Sometime in 1995 before the NBA season started I went to a sports shop and my mom bought me my first ever fitted hat. That’s a big moment in a boy’s life. Graduating from the snapback to a fitted hat is comparable to finding that first piece of armpit hair, at least it was, now mainstream MTV skater kids ruined the whole trend.
The hat was none other than a Vancouver Grizzlies dome piece. A lot of people asked me why I had a Grizzlies hat at that time, but why not? They were new to the league, they had a bear in the logo and cool colors, plus if they became good, I could brag and say I was their first fan.
The hat’s brim was eventually was bent and cracked by my friend Brad (he paid me back for it a year later) and then left behind at basketball camp, which eventually meant it was thrown on the roof of my high school.
I miss that hat, but more importantly, I miss the Vancouver Grizzlies.
Make no doubt at it — the Grizzlies sucked.
They never won more than 23 games during their six years spent in British Columbia and after a short time of “trying” to make hoops work in the Western provinces owner Michael Heisley took the team to Memphis, Tennessee.
I can only imagine what would have happened if the Grizzlies were to take Steve Nash instead of Shareef Abdur-Rahim in the 1996 NBA Draft. Nash is the best Canadian basketball player of all-time (he grew up in British Columbia), and easily one of the best players of our generation — two MVP’s and at 35 years-old still playing at an MVP level.
I won’t blame GM Stu Jackson for not taking Nash. Abdur-Rahim was a really good player and injuries shortened a very promising career for him. Rahim was taken with the No. 3 pick and Nash didn’t go until the 15th, so it makes sense. Nobody thought Nash would be this great, nobody.
If Nash would have went to Vancouver, maybe things would have been different, but unfortunately they weren’t. It stinks, Canada deserves more than one team and Vancouver deserves another shot with a better owner and a much better GM.
This isn’t over, trust me…
BRING BACK THE VANCOUVER GRIZZLIES!
November 18, 2009 at 4:49 pm
i believe i paid you 2 years after the deed, but whose counting anyway. but yeah, sorry about the hat, i guess doing stuff like that was why i didn’t have friends back then except for my x-men. ha?