On team fandom, love of the game, and the New York Knicks
Where do I put my fandom?
How do I think about my sport team fandom being this impactful at this stage of my life?
Please, let me explain.
I'm 45 years old, going for a walk on a Saturday while my wife and kids were out at a kid’s birthday party. For those with kids you'll recognize, 120 consecutive minutes without responsibilities can be quite the self-care.
I'm listening to Mike Breen on the Roommates Show with Josh Hart and Jalen Brunson. They're talking about great moments in NBA history, great moments in recent Knicks lore, they're talking about a game we all love, a game I've thought about so much over a lifetime. The game of basketball.
Where do I put my fandom of the New York Knicks in relation to a life? I know, ultimately, it doesn't have meaning. I know, after years of not even considering the notion, that there is no material impact on the world at large whether or not the New York Knicks win a championship in my lifetime.
Whether or not the orange orb passes through the round ring in the sky, no one lives or dies as a result. I know that.
And yet, let's talk about it. Will you go there with me?
Because you see, I'm not just that 45-year-old with a full-time job (and part-time ones), two children and a happy marriage. I am the 9-year-old in front of my parents’ bed, first eyeballing that ball passing through that rim, Patrick Ewing and company in the late 1980's, turning the corner into the early 1990's, becoming a fan as my team became good. Just good enough to be not quite good enough, and for Michael Jordan to ruin my childhood, for the next decade. My formative years.
And my mother loved it, too. Who knew?! She had played the game as a young person on the kibbutz in Israel. She had it in her, the joy, the love of the game. And then when she saw how I took to it, she met me back there at fandom, took on watching the Knicks, started to watch it religiously. Record games when she had to, watching them later (which I do to this day). My mom would record the games, wait until the game had ended, intentionally learn of the score, and then watch the game the whole way through. As she got older, she would fall asleep at parts, the doldrums of Knicks basketball unable to sustain her attention, our presence walking past her in the den stirring her awake. She'd smile and we'd chat about what had happened. You see my mom is a huge Knicks fan. Moms matter to people. Certainly, my mom mattered to me. So, without knowing it, the love of the game doubled itself down.
I was hooked.
Lined.
Sinkered.
By 11 years old it was practically all I cared about. Thought about it first thing, read the newspapers over the bowl of breakfast cereal, peruse every box score. Talk to my friends about it. Friend selection based in who wanted to play it at lunch and again after school. The rare (then) chance to actually go to Madison Square Garden, ride the LIRR in, walk up from under in Penn Station, up the two escalators, morphing there into the World's Most Famous Arena. Our Mecca. My favorite place on Earth.
I would of course play it. Lucky enough to be a kid with a hoop in his driveway. Lucky enough to be able to ride his bike to whichever friend was having us over for the 3-on-3 in their driveway that afternoon, most afternoons. Play until dark, or go to the houses with the lights on, on the weekend nights, and play after dark. All of it. All the day long, I'd think about it, dream about it, want to do it later in life. Absolutely and entirely taken by the game.
There were the Knicks sneakers. They had the triangle Knicks logo on the side, and they were a pair of shoes you order in a catalog, by calling up. Suede on the side with the Knicks logo actually emblazoned on the shoe. I loved those shoes; got a lot of great feedback about them. So much so that when those Knicks logo'd shoes ran their course, I called that catalog back up again and yes, I ordered those Knicks shoes for another pair. I had two consecutive pairs of Knicks logo shoes that I wore damn near every day for however long a 12-year old's shoes last.
I remember I had a decent left. I had my days in this game. Days I'll get to later, sure, but I never made it past Junior Varsity making an impact in real, organized basketball. I had the option of not playing as a Junior or playing on JV. I chose to play and captained on JV. I had the option of playing on Varsity and riding the pine as a Senior or not playing at all. I chose to Assistant Coach the JV-9th grade team. I never played on Varsity, let alone college basketball at my Division III Wesleyan (I was team manager for one season). But I digress. One thing I did have, and which is due to having cross-dominant handed, was a good left hand. A righty shooter, loved to go to my left and could finish left or shoot floaters with the left, fairly well. This made me feel special, connected in my own way to the game. Something I was uniquely good at, maybe just a little bit.
That and passing. Loved to pass. Remember feeling like a "true" point guard (of course a point guard, I was smaller than most and capped out at 5'9") and "pass-first" point guard, and that finding a niche in the game I loved, a niche whereby I represented playing the "right way" was so important to me. Seeing the game a step ahead, seeing angles, or so I thought. It felt important. Would later help me coach.
And really what I had most was an insatiable love of the game, deep interest in it, desire to have a life and career with it, a want to study it. Being a point guard, and loving to study point guards, is likely why I coached, and why I am in mental performance now.
There's a through line here, I promise.
The 45-year-old is now 13. He has a Bar Mitzvah party at his father's kibbutz in Israel. It's humble. It's far from the sort of functions you've seen others have in terms of events, but we did make T-shirts. The T-shirts represented a theme. That theme, of course, was basketball. A basketball emblem dab square in the middle of the shirt.
