(photo credit to Reuters/AP)
(photo credit to Reuters/AP)
There really aren't words for this. I have always been a Boston sports fan, and therefore have known a tortured existence as such. It's not just not winning -- it's the added pain of others delighting in your failure.
I was a basketball fan first -- I saw the last sad days of Larry Bird and His Back. I remember Reggie Lewis dying and the indignities of fielding a team with an aged Dominique Wilkins. I followed the Bruins for a spell, and was one of the delusioned masses hoping for Cam Neely's knee to recover from The Ulf Samuelsson Whack. I remember the Patriots being humiliated in the 1986 Super Bowl, and the disinterested gleam of Bill Parcells' eye as he half-heartedly "coached" the team in Super Bowl XXXI that they lost. And I won't spill any more words on Bill Buckner. These are my sports memories, and these have shaped my fan experience.
But I thought the tide had begun to turn in 2002, when the Patriots won the Super Bowl in dramatic fashion. I remember screaming "This never happens to us!!!" Bill Belicheck the Genius has further convinced me that a new era, a new belief system is possible in Boston sports fandom.
Enduring last year's ALCS excruciating torture made me doubt that once again, but this year... is beyond comprehension.
(Obviously, this post is completely NOT food-related but to know me is to know that being a Boston sports fan is as much a part of my identity as food. So there -- back to food soon).
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Bill Simmons
Posted by Astrid at October 28, 2004 12:24 AM