03/12/2008 11:53 AM
By the time you read this, Sydney Spirit may have joined Australia's increasingly crowded sporting franchise graveyard.
The engravers won't need long to work on the tombstone; fruit flies seemingly have a longer life span than Sydney's near anonymous basketball team.
However, I come here not to bury Spirit but to praise them.
You can take your AFL clubs, NRL outfits, national cricket teams and their associated homogenisation and growing aloofness from those who pay their wages at the gate.
The Sydney Spirit is my club of the year.
The way the players, headed by the impressive Jason Smith, and coach Ron Beveridge have handled the impending demise of their club has been exemplary and a lesson in dignity and class.
Less than two weeks ago I had the misfortune of visiting the Australian dressing room after the Kangaroos lost the World Cup final.
Apart from a handful of players, most sulked churlishly in the corner while sending death stares the way of the media.
Ricky Stuart's subsequent tirade against referee Ashley Klein continued the embarrassment.
A few days later I was at Spirit's training headquarters as they were being told owner Greg Evans had placed the club into administration and couldn't be contacted.
Four weeks out from Christmas they were eyeing Centrelink forms instead of the NBL draw.
How did they react?
They got on with training for a match against league leaders South Dragons.
Then Smith and Beveridge fronted the media to explain how they were feeling while detailing their limited options.
For Smith it was deja vu after going through the collapse of the Sydney Kings earlier in the year.
The Spirit decided the show would go on for now, even with no guarantee they would be paid for their services.
Somehow amid all the drama and uncertainty - and with two of their leading players forced to sit the game out - Spirit beat the Dragons 103-94 before their biggest ever crowd.
They sit sixth with 11 rounds left.
The big question is what will come first, the axe or the playoffs?
Smith revealed on Tuesday that the rescue package offered by Basketball Australia equates to around a 60 percent pay cut for each player.
Would you keep working for 40c in the dollar?
Evans' role in all this has been nothing short of disgraceful.
Not only has he left the club to rot on the vine, he is refusing to deal with the players, coaches and BA officials.
Gutless doesn't begin to describe it.
Businesses go bust all the time but Evans doesn't even have the decency to hand back the licence so new investors can jump aboard.
For that we will have to wait until December 10 when the league can officially take back control of the licence and hopefully hand it on to a new investor.
Until then Smith and Beveridge have got to somehow keep the team together and keep them focused on winning games of basketball while the banks and creditors circle.
Don't bet against them doing it.