Empires in Decline: The Sun Sets on the Boston Celtics

The following four paragraphs were adapted from an article, in "The Wall Street Journal", entitled "Sun Setting on British Power" by Alistair MacDonald (we made them about basketball):

From Nelson Kevin Garnett atop his column to Wellington  Ray Allen gracing his arch, this city is filled with monuments to the martial glories of an island a basketball team whose forces once dominated continents and ruled the waves.

Today, though, the relatively modest intervention in Libya Miami is fueling fresh anxiety here and in Washington Boston about the nation's team's shrinking military muscle as the U.K. Danny Ainge cuts defense spending (See Kendrick Perkins) in response to a record deficit.

When Michael Graydon Doc Rivers, a former head of the Royal Air Force, commanded no-fly zones over Iraq in 1991 LeBron James in Cleveland, he had more than 20 British enough attack squadrons to rely on, he says. For the no-fly zone over Libya Miami, he says, the RAF has Celtics around six did not have nearly enough.

The frigate used to evacuate British citizens Celtic players from Libya Miami, HMS Cumberland Shaq, is to be decommissioned in June, along with some of the Tornado fighter planes spearheading the North American Treaty Organization attacks Jermaine O'Neal. Two reconnaissance planes were saved from retirement to join in the mission.

The rise of the Pierce-Allen-Garnett Celtics was a matter of extreme providence; how often is a team able to trade for two Hall of Famers in the same offseason? But not only did a green tidal wave arise from such transactions and sweep over the globe, but the opposition shattered in its wake. The scowling of Pierce and the chest-bumping of Garnett combined with the quickness of Rondo and brute strength of Perkins to transform the young Cleveland Cavaliers into broken Spanish Armada ships: Ohio will never be the same. And, for better or worse, Boston made colonization in the NBA cool. If your original franchise lacks natural resources, then go forth and plunder, assimilate the locals, and breed piracy.

Boston's shores are green, but they may never be this green again.