This is one of those times I feel lonely, when my second favorite team (after the Bears) wins it all and I am stuck in the sticky, mushy humidity of NC by myself where probably no one cares about hockey. I wish I were home getting stupid drunk on Monday night and skipping work the next day to continue celebrating with other like-minded Kaner fans instead of actually GOING to work a tad hungover after falling asleep almost immediately after a game I watched by myself.
This is not the point of my post. The point of my post takes me back to last Saturday (June 13) when my boyfriend and I ventured out in the city of Louisville, KY to watch Game 5 of the Stanley Cup finals in our full-on Blackhawks gear. We took care vetting places to watch the game. How was the food? How were the TVs? Most importantly, was there going to be sound? We watched the Hawks win at a place called Griff's, named after Dr. Dunkenstein Darrell Griffith (of Louisville legend) because we figured that would be the sportiest of sports bars. (It was awesome.)
So, as I mentioned, the Hawks won. On the way back to the hotel, our shuttle driver, one dapper, hatted, and exquisitely blinged Mr. Greene had to stop by Churchill Downs to pick up some other participants in Louisville nightlife for a ride back to the hotel. Two dudes get in the shuttle. One of them, seeing our red and black attire, IMMEDIATELY starts in. "Oh, DUDE, you guys are Blackhawks fans??? I HATE the Blackhawks." Jesus. I hate people like this. "Are you REAL Blackhawks fans? Do you only know TOEWS and KANE? Do you know who CHRIS CHELIOS is?"
I'm immediately fired up. Yes, I'm a real fan. I know their whole roster. Yes, I know who Chelios is, and you didn't even have to say CHRIS CHELIOS for me to know who you were talking about. My boyfriend was very diplomatic. I shut my mouth so as not to get into some f-bomb death match with a drunken asshole.
It turns out, dude is a St. Louis Blues fan. This doesn't surprise me, but I'll get to that. He goes on to ramble about how it's OK that the Blues (despite being the number 1 seed in our bracket) didn't make it past the first round of the finals because the Cards are so good this year, so that means Chicago and St. Louis are "equal".
This is where I get REALLY pissed. First of all, don't question my loyalty to Chicago. I am a Cubs fan - arguably the most loyal of any sports fans because our team sucks and continues to suck year after year after one hundred years, but I still waste one vacation day every year to watch their home opener. Note - this year they lost it to the St. Louis Cardinals. I am a Bulls fan, and a Bears fan, and a Hawks fan, and a Cubs fan. Do I pay attention to the ins and outs of their rosters every year? No. Do I watch every single game (especially the Cubs post July when they have inevitably removed themselves from Wild Card contention)? No. Do I know who Chris Chelios is? YES. I pay attention, and I never cheer for anyone above any of those teams. Second of all, the Cardinals are the winningest team in baseball after the Yankees. Chicago and St. Louis are not EQUAL. My teams - the Bears, the Bulls, the Blackhawks, the Cubs have about as many championships between them as the THREE St. Louis teams - the Rams, the Blues, the Cardinals, keeping in mind the Rams and the Blues haven't always been in St. Louis (actually, not until recently). So, don't give me some St. Louis sob story, like it's so hard to be a St. Louis fan. BS. If anything, you should find it hard to admit you come from an area where the mention of "Ferguson" to anyone else in the nation fires up images of how racist and backwards your twang-ass area of the country is, or you should maybe not pledge allegiance when the most evil of evil corporations roosts in your city (Monsanto) plotting world domination by suing local farmers and pumping cows so full of antibiotics that a strain of MRSA is becoming strong enough to take over the world.
The point of this post is that people shouldn't be dickheads, and they ESPECIALLY shouldn't be dickhead fans. This point, especially about St. Louis, is summed up in this wonderful Deadspin post from last season MLB playoffs. Please read. It's fantastic.
The Mayor of St. Louis is a Complete Dipshit
I lived for a long while in the north suburbs of Chicago. I remember, distinctly, Green Bay Packers fans coming out in their hideous green and gold colors when the Pack wasn't even PLAYING to cheer against the Bears. This is when I first realized the dickhead fan syndrome. Dickhead fans don't only cheer for their chosen teams, they cheer AGAINST other teams and also lambast any fans that are fans of that other team like it is some personal flaw. They try to make it miserable for anyone else to be a fan. They most likely have a small penis and/or are scratching their armpits right now. (Here is my disclaimer. I am from Bloomington, IL which is about halfway between St. Louis and Chicago. My town is split red and blue, Cards/Cubs. This rant is in no way a comment against ALL Cardinals fans, some of which are my very dear friends…)
When they weren't playing MY team, I used to cheer for all Big 10 teams, all NL Central teams, all NFC North teams (except for the Packers as taught by my father… Note - I didn't cheer AGAINST them either) until I learned that if I wanted to be a sports fan, I would also have to become somewhat of a dickhead. "You CAN'T be a Cubs fan if you ever cheer for the Cardinals. That means you're not a real Cubs fan." This was coming from a family of Cardinals fans like I wasn't allowed to usurp their supreme success. I wasn't even allowed a breadcrumb of it.
So now I've learned that love also has to come with hate. I love the Cubs, I hate the Cardinals. I love the Bears, I hate the Packers. I love the Bulls, I hate Miami (more of a recent thing, I guess?). I love the Blackhawks, and I guess now I hate the Blues. However, I refuse to be a dickhead fan. If your team gets farther than mine, so be it. I won't criticize you as a person, even if I may be sad for my team. Why? Because you weren't responsible for my team losing. So, I'm sorry doucher Louisville dude. Sorry your number 1 seeded team didn't even make it past the first round. Sorry the number 3 seeded team from your bracket won it all for the third time in SIX years thus securing dynasty status. Finally, I'm sorry that your life is so clouded in anger and hate that you can't even appreciate your own teams enough that you have to reign BS-small-penis syndrome down on anyone else who is a fan of another team.
By the way, doucher admitted at the end of the night (he was at a bar we went to later) that my Duncan Keith shirt was pretty cool and that he was sorry he was being an asshole in the shuttle. This made me happy, but you know what? It really didn't matter if I had received his apology or not. My team won, and then they won on Monday for the Stanley Cup. That is what life is about. Cheer for your team, but don't be a dickhead fan and cheer against anyone else.
