A Year of First Time Champs (Except in the NBA)

I will start by getting this off my chest.

Cavaliers-Warriors Part IV has been a dud.

The first one was great, the sequel was fantastic and even though Golden State added a new cast member in Kevin Durant last year, that series was like every third film in a franchise. You sat through the first two, so you want to see what happens.

I didn't want to see Part IV, but others did and now some are regretting it.

It's not over yet, but we know how it will end. Either tonight in Cleveland or Monday in Oakland.

The NBA has dragged us through another spring where it teased us with first round stories like the Pelicans sweeping the Trail Blazers and the Sixers "process" appearing to come to fruition, only to let us down in the next round. The conference finals were actually good, with both series going seven games and thinking for a moment a Cleveland-Golden State championship series could be avoided.

While the NBA continues to lack parity, the three other major sports leagues in North America all had first-timers lifting trophies.

Back in the fall, the Houston Astros, who lost 111 games just four seaons prior, beat the Los Angeles Dodgers in seven games for the franchises first title just months after Hurricane Harvey devastated the area.

For as insufferable as Philadelphia sports fans can be, the Eagles prevented another Patriots Super Bowl championship while capturing their first Lombardi trophy and the first of any kind since 1960.

And just this week, the Washington Capitals, one of the NHL's most snake-bitten teams (I see you Buffalo and Toronto), finally won a Stanley Cup.

It was a run where they dropped their first two games at home in round one to the Columbus Blue Jackets, but won the next four to advance. Let Game 1 of their second round series against the Pittsburgh Penguins slip through their hands, but in the end, finally beat the team that has tortured them in the playoffs over the last two decades, making their first conference final in 20 years, where they won the first two against the Tampa Bay Lightning, dropped the next three and rallied to win the next two to make the Final, where they dropped the first game, but won the next four to clinch the title. 

One of the league's best players, Alexander Ovechkin, finally lifted the Stanley Cup and did it on the road in...Las Vegas.

Oh, yeah! The National Hockey League saw the Vegas Golden Knights, in their inaugural season, win their division and make the Final. Holy parity, Batman!

LeBron James is great, Kevin Durant is great, but we've seen this movie before and I'm fine if it doesn't happen again. Give me the Sixers, Rockets, heck, anybody but Golden State winning it again.