We like sports. We hate sports. We're basically assholes.
I love teams that lose. The early Buffalo framework will do that, as it's done to so many. On the bright side, sometime during the 2007-08 Sabres season, I realized there is a certain morbid comfort in knowing I won't ever have to figure out a way to take off work and make the trip back to Tuffalo for a championship parade. I am aware that this is tremendously sad. Since moving to New York City in 2005, my obsession with shit squads only increased as I welcomed the Mets into my life. The team promptly devolved into a yearly shit show just palatable enough to keep me watching but not palatable enough to keep me from vomiting all over Fred Wilpon's face. The New York Red Bulls and Knicks were been added along the way as well, giving me a team in a league barely followed and a team run by yet another dipshit owner. The closest I've got to unadulterated sports joy was Liverpool's Champions League win in 2005, but LFC has been a tire fire ever since, narrowly avoiding complete financial collapse only to be bought by clueless Americans who also own the Red Sox. Oh, and LeBron James is a minority owners as well. Lovely.
I keep watching these egregious parades of horrors out of fear that fortunes will quickly change and I'll be left on the outside, wishing I had been paying attention to the series of miracles that let my team win it all.
As for my reason to be here writing at the Deeg with guys from my hometown whom I didn't meet until we stumbled into each other at a Sabres bar in NYC, the answer has a pretty long story attached to it, but needless to say a lot of craft beer and yelling was involved.
I keep watching these egregious parades of horrors out of fear that fortunes will quickly change and I'll be left on the outside, wishing I had been paying attention to the series of miracles that let my team win it all.
As for my reason to be here writing at the Deeg with guys from my hometown whom I didn't meet until we stumbled into each other at a Sabres bar in NYC, the answer has a pretty long story attached to it, but needless to say a lot of craft beer and yelling was involved.
I root for the Bills, Sabres, Orioles, Jazz and Fighting Irish. So somewhere in between Norwood's bad kick and Jordan's push off, I got used to the idea that my teams just weren't meant to win championships. Now early on, I was ok with this, since at least my teams were going to the playoffs and occasionally the finals. Then the awful decade known as the Aughts occurred and I realized it could be a few more decades before I see anything resembling a "championship team". But as the name would suggest, my instincts push me to be empathetic with my teams. More often than not, I try to give my teams the benefit of the doubt and keep my eye on the bigger picture. Sure Jimbo & Co. never won the big game, but we will never again see another team make it to the Super Bowl four years in a row. Sure the Orioles play in the toughest division in baseball and have only a puncher's chance of ever getting a whiff of a World Series again, but after seeing the San Francisco Giants win a World Series with a 12-year-old ace and zero real batting threats (Cody Ross? Seriously?!), how could you not believe anything is possible? Sure the Sabres had their shot at glory robbed from them on national television...
...nope, still got nothing on that.
...nope, still got nothing on that.
You know how it goes.
You’re a kid growing up in Buffalo, cheering on the Bills and Sabres like every other kid in your town, nothing crazy. Then suddenly you’re in your early twenties and holding back tears after a crushing defeat. You’ve seen this before and didn’t react like this, so why now? Because you’re an adult and you’re a Buffalo fan and that’s what happens. Bills, Sabres, Red Sox, PSU football, Bonas basketball and Man City. I’m a habitual line-stepper and underdog-rooter. I want to take Marcus Foligno to a strip club and make it rain. After spending too much time working in Vermont, I moved back to Buffalo and found a job which one would think is rarer than a total eclipse, but I promise you it is possible. It took be about two weeks to feel like a human being again after the ’06 Conference Finals. Why do I go through it? Because sometimes the greatest playoff run of a generation happens to fall during your last weeks and days of college and every few months you’re shit-faced talking with your buddies about what you’ll all do when the Sabres/Bills win their Stanley Cup/Super Bowl.
Speaking of, I’ll be writing for this blog until the Sabres and Bills win titles in the same year and my book “Two Parades” becomes a national bestseller, which should be June of whatever next year is.
You’re a kid growing up in Buffalo, cheering on the Bills and Sabres like every other kid in your town, nothing crazy. Then suddenly you’re in your early twenties and holding back tears after a crushing defeat. You’ve seen this before and didn’t react like this, so why now? Because you’re an adult and you’re a Buffalo fan and that’s what happens. Bills, Sabres, Red Sox, PSU football, Bonas basketball and Man City. I’m a habitual line-stepper and underdog-rooter. I want to take Marcus Foligno to a strip club and make it rain. After spending too much time working in Vermont, I moved back to Buffalo and found a job which one would think is rarer than a total eclipse, but I promise you it is possible. It took be about two weeks to feel like a human being again after the ’06 Conference Finals. Why do I go through it? Because sometimes the greatest playoff run of a generation happens to fall during your last weeks and days of college and every few months you’re shit-faced talking with your buddies about what you’ll all do when the Sabres/Bills win their Stanley Cup/Super Bowl.
