Jay Meydad's Life Mashup

Last May I posted about the unbelievable achievement made by my long time favorite Israeli basketball club – Hapoel Holon. This is part two of the story.

Shortly after winning the Israeli 2008 championship the future of the team looked very dark. Miki Dorsman, the owner/manager/coach left the team, the budget for the 2009 season was unknown and the the entire squad moved on to other teams.

A few weeks before the current season began, the club somehow managed to resurrect itself. A tiny budget was formed, a young coach, Dani Franco, was signed, and a squad of  fairly unknown players was assembled. The fans had one hope – that the team would not fall apart and drop to the second division.

Well, apparently, this club has something else that is worth a hundred times more than superstars earning millions or experienced coaches. It has a big heart. And big heart is what wins big games.

Last year, it was Malik Dixon who scored the winning shot only four seconds to the end of the Israeli championship game against Maccabi Tel Aviv, one of the most successful basketball clubs in Eurpoe. It was Holon’s first championship title, and Maccabi’s 2nd lost of the title in 34 years.

Last night, in the Israeli Basketball Cup final against the favorite Maccabi Haifa Heat, the drama was even bigger. With less than a second on the clock, and Haifa leading 68-66, the seasoned Brian Tolbert scored an amazing three-pointer with the buzzer to give Holon a 69-68 win. It was the team’s first cup title ever.

Take a look at this great video, shot by one of Holon’s fans, to experience the drama and the excitement after the victory. Holonia plays in yellow, Haifa in green.

Holon is now holding “The Double” (when a team wins both champoinship & cup titles at the same season), and if you want to make an analogy to the high tech/venture capital environment, this is like seeing a serial entrepreneur building two companies on very little seed money, and scoring two huge home runs, one year after the other. And as a fan, I am as proud and happy as a share holder could be from these liquidity events.

I am big football (a.k.a soccer) fan. I love to play, I had a season ticket for many years for Maccabi Tel Aviv’s home game (I’ve been their fan for more than 30 years), and recently also coach my oldest son at AYSO which is something I highly recommend doing. It is very fun, rewarding and bonding.

Shortly after we moved to the US more than 6 years ago, we got our house connected to the Israeli Network. It is a pretty expensive premium TV channel ($20/month) and the programs are not that interesting (mainly news, politics, Israeli soap operas and reality tv) but the channel has the broadcasting rights for the Israeli Premier League games, and that was the main motivation for me to get connected.

In the first 3 years for our live in the US, I used to wake up early on Saturday morning and sit for 2 hours to watch the game of my beloved team. Using the DVR was not even an option back then since my mentality said that a game had to be watched live. There were a few games that were not broadcasted on the Israeli Network due to rights issues and I found myself watching games on a laptop in terrible quality on sites like Tapuz and others (imagine a guy who points a webcam at a TV and provides his own commentary using the microphone).

The last 3 years have been a disaster. My team sucks. And it is getting worse and worse every year. This led me to completly change the way I watch Israeli football. First, I started DVRing the games and watched them late at night once I am done with family activities during the day. This did not last much. I quickly switch from normal speed to a x4 speed which basically has 2 advantages:

• The game suddenly looks like it is an English Premier League / Spanish La Liga game. You can see players that are actually running!

• You don’t hear the terrible commentary.

That did not last as well. Even at the x4 speed I quickly got bored since no goals were scored, and the ball was not even getting close to the 16 meters box. Nothing was really happening at these games.

So, I increased the speed to x15, and then to x60 and later on to x300. Yes, you can not really see much when watching at this speed, but honestly, there was nothing to see. I simply kept my eyes focused on the upper left corner where the score/time label is and waited for the label to change. Once it changed, I would switch back to normal speed, rewind 30 seconds, watch the goal re-run and speed again to x300.

This year, since my team looks really pathetic, I have completely stopped doing that. I switched from wathing the full 90 minute games to watching only the Weekends Highlights show. But the truth is that the other teams in this league do not play much better compared to Maccabi, and all the games looks boring when watching at normal speed. So, the latest for me is that now I am watching the highlights show at x60 speed.

This is in a nutshall the state of Israeli football in 2009 from my point of view. And If you are one of those who look at FIFA ranking and thinks it tells a true story, you might want to think twice.

I would like to thanks my friend Roy Klieger who used to sit next to me at Maccabi’s home games for many years for the inspiration. A note he sent me regarding our team’s pathetic situation led me to turn a reply email into a post.

This is probably one of the biggest and amazing things that ever happened in the history of the game of basketball. This is a story for a Hollywood movie. This is the story of a very happy team, that tonight won for the first time in its history the title – Israel’s Basketball Champions.

And if you are curios to know why I think this is the biggest thing in the history of basketball, read further:

• At the end of the previous season, Hapoel Holon qualified from the 2nd league to the premier league. After less than a year (!) they won the title.
• The team is coached by an unknown and inexperienced coach – Michael (Mickey) Dorsman, a charming businessman that bought the team who has been a fan of since childhood, then took also the coach position and did amazingly well in it. Yesterday he received the ‘Best coach of the year’ title. Tonight he won the championship.
• Hoolonia’s opponent in the final game was Maccabi Tel Aviv, one of the most successful clubs in European basketball. For decades Maccabi has been dominating Israeli basketball with 47 championship titles (since 1970 they lost the title only once in 1993).
• At the beginning of the season, the team was penalized due to the behavior of one stupid fan who threw a stun grenade in a game and wounded a guard. The stupid guy is now in jail and the team have overcome the difficulties and ended the season in the first place in the Israeli league.

I have been a fan of this team for more than half a decade, attended many games in the good old Holon City arena, watched many more on TV and a few on my PC (thanks to RayV’s player). Today was the best day ever and it was worth the long wait.

Sorry I can not be in person at Blumfield tomorrow and cheer you in your last game.

The deal just got signed and it is time to thank our new owner, Alex Shnaider, Canada’s youngest billionaire, for brining some hope back to the millions of Maccabi Tel Aviv fans. Alex – good luck and thank you.

Loni – Thank you as well. It has been a great ride and everything you have done is greatly appreciated. Now, you have one less thing to worry about and could put more focus on your other businesses.

BTW, I really like what Avi Nimni is doing with regards to the young Jewish players he is bringing from US & France. It is a good strategy to overcome the lack of young Israeli talent. Zionism 2008.

Saturday’s game is going to be fun. I wish I could be there.

photo credit: ynet (by Eli Algert)

It happened just as I thought, and as of Saturday night Eli Cohen is no longer our head coach.

Roni, Loni and Avi have a great part in the latest crises in our team. It is easy to blame the coach for the poor performance of the players, but when you tie his hands (cut players’s budget in half) and constantly criticize his work in the press (how can a coach motivate his players after they read he is not going to be the coach soon?) you create an environment where no one can succeed. Unless our multi-headed management will change her leadership & communication style, the future of the next coach is not going to be bright.

Speaking about the next coach…well, during the pre-Klinger era , in the years 2000-2002, the team played happy football and won two cups. Nir Levine was responsible for that and therefore he deserves the job. My 2 cents.

Technorati Tags: Maccabi Tel Aviv, Eli Cohen, Football, Soccer, Layoff

“Like So Many Rabbit Heads” picture by: JeffCam