A witness to history

Former San Jose Mercury News columnist Mark Purdy tweeted Monday: “Years from now, tens of people will claim they were at @ChaseCenter when @StephCurry30 scored 62 points. (And they’ll still be lying).”

Well, there was at least one fan in the stands: Eddie Croft, B Street Boxing owner and trainer. Croft has a relationship with Warriors player development coach Aaron Miles, whose kids started training at B Street Boxing at the beginning of 2020 before the pandemic shut down gyms.

In the course of chatting over the last year, it became known that Croft was a huge Warriors fan.

When I say huge, I mean HUGE fan. You can hear the excitement in Croft’s voice when you talk to him about Golden State. He gets revved up like a little kid explaining his first trip to Disneyland. He’s so into the team he uses “we” when talking about the Warriors. He has his opinions about the expectations for Kelly Oubre Jr. (“We were trying to make Oubre into Klay Thompson.”), or what Andrew Wiggins needs to do to be more effective (”I told [Miles] to bring him in here (to my gym). I’ll make that [guy] mean.”), or even what Curry needs to do (“He has to be like (James) Harden for a bit.”).

To make a long story short, Croft knows the Golden State Warriors.

“When the season starts, I’m like consumed (by the Warriors). After the game, I try to find every article about the game. I’m reading all these blogs,” Croft said, rattling off a number of major media outlets.

“I’m spending three, four hours trying to read what everyone is saying after every game. I said, ‘I have to stop.’”

When Miles realized how big a fan Croft was, he told the San Mateo native that he would get him a ticket to a game. Croft thought he meant when fans are allowed back in the Chase Center, so Croft was caught off guard when Miles asked him if he wanted to go to the New Year’s Day game against Portland this past Saturday.

Those arrangements, however, fell through. Players and team staff members are allowed a small number of tickets for family and friends for each game. The thought was Portland guard Damian Lilliard was making his annual homecoming — he’s an Oakland native —and the Blazers’ star bought up most of the seats.

But Miles came through with a ducat for Sunday’s game. Croft got to the Chase Center in San Francisco at 3:30 p.m. for a 5:30 p.m. tipoff. He took a rapid COVID-19 test at a VIP entrance and about a half hour later he was given a negative result and he was whisked to his seat — masked the entire time. Once there, he saw there were several dozen seats with Warriors T-shirts over them — an indication that those were the only places people could sit.

“I was actually the first one in there. I was counting all the shirts. There were about 60,” Croft said. “About half of them weren’t even used. There were probably about 35 people [in the stands].”

Chase Center holds 18,064 people for a basketball game.

Croft was so excited to be going to the game, he wasn’t necessarily thinking straight. When his wife asked if he was going to wear all his Warriors gear, he said he wasn’t because he was going to buy all new T-shirts, hats and other souvenirs at the game.

Oops.

When he asked one of the ushers where he could buy Warriors stuff, the usher looked at him as if he was crazy. No — the organization was not going to open concession and souvenir stands for 60 people.

“I felt so stupid,” Croft said. “I was ready to drop 400 bucks on a bunch of Warriors [stuff].”

Once the game started, Croft got another lesson in small “crowd” etiquette: everyone in the arena can hear everything. At one point, Croft expressed his displeasure over an Oubre play, letting out a loud expletive before sinking back in his seat.

“I was like, ‘Ooh. That was loud.’ … He heard me,” Croft said, laughing. “It’s not background noise and it’s not getting blended in.

“I didn’t want Oubre to come up and Stephen Jackson me — the chase at Chase.”

But as Curry began racking up the points — 21 after the first quarter, 31 at halftime, 45 after three periods — Croft didn’t care if he was being loud.

“Everybody in there was yelling, but not everyone was loud,” Croft said.

Croft admitted he was still amped hours after the game, saying he didn’t fall asleep until about 1:30 Monday.

Croft said he only goes to one or two games per season, in his estimation, but he has certainly been fortunate in the game’s he’s seen. Croft said he was at the game during the 2014-15 season when Klay Thompson scored 37 points in one quarter against the Sacramento Kings. Croft was also at the 2013 playoff series against the Denver Nuggets, when Curry scored 22 points in the third quarter of a Game 4 win.

So it was appropriate a fan like Croft was one of the few people in attendance to witness Curry make history and it is not lost on him.

“I’ve had some bad luck in my life, so I also have some really good luck to balance it out,” Croft said. “I’ll tell you what: I’ve been to a lot of sports events. A big thing a lot of times is the crowd. … But I get to say I was one of like 40 people who were at the game when Steph scored 62. When he put the team on his back and put half the Portland Trailblazers on ice skates.

“2020 was such a s—tshow for me. … There was hardly anyone there (at Chase Center Sunday night). But I was there.

“I feel pretty good about that.”