New York City —
The large man was dressed in a suit in unseasonably sticky 90-degree weather. He had an ear piece, a badge, and a walkie-talkie – and also a bit of wisdom for those who doubted Jalen Brunson and the New York Knicks on Tuesday.
He was, quite clearly, some sort of security official, the kind associated with a classy establishment like The World’s Most Famous Arena. And, crucially, he was standing on the desirable side of a crowd-control barricade, although he was stoically facing away from the source of increasingly giddy revelry.
Inside – which is to say, some hundred or so yards from here, at the center of the city block that had become a pulsating sea of blue and orange – the New York Knicks were in the midst of a stunning comeback to snag Game 1 of the Eastern Conference Finals. But out on the sweaty sidewalks, crowds clamored, craned and crawled all over each other for a glimpse – not of the action itself, but of a screen erected precisely for the purpose of bringing the basketball to people who couldn’t afford the historic ticket prices.
They didn’t have to pay a penny to join the official watch party. But to get close to the virtual action, they had to have something else to spare, as the security guard reminded them in those fateful fourth-quarter minutes.
