As Derek Fisher and the Oklahoma City Thunder prepare for the NBA Finals to tip-off tonight in OKC, D-Fish will be seeking membership in an elite club.
With a Thunder win over the Miami Heat in the Finals, Derek can become just the 14th player in NBA history to win at least six NBA championships. The paths he travelled to the first five were similar, all taken in purple and gold during 82-game seasons.
Derek is seeking his sixth title, and first away from LA (Getty Images).
But this season’s path is much different and because of the work D-Fish put in on and off the court to get this far, the sacrifices he made prior to the season and then again within it, it’s an opportunity that he covets, as Kevin Ding of the Orange County Register writes:
"Considering how long Fisher has toiled to reach the moment at hand, the future – including an offseason power struggle with union chief Billy Hunter – isn’t even on the radar, though. He gave up $3.4 million in certain earnings for next season to have this opportunity to end this season the way he dreamed.
He’s awfully close to his sixth championship. And considering the rocky private road he traveled in his negotiating business suit and new-colored uniform to get here, it might be the one that means the most of them all."
But Fish doesn’t enter tonight’s Game 1 expecting that the Thunder will fulfill this destiny he and they have sought. As a veteran of 224 postseason games and counting, Derek said there’s no way to be sure your team will win a championship until they actually do it.
"You never know if you have what it takes as a team to win a championship until you do it," he said. "You could play in The Finals and have a great series, win three games and not figure out a way to win the fourth one and you weren’t good enough to be champions that year. You just have to go out there to play, give it all you have and do a lot of the things that got us here."
Fish is a believer that experience like he has matters, and the team the Thunder will be facing, the Miami Heat, possess the more recent Finals experience, having just played for the title last season. But other things matter too. Things like talent, desire and dedication, the pillars the Thunder — led by stars Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and James Harden — are built on.
"We’re not here by accident. The three of those guys aren’t here by accident. They’re capable of getting some special things done," Fish said. "Their personalities are different, in terms of Kevin, Russell and James, but they all have a work ethic and a commitment to being really good that makes us who we are."
Though he has been in this position seven times before, Derek has no plans to alter the first Finals experience for Durant, Westbrook and Harden. It’s something, D-Fish says, they must soak in for themselves.
"I’ve found it better to on some level allow guys to experience things for themselves in its natural state," he said. "You can’t always tell someone what they should feel or what they should be thinking as they get ready to go into what may be the biggest moment of their life or their career. I think it’s important to allow people to be who they are and experience it the way they naturally would."
Derek’s Finals experience could come in handy, but he won’t force it on teammates (Oklahoman Photo).
The marquee matchup of the series pits Durant, the three-time defending NBA scoring champ against Miami’s LeBron James, the league’s Most Valuable Player, who is still seeking an elusive first championship in his third Finals trip. After observing Durant work hard for the last few months, Derek has come away sure that the 23-year-old forward is ready to grasp the opportunity.
"He’s just an impressive guy because he takes his job seriously and although he doesn’t spend a lot of time trying to impress, or worrying about the burden of being one of the greatest players in the game right now, he still puts the work in as though he expects to be great. That’s a refreshing approach," Fish said. But for us, it truly is a team game. We’re not expecting Kevin on our end to have to be supernatural in order for us to win. We want him to just be who he is and have the rest of us be who we are and be the better team four out of these seven games."
COMM-UNITY
Game 1 will be played in Oklahoma City, perhaps the biggest sporting event in the city’s history. It’s that history that unites the OKC community, tied together by a tragic bombing in 1995 that took the lives of more than 100 citizens, injured several hundred others and caused hundreds of millions of dollars worth of damage in the downtown area.
Derek said that upon his arrival in Oklahoma City this spring, he visited the Memorial for those lost in the attacks. He believes it was an appropriate step toward becoming a member of the community and understanding what that means.
"When you come to this community and you join the team, you become an instant member of this community and without having an understanding of its history, and what took place — where the community was before the bombing and where the community is now — it makes it tough for you to feel at home," he said. "The time I spent there was well worth it. It was obviously emotional, but it gave me a great sense of who the people are in this community and what they’re made of."
More than 17 years after the bombing, the team unites the community once more inside Chesapeake Energy Arena on Tuesday night for a chance to celebrate.
"We’re in a good position in terms of being the people’s choice on our home court and having our fans here to open up
[tonight]. But at the end of the day, it’s about our mentality and our approach to the situation."Game 1 of the NBA Finals between the Oklahoma City Thunder and Miami Heat tips off at 8 p.m. CDT and can be seen on ABC.
RELATED STORIES
- Finals Practice: Derek Fisher (NBA.com, June 11, 2012)
- Derek Fisher is eager to win without the Lakers (Orange County Register, June 11, 2012)
- Derek Fisher has no lectures for young Thunder teammates (Associated Press, June 10, 2012)
- The six-ring club (The Oklahoman, June 12, 2012)
- Practice Report: Keep calm and… keep calm (Daily Thunder, June 11, 2012)
- Talking age and experience with Derek Fisher (Sheridan Hoops, June 11, 2012)