A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
Tipoff for Game 1 of this year's NBA finals is tonight in San Antonio. The Spurs face the New York Knicks in a matchup guaranteed to give the league a new champion for the eighth year in a row. Jake Fischer covers the NBA for The Stein Line on Substack. So, Jake, I mean, the Knicks have the celebrity fans - Spike Lee, Timothee Chalamet - but the Spurs are the betting favorite. I mean, it feels like must-see TV to me.
JAKE FISCHER: It is must-see TV because this is either going to be the end of a long 50-plus-year New York Knicks title drought or the true coronation of 22-year-old Victor Wembanyama as the alien touching down from France and taking over the NBA.
MARTÍNEZ: I mean, doesn't it feel like that? I mean, you mentioned the coronation. I know we're maybe ahead of ourselves there, but he's a 7'4" center. A league has never seen anyone like him because he has the skills of a shooting guard, as well as being a center who blocks shots and rebounds. And they - and he beats the team that's the defending champ on their home floor, so it feels like this is something that's building for him.
FISCHER: And he's just 22 years old. He is in this era of superstars in at least the NBA who don't really allow much access to the media, who all don't want to seem vulnerable or show too much of their personalities that can reveal anything aside from being a superhero. This guy is meditating with monks, and he's playing park - he's playing chess in the park with strangers. He is truly a renaissance man at just 22 years old.
MARTÍNEZ: Yeah. The Knicks have had five more days of rest than the Spurs. The Spurs went to seven games against Oklahoma City in the Western Conference finals, but the Knicks swept the Cavaliers. So they've had a lot more time to just kind of relax. What do you think of that - rest versus maybe the immediacy that the Spurs might bring to the series?
FISCHER: It's definitely a factor here. I think it could work against New York, but they had a very similar setup against Cleveland in the Eastern Conference finals where they swept Philadelphia in the second round, and they had this big layover. In the exact same scenario, Cleveland won on the road Game 7 against Detroit, and New York came out and won that Game 1, although that was at home in New York. So now they go on the road where they have to obviously go against a roaring crowd that will be very, very fired up. So they're going to need to steal one of these two games in San Antonio, I believe.
MARTÍNEZ: OK. So really quick, the Knicks win if blank. Go ahead.
FISCHER: The Knicks win if Jalen Brunson can be the best player in a David-verse-Goliath situation. He's an everyman, 6-foot, you know, guard against the 7-foot-4 alien we were just talking about.
MARTÍNEZ: And the Spurs win if...
FISCHER: The Spurs win if their complementary playmakers can keep up with all the hype around them. If these young guys outside of Victor - the Steph Castles, the Dylan Harpers, the Devin Vassells - if they can all hit shots and rise to his level.
MARTÍNEZ: Now, Game 3 is going to be in Madison Square Garden. I mean, ratings for the NBA finals have fallen in recent years. So how important is it - quickly. I got about 30 seconds to go here. How important is it for the NBA to get a game in New York City in the NBA finals?
FISCHER: It's huge. I mean, for years, there were jokes that David Stern, the former commissioner, would've done everything he could to rig the finals to get this matchup to happen. So not only for it to be New York, but for it to have this rich kind of history repeating itself of this being the exact same matchup from 1999, it's something that I think will have a nostalgia factor as much of a new kind of kid-on-the-block situation as well.
MARTÍNEZ: Jake Fischer covers the NBA for The Stein Line. Jake, thanks a lot.
FISCHER: Thank you.
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