The rivalry between the Los Angeles Lakers and Boston Celtics knows no bounds. Decades later each side continues to take joy in the failure of the other and Lakers legend James Worthy and Celtics legend Cedric Maxwell take every chance they can to troll the other whenever the opportunity presents itself.
With the Golden State Warriors defeating the Boston Celtics in the 2022 NBA Finals, the joy Lakers fans showed nearly rivaled that of the Bay Area fans cheering on their Warriors. Lakers fans basked in the Celtics coming up short and that extended itself to Worthy, who remains a studio analyst for Spectrum SportsNet.
As time wound down in the deciding Game 6, Worthy took to his Twitter to post a couple of pictures, trolling his old friend Maxwell once again and having fun at the expense of the Celtics:
What happened? @cedricmaxwell81
Congratulations @warriors #NBAFinals #NBA75 pic.twitter.com/hnK1AQ4gGT
— James Worthy (@JamesWorthy42) June 17, 2022
This is why the Lakers and Celtics are one of the greatest rivalries in the history of all sports. It doesn’t matter how far removed a member of either organization is from actually being on the court, they will still take any opportunity to laugh at the other and no one embodies that more than Worthy and Maxwell, who faced off regularly during the peak of the rivalry in the 1980s.
Most importantly in the eyes of Lakers fans is that this Celtics loss keeps the two franchises tied in all-time NBA Championships at 17. The Lakers only recently tied Boston with the 2020 championship led by LeBron James and Anthony Davis and for that to be broken just a couple of seasons later definitely would have been rough for the Lakers and great for Boston.
Thankfully for the Lakers, Stephen Curry dominated the series on his way to leading Golden State to their fourth NBA Championship in eight seasons and his first NBA Finals MVP. And in doing so, he gave Worthy and the rest of the Lakers fans another opportunity to have fun at the expense of the hated Boston Celtics.
Green says playing Celtics in NBA Finals doesn’t compare to Lakers’ LeBron James
The Warriors’ trio of Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green won their fourth NBA Championship, but for the first time, it didn’t come at the expense of current Lakers star LeBron James, who was then a member of the Cleveland Cavaliers. The Warriors went 3-1 against James from 2015 to 2018 and Green says this year’s matchup with the Celtics just doesn’t compare.
Green spoke about the mental challenge of facing LeBron, calling him one of, if not the smartest player in the history of the game and that forces he and the Warriors to step up. While Draymond called the Celtics a challenge, he went as far as calling it disrespectful to compare it to that of LeBron James.
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