The Stephon Marbury Redemption

by Marcel Mutoni

When the Boston Celtics signed Stephon Marbury a few months back, the thinking in Beantown was, If “Starbury” doesn’t implode, and somehow manages to help us win a big Playoff game, this will all have been worth it. Many outside of Boston (including yours truly) were understandably skeptical of this.

Last night, however, Steph proved the Boston front office to be a band of geniuses. Marbury played an outstanding fourth quarter when his team needed him the most, and helped jumpstart their incredible rally late in Game 5 against Orlando.

Afterward, Marbury talked about what it took to get here, far and away his best moment in a Celtic uniform.

From the Boston Globe:

“It’s been very difficult,” Marbury said. “But for me, I think the mind-set and the focus is to see the big picture. When you look at a puzzle, what’s the most important thing? A lot of guys would say different things. The picture, that’s the most important thing. The big picture is to win a championship. Whatever is needed for me to come here and do, I was willing. It didn’t matter.”

[…]

“It felt good,” said Marbury, who made 5 of 10 shots from the field and had two assists. “I know that we needed it and the timing was right. It was right for me to go in and do what I did for us to win the basketball game. When I went into the game, my whole mind-set was to go out there and try to create something so we could change the flow of the game.”

And in case you were wondering, this is the part of the movie where each and every Knicks fan throws himself in front of a moving train.