And the winner is...

The twenty-first century has been very kind to Boston's sports fans. This century, no city has more championships across the four major professional sports (football, baseball, hockey, basketball).

In 2002, the Patriots won their first of six Super Bowls. They're tied with the Pittsburgh Steelers for the most SB wins. For those of us who remember when the hapless, lowly Patriots were nicknamed the Patsies, these six wins are nothing short of astounding. 

When it comes to football, I'm admittedly a frontrunner of a fan. I only started avidly watching the Pats when they started winning, and mostly stopped watching when they folded.

But when it comes to baseball, well, I'm a better or worse kind of fan and, as much as I might piss and moan about the Olde Towne Team, I watch at least part of every game. As I've said many times, I may have been baptized a Catholic, but I was born a Red Sox fan.

If all they'd done was win the World Series in 2004 - after an 86 year wait - that would have been plenty enough for me. But they did it again in 2007, in 2013, in 2018. (Sure, it sucks to see them mired in mediocrity, as they surely are despite just beating the Yankees and the Phillies (the two best teams in baseball) two out of three. But we'll always have those four great World Series wins, none greater than 2004.)

Not having won the Stanley Cup since 1972, in the days of Esposito and Orr, the Bruins won it all in 2011. (I don't watch a lot of games, but I do follow the Bruins. I keep up by reading the sports pages. I always know where they are in the standings, and tune in once the playoffs start.)

And in 2008, the Celtics won the NBA Championship - the 17th in their stellar history. That year, they won on June 17th. 

And this year, damned if they didn't do it again this year on June 17th. Their 18th banner will be flying over the TD Garden, putting them one ahead of the (hiss-boo) LA Lakers as the team with the most NBA Championships.

As with the Bruins, I don't watch a lot of games, but I do follow the Celts. I keep up by reading the sports pages. I always know where they are in the standings, and tune in once the playoffs start. This year, I even went out and bought a cap. (My husband was a big Celtics/basketball fan, and when he was alive, I watched a ton of games.)

This edition of the Celtics has been a fun team to watch. Bonus points that their coach is a local kid who grew up in Rhode Island. 

After a disastrous, blown-out performance in the the fourth game, it was comforting that the Celtics - up 3-1 - had a reasonable lead through game five, so I could watch without experiencing heart palpitations and an anxiety attack. 

I watched wearing my cap, and for extra good luck, I brought my $3, grocery-store, St. Patrick's Day but still alive shamrock into the den to hang with me.

My cap, my shamrocks: looked like it worked out.

What's most enjoyable about having your team playing for the championship of their sport is how it brings people together.

For the last couple of weeks, the Celtics have been the talk of the town. Lots of Celtics gear out there, lots of wearin' of the green. You pass a couple of folks standing around, and they're talking Celtics. You go into a store: Celtics talk. You're waiting on the corner for the walk sign to pop, how about those Celtics!

Turn on the news, and the Celtics story leads. And most of the newspeople are wearing something green. 

I've been wearing my cap when I've worked lunch at St. Francis House (the homeless shelter where I volunteer; if you don't wear a ballcap, you have to wear a lunch-lady hairnet, which makes everyone look like a nutter), and the guests have gotten a kick out of it. Lots of the staff and some of the guests have been been decked out for the Celtics, too. 

As have the Make Way for Ducklings ducklings statues, who've been wearing Celtics shirts since the finals began. The ice cream truck outside the Public Garden, where the ducklings live, has been flying a Celtics banner. There's a giant sign hanging from the Massachusetts State House bearing the Celtics' slogan: It's Different Here! (Whatever that means: it's different everywhere. But I guess there is all that history, all those banners. Bob Cousy. Bill Russell. Satch Sanders. The Jones Boys. Tommy Heinsohn. John Havlicek Dave Cowens. Cedric Maxwell. Dennis Johnson. ML Carr. Larry Bird. Robert Parish. Kevin McHale. Bill Walton. Ray Allen. Kevin Garnett. Paul Pierce. Rajon Rondo And now, Jaylen Brown, Jason Tatum, and (yea for old guys) Al Horford.)

It's just plain fun to have a winner, to have that buzz, to have the parade.

No date yet for the Duck Boats to roll through Boston. We're having a heat wave, a tropical heat wave, and the city really doesn't need one million fans - many of them drunk out of their minds - raging around Boston when it's 98 in the shade.

I might walk out to see a bit of the parade, which I usually do, given that it passes within a five-minute walk from where I live. The next week or so, everyone around here will be on a high. (Wish Jim were here to enjoy it...)

Congratulations, Boston Celtics! Greatest basketball franchise ever! 

How fun when the winner is your guys!!!