Speaking of, I’ll be writing for this blog until the Sabres and Bills win titles in the same year and my book “Two Parades” becomes a national bestseller, which should be June of whatever next year is.
Nearly every time I talk sports with some NYC bro they go "Oh that's cute" clearly wondering whether or not I have a pink Manning jersey or a pink Sanchez jersey. When they find out I'm a Bills fan it's "you must really love sports to be a BUFFALO fan" or mostly "why do you do that to yourself?" The answer is simple: I am a crackbaby. Like many WNY-ers I left, but no matter how many times I hear "WINTER" or "how depressing," I can never really let the region go, try as I might.
The sports insecurities followed me to New York City. I could never in good faith be a Yankees fan so it's Knicks/Mets/St. John's bball for me (and hopefully the Cosmos someday soon). When I recite that laundry list of failure to those NYC bros, the condescension runs freely. It's okay, I just press them on any fact about any team they claim to support and they crumble almost immediately, especially Rangers fans. I take refuge in their smugness until someone goes "BOY I LOVE LOSING SUPERBOWLS RIGHT," then I summon all of my strength to refrain from cock-punching a motherfucker.
The sports insecurities followed me to New York City. I could never in good faith be a Yankees fan so it's Knicks/Mets/St. John's bball for me (and hopefully the Cosmos someday soon). When I recite that laundry list of failure to those NYC bros, the condescension runs freely. It's okay, I just press them on any fact about any team they claim to support and they crumble almost immediately, especially Rangers fans. I take refuge in their smugness until someone goes "BOY I LOVE LOSING SUPERBOWLS RIGHT," then I summon all of my strength to refrain from cock-punching a motherfucker.
The Wild Card
Pretty much all you need to know about me is that if (when?) (OK, if.) the Bills win the Super Bowl I will run out into the streets of Tonawanda (Town) singing Queen's We Are the Champions until all my closest friends along with the majority of the neighborhood have joined me in walking and singing in the street, a la Offspring's Why Don't You Get a Job?, and finally we arrive on the field at the Ralph where a wholesome campfire is waiting for us. The song crescendoes with "and it will go and on and ON AND ON AND" just as I finish climbing the goal post to belt out "WWWWWEEEEE ARE THE CHAMPIONS MY FRIE-ENDS" in the perfect pitch, and the wind blows through my hair like fucking Rose on the Titanic and I strum my acoustic, balancing ever so perilously on the crossbar. And then... orgy. Everybody fucks each other. Right on the field. Peace.
Wait? You have that exact same fantasy? Well shit. I guess I have to say a little bit more then. I'm the Wild Card. Delusional optimism? Sometimes. Vitriol? frequently. User of fancy words like vitriol? You bet your sweet ass, Daisy. Who's Daisy? I don't know, it just kind of seemed to fit. Take that and roll in a pinch of sarcasm, a full cup of ranting, and an unabashed love for underdogs. Season with profanity to taste. Pairs well with stiff drinks and cold medicine. Go Bills, baby.
Wait? You have that exact same fantasy? Well shit. I guess I have to say a little bit more then. I'm the Wild Card. Delusional optimism? Sometimes. Vitriol? frequently. User of fancy words like vitriol? You bet your sweet ass, Daisy. Who's Daisy? I don't know, it just kind of seemed to fit. Take that and roll in a pinch of sarcasm, a full cup of ranting, and an unabashed love for underdogs. Season with profanity to taste. Pairs well with stiff drinks and cold medicine. Go Bills, baby.
These guys have, in the wake of too much heartbreak, too much "build-up to a letdown," and too much frustration over the current state of our teams, taken leave of this website. You'd think that kind of heartbreak, letdown and frustration would be the perfect recipe for further contributions here, but - let's face it - these teams are bad. No one is invincible, and while those of us remaining at the Deeg hold out some hope for a triumphant return to regular participation, it's likely that such would rely on our teams being good again so we won't hold our breath. In the end, these two stellar examples of Buffalo manliness still have the login information for the site, so if they get drunk enough one night, who knows? (Note: they will, and it will be glorious).
What dreams may come.
What dreams may come.
