The Media's Purple Bias

If you’ve found yourself watching too much Celtics-Lakers programming on television, and, admittedly, I have, you no doubt have heard a few media types poke fun at the exuberance shown by the Celtics in celebrating their Eastern Conference Finals victory.

Fun has been made of

Paul Pierce starting a Beat LA chant

Wyc Grousbeck bragging that the Celtics hold an 8-2 Finals lead over the Ls

and

The general level of exuberance expressed by all Celtics in winning the ECFs

“It’s been 21 years.” said one reporter. “I guess they are making up for it.”

Good lord.

Let’s compare the Celtics celebration, one contained to a visitor’s locker room, with the Lakers celebrationn (pictured above), one in which the players, coaches, and executives carried the WCF trophy on to the court where they could celebrate with an arena still full of fans, even though those fans just celebrated a WCF win 4 years ago and title number 14 five years ago.

Shouldn’t someone in the media be making fun of them, too?

Oh wait.

I get it.

There’s a double standard.

The Lakers are cool.

The Celtics aren’t.

The media’s Showtime bias obviously didn’t die when Magic Johnson retired.