The Battle of "Insert place here"

So if you've been following the hoops hype, you'll know that there was lots said about the once possible "Battle of L.A.", the so-called "hallway series". No away games for either team.

If you're a hockey fan (and I know there's at least 6 of you out there in the contininental United States, not including Canadian Joe, because well, he's from Canada after all), then you probably heard the "Battle of Alberta" hype.

Really, at what point was this ever interesting? I don't think it ever was. Real rivaries are not based on geographical boundaries. If we suddenly called a game between the Seattle Sonics and the Portland Trailblazers "The Battle of the Pacific Northwest" does it become any better? Possibly in the mind of marketers. Ultimately it would still be a matchup between 2 terrible teams, with the highlight being "Will Darius Miles launch a Sprewell-easque attack against Nate McMillian after Ray Allen hits a 3rd consecutive 3 point shot?".

Let's get back to hockey for a moment here. Look at the Senators-Leafs rivalry. There is a certain amount of geography involved, I can't deny it completely, but the main driving factor was really "Why can't a talented young Ottawa squad beat the Toronto geriatric all-stars?". There is a liberal amount of "Man, I hope stuck-up, snobby Toronto gets theirs handed to them," but hey, the whole country wishes that, not just Ottawa. Really, no one in Toronto cares what's going on in Ottawa beyond possible tax relief, it's barely a city some nearly 600 km away (Hey, who are you calling stuck up?).

Basically, what it comes to is this: it's only a geographical battle when there's nothing else behind it. Do you hear anyone touting "The Battle of Texas" for the San Antonio-Dallas series? It's just going to be two good teams (plus Mark Cuban's usual crazy antics) slugging it out. Now there was a certain amount of novelty in the L.A. series since they share the same building, but was there any question that the Clippers are probably are far more balanced team than the Lakers?

Battle for L.A. sounds like some bad Kurt Russell movie anyway.