Many people from Kansas never leave. Many more believe Boston is the capital
of New England, which they believe is a state somewhere near Maine; it would be
humorous if it wasn’t such a poor reflection of our education system. New Englanders’ and their passion for
sports, real maple syrup, apple’s picked from the tree and the four “seasons”
are all very foreign to a Plains State man. We know straight roads, tornadoes and the fundamentals of
basketball. When it comes to
sports, we are not familiar with winning.
We have no idea why the Garden, Fenway or Tom Brady are so damn
special. We know the Chiefs and
the Royals actually belong to Missouri, a hockey team will never come close to
Kansas and the NBA isn’t moving to Wichita any time soon. Is it any wonder we support a mythical
bird so profusely?
My friends call me a traitor, a fair-weather fan, a sell
out. But can you blame me? My wife grew up in New Hampshire. The NH is worse than Kansas; they have
no professional sports teams, two sub par Division I programs and some average
ski mountains. It’s no wonder they
adopt the Massachusetts pro teams as their own. There is nobody else to cheer for.
Fenway.
My first ever trip to Boston included a trip to the historic
ballpark; I will never forget it.
The K in Kansas City has waterfalls and is a beautiful park, but nothing
compares to Fenway. I love George
Brett and the passion he played the game with but he led the Royals to their
last World Series 3 months before I was born. We haven’t sniffed success since. After graduating from college, I moved to Boston to be with
my then girlfriend, now wife. We
lived 8 minutes from Fenway and became professional Stubhub navigators. I was fortunate enough to catch a lot
of games during our year in Boston.
I fell in love. The Red Sox
won games and grew beards and beat the Yankees and made baseball fun. Can you blame me for cheering for my
new “home” team; the loveable cursed losers who all of a sudden were winning
World Series?
The Garden.
Paul Pierce is one of the greatest Jayhawks of all
time. Larry Legend is a Midwest
icon and the idol of many fundamentally sound, un-athletic, basketball loving
white boys like myself. The aura
of the Garden, the history in that place is awe-inspiring. It gave me tingles just walking into
the place and seeing the floor, the banners won by Russell and Bird and all the
other greats. The Celtics during
the “Big Three” era were unbelievably loveable and winners. Watching the Celtics play in the Garden
is a dream come true for a basketball lover. Ubuntu and unselfishness; a team first approach is the
standard taught in Kansas to most young players growing up. Watching an NBA team full of stars buy
into the same idea and battle younger, more pompous stars and win was
stimulating. Can you blame me for
making the jump from cheering for the non-existent Kansas NBA team to the
Celtics bandwagon?
Many of my newer friends, met through my wife and her
family, grew up playing hockey, real hockey: the sport played on ice with
skates and a puck. I grew up
playing on roller blades (until I outgrew the one pair I ever owned, then I
just ran) in a street with cones and very dangerous patches of tar work. I would have loved cheering for the
local team growing up. Only problem was, until the Avalanche escaped Canada,
the closest team was far, far away.
I did adopt and follow the Avalanche as close as I could when they moved
in 98’. It helped that they were
good and had a team of All-Stars, but it was still hard to become a die-hard fan
when they were never on TV and I never saw a game live.
My first Garden hockey experience happened in the spring of
08’ and involved free food, a flask of whiskey and the Bruins beating the Habs,
both on the scoreboard and with their fists. I will never forget that experience and will forever hate
the Montreal Canadians. It was too
easy, the Bruins were good, all my new friends were Bruin nuts, I lived in
Boston and I had real affiliation with another team. This was the easiest and most defensible transition. I may have abandoned the Royals but
becoming a Bruins fan was a no-brainer.
The one professional sports team I passionately followed and
cheered for in my youth was the Denver Broncos. This will never change. I was able to watch them almost every Sunday and was
privileged enough to cheer for them during the Elway era. Arguably one of the greatest of all
time, John played harder and smiled bigger than anybody. He was my hero and his fathead hangs on
my wall. Even with all the success
the Patriots and Tom Brady have had during the time I have spent in New
England, I have never made the jump and never will. After last year’s AFC Championship game, can you blame me?
No comments:
Post a Comment