Of course, they finally broke through in 2004. Coming back from 0-3 against the Yankees in the ALCS only made the victory that much sweeter!! I listened to the end of game 4 of that World Series (the Sox won the first three games) over St. Louis on the radio in the parking lot of the Tempe Public Library. I yelled and screamed when the game was over, and drove home listening to the post-game show.
I spent much of the next week or so reading articles and watching highlights. I particularly enjoyed watching highlights of game 3 of the ALCS. The Red Sox sucked that game and Yankees won big. It sure was nice being able to look back at that as an irrelevant game in the story of the season. Who was the losing pitcher for Boston? Did anyone make any errors? Who cares?!?!! They won the series and that's all that matters...
When the 2005 season started, I realized that what I had been telling my older brother all these years was true. That was last year, it's history; stop living in the past! You see, my brother, father, and uncles are Yankees fans. (I have four uncles and can only speak for the two who lived closest to us.) I can't say for sure why I became a Red Sox fan, though I heard it had something to do with my brother and I not trying to collect the same baseball cards. Seems like a stupid reason to root for a team. Just as stupid is living near the team's home stadium, or being from that area...
A friend of mine once said that rooting for sport teams these days is nothing more than rooting for laundry. The players are rarely "local boy made good" types because the best players go where the money is. A team wins or loses based primarily on the owners' willingness to invest in a winner...and star players' belief that the franchise wants to win. I didn't really think about sports in this way until after the Sox won again in 2007. It just wasn't that big of a deal. In fact, because they were so heavily favored, it was more of a relief that they didn't blow it than a joy that they won it all. (This may explain why Yankees fans are generally such jerks. No real joy when they win, just crap from the rest of the world when they lose.)
It was at this point that I started wondering how my life would have been different had I been raised a Yankees fan. Now, this may be traitorous coming from a citizen of Red Sox Nation, but it was a legitimate question for me since I was surrounded by Yankees fans at home. The truth is that my life (as a sports fan anyway) would have been much better if I'd been rooting for the Yankees. All those games in the Bronx or Fenway I went to with my family could have been real bonding experiences! I never had that. My father and I never talked about baseball, because the team he wanted to talk about was a team I hated!
My brother and father went to the 2001 World Series games in Arizona. I didn't want to go. My excuse (and it's a good one) was that my wife was over eight months pregnant, but the real reason was that I didn't want the conflict that would come from being with Yankees fans and rooting for the Diamondbacks. If the Yankees won, I'd hate them for being happy. If the Yankees lost, I'd have to stifle my joy. (My brother bought my unborn son a baseball bat at game 6. I am sure that he expected to be able to say that he bought that the night he saw the Yankees win the World Series in person. Alas, the Yankees were epically crushed in game 6!)
You see! I still take some degree of pleasure in thinking about a game that happened almost 10 years ago...I also read with glee news of Joba Chamberlain's season-ending surgery. It's sad... It's too late to switch now, but I know I'd be much better off had I been a Yankees fan from the start. I'd probably have been at those World Series games and would have had a great bonding experience with my brother and father. Also, my daughter was born the night the 2003 ALCS ended, which would have been a great family story. Who know? Maybe we would have named her Mariana...
The point I'm trying to make is that it's not whether "your team" wins or loses that matters. What matters is who you get to share the experience with and how it strengthens your relationships. I happen to know that some Cubs fans are pretty happy, well-adjusted people...but you could never guess that based on the Cubs' post-season record. I'm sure the same is true of Detroit Lions fans...assuming there actually are some. I hope the Canucks win, I really do. (Boston fans will be okay. Between the Red Sox, the Patriots, the Celtics, and the Bruins, they've had plenty of practice at both winning and losing.)Bringing Lord Stanley's Cup to Vancouver would be historic! Seeing the victory parade will give you another shining moment to share with loved ones...and then it'll be all over and you'll look around and see what really matters...
In the meantime...get it done!
