.
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