THE SPORTS DIVA MAGAZINE: The Red Team that Jordan used to Play For

Hard-core NBA fans in Rio? NBADraft.net would have us believe:

In Rio de Janeiro you will find beach basketball courts laid on top of the sand, and mobile courts on wheels that are driven onto the beach. Brazil has adopted basketball as a rapidly growing subculture.

Stop it. Or, better yet, explain it. Say hello to Pedro, a friend of a friend, and a Brazilian NBA fan, who will tell us the real story:

Q. Where in Brazil do you live?

Answer. Rio de Janeiro, RJ. (No, it's not as dangerous as it probably looks like!)

Q. Are you a Brazilian native?

Answer. Yes.

Q. Depending on the answer to the first question, have you been to the US? If yes, have you seen an NBA game live and in person?

Answer. I've been to the US twice. In the early 90's I spent a week or so in New York and a couple of years later I went to Florida for a couple of weeks. I think this was around '94. Much to my delight, I did manage to attend an NBA game: it was a regular season game between the Shaq & Penny Magic against the Mookie Blaylock-led Atlanta Hawks. I think Dominique Wilkins was playing for the Hawks too. Anyway, it was a blowout win for the Magic and a great live experience to me.

Q. Is there a professional basketball league in Brazil?

Answer. Yes, there is, though it must be said that basketball is somewhat of a fringe sport in Brazil. It was more popular in the 80's, I guess, with the '87 win against the USA for the Pan-Am games gold medal. And Oscar Schmidt is an icon. But since then it's gone downhill.

The Brazilian basketball association is a real mess; I suppose that if they ever have their accounts audited someone will get in real trouble. Oscar tried to create a "parallel league" a few years ago but it went down badly.

Nowadays there's a kind of split, with some ball clubs boycotting the official league and all. Pretty sad, actually. However, it's worth noting that my home team - Flamengo, which is also a football (soccer) club and competes in several other sports - did reach the finals of the South American version of the Euroleague.

Anyway, I must confess that I'm not a huge enthusiast of our domestic leagues so there's not much that can be said about it. They surely need a better business plan - or at least any kind of business plan. The games are hardly ever televised - only on cable, which reaches a very restricted audience - and the majority of the supporters are in fact football (soccer) fans who believe it's their duty to also root for their club's basketball team.

Q. Is there an amateur basketball league?

Answer. I suppose there is but I don't know much about it.

Q. Is it possible to watch NBA games on television in Brazil?

Answer. During the Michael Jordan era it was really easy to watch games; even regular TV channels aired them. Then it became a very restricted cable-only attraction. There were a couple of seasons with hardly any NBA coverage. The past couple of years, however, have been much better: ESPN often airs them and globoesporte.com - which is a sports-only site that belongs to Globo, the largest TV network in the country - broadcasts games on the Web twice a week. It's not free, but the monthly subscription is really cheap (something like US $5 for 8 games).

Q. Is it possible to purchase NBA apparel other than online? If so, what are the most popular items?

Answer. I guess that most sports-wear shops sell them, but probably at prohibitively high prices. Even football (soccer) jerseys are really pricey here. Nike sneakers and the like are also way too expensive, but these are far more popular. It's not that rare to walk past someone wearing a Kobe or Iverson jersey though.

Q. Who is the most popular NBA player / team?

Answer. It's kind of hard to gauge that. Most people have no interest in basketball and know nothing about the NBA. Michael Jordan is the obvious exception - he's an icon everywhere. I guess Magic Johnson has some notoriety, too.

As for the current crop of players, as I've said, it's not that rare to bump into someone wearing a Kobe or Iverson jersey. I suppose that those are the most popular ones there.

I guess that Shaq's pretty well-known, too. As for teams, there's no doubt that the Chicago Bulls are the most well-known. Everyone who learns that I love the NBA immediately asks me, "so, how are the Bulls doing?". Others simply wonder about that "red team that Jordan used to play for."

Q. Are you personally interested in basketball?

Answer. Watching basketball? Sure. I love the NBA and try to watch as many games as possible. I also check the box scores daily and play in fantasy leagues. And NBA video games on the Playstation 2, I should add.

Q. Do you or did you play basketball?

Answer. Well, not really. Only in gym class back in high school. I'm not exactly a high-flyer and, at 6 feet, I'm hardly Yao Ming material.

Q. Do March Madness (NCAA) and/or the NBA Playoffs generate excitement?

Answer. I don't care much for March Madness, but the NBA Playoffs surely get me excited. The rest of the country?... Not so much. It hardly ever makes the news.. at best we can find some three-line notes regarding the Brazilian players buried deep in the newspapers.

And it's even worse when it's a World Cup year - in 2006, for instance, the football World Cup had already started when the NBA finals began which made it all but impossible to find any NBA news in the mainstream media.

Q. Do you know of any Americans playing basketball in Brazil?

Answer. Er, actually, no. I know there was an American player who was murdered up in the north a few months back. I do not really follow local basketball, that's the problem. But I know for a fact that there are quite a few Americans over here.

Q. What is the most popular sport in Brazil today?

Answer. Football (soccer), definitely. It's always been and will always be the country's #1 passion. No other sport comes even close.

I mean, sure, in the 90's, as Ayrton Senna ruled the Formula One world and as Gustavo Kuerten won a couple of Grand Slam tourneys, auto racing and tennis became a lot more popular, but now they've receded to the background once again. (I'm being kind of unfair - Formula One and auto racing in general is somewhat popular, but it could never even come close to rivalling football's hegemony. Also, it's worth noting that the F1 audience consists mostly of upper-class folks).

Lately, the second most popular sport over here is volleyball. Our national team won several important titles, which always helps to boost popularity. But still the passion and devotion connected to football is unparalleled.

Q. Open ended - please tell us about your basketball experiences in Brazil (and elsewhere)

Answer. Well, my basketball experiences are pretty much...nil. So I guess I should tell why the heck I'm a Boston Celtics fan. It's really simple: the first game I watched was in the late 80s...and a Celtics game. And they had an aging Larry Bird. And I thought three-pointers were way cooler than dunks (yeah, I don't think I have any street-cred).

When Michael Jordan came to rule to the world, well, it's not that I was unimpressed but I did like the idea of rooting for some sort of underdog. And there was something about Bird's great passes and the Celtics' reverence for their tradition - and for the city's Irish tradition - that just made them look more "real" to me.

I mean...I grew up cheering for Flamengo. I find it terribly disturbing to think of ballclubs as pure business, as franchises that can move to and fro. The Celtics seemed to be the perfect fit for my needs. Then I just kept building on that....

It's not like I'm a hardcore Boston fan but I do cherish their wins. I endured a lot of losing seasons and always tried to keep up-to-date with them... so that's it.