It was a disgraceful display of professionalism. It was a disgraceful display of what is supposed to be the game of basketball. It was a disgraceful display of effort, or lack thereof from the Israel State Cup Champions. It was the ultimate disgrace to play the way the Yellow-and-Blue did against their arch-nemesis Hapoel Tel Aviv in the Derby.

To allow the Reds to march into your house, the Yad Eliyahu Arena and absolutely dominate every facet of the game known to man is unacceptable and for some fans unforgiving. Sure, there have been losses to Hapoel before both home and away, some by a mere few points and some by a wide margin but what made last night’s Derby so frustrating was the fact that the Maccabi players just didn’t seem to care.

Simple as that.

It was another dark day in a season that has had many.

I believe that coach Zan Tabak may have said it best after the game. “Jordan or Bryant couldn’t have even helped us.” Unfortunately there is a ton of truth to that statement.

It’s been a disappointing year from poor signings, a coaching change, brutal losses and a team that no one seems to know how it was built. Plain as the eye can see no one in management is taking full responsibility for the offseason mess. Nikola Vujcic, interviewed on the Sports Channel’s headline show “The Press Box” also didn’t provide much clarity. When asked what his title was it still was unclear if it was manager or general manager or something else.

Who has the responsibility for signing and bringing players and who does not. It looked like a bullpen by committee to use a baseball term. Sure, Vujcic apologized and so forth and so on, but the players just have seemed to have lost it and with that the fans.

The saddest sight last night was seeing fans beginning to depart the fabled arena with more than 5 minutes left in the game. It was horrifying. But even worse was watching the apathy of some of the fans, they’ve given up just like the players. Everyone has put a fork in the season and can’t wait for it to end.

The only person who seems to still care is Shimon Mizrachi. It was reported that he ripped into the players after the game saying that they were embarrassing the franchise and that’s he’s going to fine them for their play or lack thereof.

It’s been a rough year.