The picture I’m painting here and what I’d like you to to understand is that this game has been core and central to the whole of who I am, the vast majority of my identity, for the whole of my life.
But not anymore.
Now it's different and I know for fact and for sure that that’s because I'm a husband and a dad. That is because I have a profession and passion for sport psychology that has blanketed and held onto the entirety of the love for this game while adding a layer of meaning and richness I hoped I could find when I was 9, jaw agape in front of my parents' bed, watching Ewing drop stop left baseline, over his right shoulder, probably kicking his legs out and fading just so, one of his signature baseline jumpers meeting the net.
I'll have more stories to tell later, surely (like later in life working for the team!), but for now, this part here, is about right now.
Because just now (February 8th, 2025) I was listening to Mike Breen talk to Jalen and Josh about these Knicks and this time, and how special it is (no pressure guys:), especially given how....let's say...challenging the last two decades have been, save for a moment here and again.
This story is about fandom at age 45, feeling this excited about a team this good, feeling giddy at times watching them, still pumping fists and pacing while they play last season’s playoffs, unable to sit, energized and made wild by what I see on the screen when my team, in small digital form on a flat screen TV, 3,000 miles away from Madison Square Garden, succeed at throwing the orange orb into the round ring in the sky.
Fandom. How can it be that this still moves me as effectively and as much as it does - and should it? Is it right, morally? Isn’t it ultimately inconsequential? Because again, let's be clear, we know what matters in the world today. The world around us is in fact changing at an alarming pace. There are many things to be very upset about in the way our world is being harmed from a climate standpoint to a human rights standpoint, to a political standpoint, and in between. Current events have material impact on our lives and the lives of those we love. We feel it. Our kids will feel it. I can’t put my head down and just focus on sports and pretend these harms are not real or not happening. I'm 45 and I read the news.
But I can recognize it for what it is: a great escape. An agreed upon diversion. A game that is meant to be enjoyable, one that can (when done right) bring people together, and which can (when done right) be a home for life lessons and core values played out as high drama, mixed with incredible athletic and skill-based feats, for all to see and marvel at. In college, my senior thesis was entitled, "Basketball as Modern Religion” for God sakes. I know how games move the masses to great emotion.
When put in the proper perspective and context (critical), the games can absolutely matter.
But let's call it what it is: a game. A made-up game (shouts to James Naismith, am I right?). I say that it’s a made-up game in the most loving way possible! See above. I’m well aware that imagination and play are vital components of a human experience. I have loved and will continue to love a make-believe game more than most people I know. To this day (I'm now 45 years of age, have I mentioned?), I record the Knicks games, avoid the score of the game until the kids are asleep (when they're old enough maybe they'll watch some with me), and then start the game and watch every minute of every game.
Knowing it's make believe, how do I justify this level of fandom? Maybe I don’t have to justify it. Maybe the enjoyment of it is quite enough and there’s no need to analyze it (in which case, thanks for reading). Maybe, given the context above, it’s a blend of hedonic and eudemonic sources of well-being (1) for me that I should just be thankful that I have in this world.
What I know: it's in me, deep. I couldn't cut it out or just forget about it. It doesn't seem like a choice at this point. Moreso something truly in my mind’s wiring, deeply grooved patterns of checking on and caring about, the results of games featuring those who wear the orange and blue laundry (2).
There's more to the story. A lot more I’m sure. Most of my friends aren't here (we’re in the Bay Area). I grew up in New York and still have most of my closest friends on the East Coast, but we made a choice (which we would do again 10 times out of 10) and live here now. Two of my closest buddies were out here (not Knicks fans) but they have since moved away (the great migration is real). And so I don't have many close buddies out here. I have the three members of my immediate family- who I love more than all of it. And I have a career and passion for the work I do. Together, all of it really helps to (mostly) fill my cup. And sure, we're involved with the kids’ school, and sure, I have some acquaintance level and colleague sort of friends that I do enjoy seeing socially now and again. But I don't have that much in the way of much else going on besides, again, family and job, essentially. It’s different now.
But I’ve got my Knicks. Should I be so lucky I’ll surely be the old Saba (grandpa) watching Knicks games close to the set.
At 45, watching the Knicks, especially, I should say these Knicks, playing well again, very enjoyable to watch, connected to those 90's Knicks in so many ways – it’s one of the great joys of my day, week, basketball season. Smile, your Knickerbockers are playing today (I’ll text the group chat often). Sitting down, results yet unknown, watching a good team score a gob load of points, assisting as much as they are, having the talent that they have, having the point guard that they have, having the H(e)art that they have, having the pieces fit the way they do and having the belief that this is the iteration of the team that finally consummates what so many in my age bracket have spent their whole life dreaming about: a parade down the Canyon of Heroes.
This team literally makes my life better, more enjoyable. I actually smile more often in life, because of them. And life can be challenging at times! That’s worth something. That’s worth quite a bit.
So I know where to look for it. I know where fandom lives in me, and why it matters. It’s the 11 year old kid next to me on the couch, that little dude is with me. He’s wearing his Knicks kicks and we’re watching the game.
I’ll put my fandom right there.
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