Is clutch real?

Normally I would never post on this topic because after about 6000 words of blabber I would reach the conclusion that I’ve already hounded too many people about: “clutch” doesn’t exist. But over the last few days I got to thinking. Seriously. I’m wondering if I’ve been looking at this all wrong for the last few years. I’ve got to get a few things off my chest.

I realize this is like the equivalent of Ghandi saying he believes in Allah (now that’s a sweet religion reference yeah? Also, I think I just offended 40% of our writing staff with that awful “joke”.  Anyways, back to the sentence we are currently in the middle of…), or maybe it isn’t, because nobody actually cares what I think about things. Whatever the case, there were two recent things that got me on the path toward thinking that clutch is real.

Firstly, I stumbled upon this interview given by the great Dak of firejoemorgan.com. In it he states what socalsports has been trying to tell me for seemingly twenty years (that number might be a bit off): Clutch may be stupid and make no sense, but it’s tough to argue with Josh Beckett. His performance in big games at least makes you think. If a writer from FIREJOEMORGAN.COM, the chief of all anti-clutch sites, can admit that there is a chance they are wrong, than I must do so as well. And if a person like socalsports, who at least pretends relatively convincingly that she knows a lot about sports, can agree for the most part with me, but not jump to the same conclusion, then I have to think about it, right?

I may have been wrong. Also, don’t try to find dak’s quote in the interview, I think it’s like halfway in, but that interview is really long and you may never find it. Just some advice.

Anyways… the second thing was today’s performance by Paul Pierce and Lebron James. They both stepped up huge in a game that mattered a whole hell of a lot. The thing on which I’ve been basing my whole “no such thing as clutch” argument was that in a professional league, with the athletes seemingly trying as hard as they can all the time, it would be impossible to like, “try harder” or “focus more” or “step up” in a way that would actually make your performance better than what it normally is. But what if athletes do not always try their best?

Is it possible that some athletes coast until they realize that it’s crunch time and then step up? I know that in random pickup games this happens all the time. I frequently do not play defense until it is game point (even then I sometimes still don’t). Could professionals actually be “pacing” themselves in order to play well in key games and key situations?

(record scratch sound effect)

Wait a second. Hell no. It’s not like Lebron purposely went 2-18, or Pierce purposely threw up multiple wild lay-ups in a few games in Cleveland. If they could have made these shots go in, they would have. Their shots were just falling today. Yup, clutch makes no sense. Forget I ever said anything.