Author: George Denny
It seems that Chris Nelson wrote last week’s “Why I hate Boston” article without having actually talked to a Patriots, Red Sox or Celtics fan, so I thought I’d take the opportunity to educate him. It amuses me that a Minnesota sports fan would actually step to a city that takes part in the playoffs, but in exchange for the services of Randy Moss, David Ortiz and Kevin Garnett, I think I owe him at least an explanation.
The difference between the Boston and Minnesota sports fan is passion. There are cultural reasons to explain this discrepancy, but the most obvious factor is the time in which the city’s residents have had to build an allegiance to their team. We care more in Boston because sports have become a long-time source of pride for our small city, one that our citizens have celebrated and complained about for more than a century. Combine this legacy with a decidedly East Coast intensity and propensity for confrontation, and it makes complete sense that our western counterparts would feel outmatched in much the same ways their teams do.
It is no coincidence that the most popular team in Boston is the Red Sox, not for their relative lack of historical success compared with other clubs, but simply because they have been around since the late 1800s. The result of all that time is a connection incomparable to anything the hopeless Twins/T-Wolves/Vikings could ever hope to create.
Our consecutive sell-out streak at Fenway Park has run for years and is in no danger of coming to an end, even though our tickets cost exponentially more than any other team in the league. Compare that to the penny-pinching Twins, a team suffocated by its cheap owner and a fan base that never sells out regular season games.
Of course, the Red Sox fan should have greater expectations for our team: we invest more, we keep our owners happy at the box office and when the front office blows $70 million for J.D. Drew over the next five years, we pressure management enough to ensure that they will compensate us in some way, probably with another bloated free agent contract. Could you imagine fans like these accepting the fact that our best players will eventually wind up making more money in a better market? I didn’t think so, but I will send you a note of consolation when Twins ace Johan Santana signs with the Red Sox or Yankees in the next few years.
As for the Yanks’ being dubbed the “Evil Empire” in 2003 by our team president, times have changed in the AL East. Since we have won two of the last four World Series, they are the “Inferior Empire.”
Chris’s understandable jealousy of a town that demands excellence was clearest in his hopeless wishes for an end to the Patriots’ dynasty. Again, I can’t blame him, especially not for wanting Tom “I even make God jealous” Brady (his words) over a guy like, say, Tavaris Jackson (QB ratings: 136 to 48). The New England powerhouse is a team like none we have ever seen and has the most potent offense of all time.
The only advice I have for a Vikings fan is to get on our lucrative bandwagon while you still can: not only are we 8-0, but beating opponents by about 30 points a game means we’re also 8-0 against the spread.
Although I can understand the jealousy that led to Chris’s characterizations of Red Sox and Patriots fans, I’m genuinely confused about how he could attack the Celtics, the most screwed sports team of the last 20 years. Deaths to crucial players, unlucky lottery results in the Tim Duncan/Kevin Durant drafts and cap-killing deals to players like “Out Of Service” Pervis Ellison or the alcoholic Vin “And Tonic” Baker should inspire some national sympathy, especially from a town that has a similar record over the same time period.
As a young Celtics fan, I can take pride in our previous 16 championships, but since the last one happened in 1986, I’m not sure how much patience I’m supposed to glean from it. Instead, I was raised (like you) in a culture of losing and shitty management: as an 11-year-old fan, my father and I went to more Celtics games than they actually won all season (15). Things only got marginally better (and much more frustrating, you will see) in the Antoine Walker era.
Frankly, I deserve the season that’s coming to me for all that I have lost in the past. I feel for you, Chris, you deserve more as a sports fan, but don’t pretend that your team didn’t tank it at the end of last season and don’t criticize more passionate fans for complaining when our product doesn’t match our ticket prices.
I can’t blame fans of a lackadaisical sports culture for misunderstanding the love we have for our teams, but please realize that it’s an honor to receive such national scorn for our troika of dominance. As any Red Sox fan could tell you, it’s a lot more fun to be a notorious juggernaut than a lovable loser. But I don’t hate you, Chris: I’d be bitter too if my TV was dominated by Boston sports teams—instead of my own—come playoff time.
P.S. Also, don’t forget—Anna’s Taqueria is the bomb.
George Denny is a senior Politics major. He can be reached at gdenny@oxy.edu
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