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anyone who has been reading over the past few days knows that i have been trying to decide on a city whose sports teams i can begin cheering for. i want to get past my nomadic fan-hood and settle into something more permanent. you may recall that the previous post narrowed my choices down to a final five. chicago. pittsburgh. st. louis. cleveland. philadelphia. let me know if you are interested in finding out more detail about the formula of arbitrary standards i used to come to this final five.
before i get into the final stage of my decision, i must say, i’ve gotten some good comments on this topic. a couple that really stuck out to me both encouraged me to allow gunnar to make his own fan-hood decisions. and i totally agree with this. also, my mom was quick to point out that even though i’m a nomadic fan, when i’ve chosen a team, i’ve stuck with them through bad seasons (see: notre dame football). my loyalties have only changed when players i liked came and went. so in that regard, i am no fair weather fan. but i think there is something to be said for being loyal to a single city. a hometown of sorts. when the season rolls around, you know where your loyalties are because they are with a franchise not with a player that can move more easily. you can recycle your old fan gear because after a few years, they become throwbacks. anyhow, i know full well that even if i chose to teach gunnar the virtues of one city, he may chose another one as he gets older. he may grow to love players more than teams. heck, he may never grow to be a big sports fan. and that’s ok too. more than anything, i want him to have know what teamwork, loyalty, and community are about. i think you can learn those types of things just from being a fan of sports. maybe i’m idealistic….
anyhow, enough of that. let’s get on to the decision making. right off the top, i’m going to eliminate three cities: philadelphia, pittsburgh, and cleveland. i decided to eliminate them for distance purposes. chicago comes in at about 650 miles from fargo and st. louis is about 800. that gives them a distinct advantage because i could attend games in those cities more easily than in the others which are significantly farther. none of the three eliminated have a natural rivalry with minnesota or kansas city which are the closest nfl cities to fargo.
so i thought about it a lot today. chicago or st. louis. i think on paper the obvious choice would be chicago. there are 5 professional teams (cubs, white sox, bears, bulls, and blackhawks) compared with only three in st. louis (cardinals, rams, and blues). it’s closer (650 to 800). more natural rivalries with minnesota (vikings/bears, twins/white sox). greater history/tradition. but there was one area that hit a snag… the hockey teams.
the st. louis blues have been my favorite hockey team since i was a little kid. i remember getting a sports illustrated for kids magazine that had something about brett hull and i was sold. they were my team. i made my own shirt with their logo and wrote them a letter asking for brett hull’s autograph (which i received back from them). i have two blues jerseys and just bought gunnar his first hockey jersey for christmas, a st. louis blues jersey to match mine. couple that with the fact that chicago’s team plays under the name “blackhawks” and has a giant indian head logo on their jerseys and i’ve got a dilema on my hands. see i’ve decided that i don’t want to cheer for teams with native american nicknames. and while “blackhawks” is pretty tame, i don’t want to compromise. it just seems to me that if an group of people that have been as subjected to abuse, genocide, and broken promises ask you not to use their names or imagery as a sports nickname, you should respect that. i don’t know what kind of relationship the blackhawks or organization has with the native people in illinois, so for that reason, i’d like to stay away from them.
so here’s what i’ve decided. because most of the standards of this whole experience were entirely arbitrary and based on my own biases towards certain cities and teams, i’m going to apply some “artist’s license” to this little activity. new rule: one substitution is allowed to push a city over the top. based on this new rule, i have substituted the st. louis blues for the chicago blackhawks. as a result of this substitution, chicago has become the overwhelming winner. the only issue left to be decided is which baseball team to cheer for, the cubs or the white sox. having been to wrigley field to see the cubs play once already, i don’t think i could justifiably make a case against being a fan. simple enough. decision made. the other beautiful thing about being a chicago fan? south bend, indiana, the home of the univeristy of notre dame is only 100 miles on the other side. can you imagine the kind of sports weekend i could have some september? cubs baseball on friday, fighting irish football on saturday, bears football on sunday…. wow.
so there you have it. chicago it is (with a little help from the blues). here are my new favorite teams:
football – chicago bears
baseball – chicago cubs
hockey – st. louis blues
basketball – chicago bulls
college football – notre dame fighting irish
the only exception i will make to this is in college hockey. i went to the university of minnesota my freshman year, attended a hockey game at mariucci areana, and decided to cheer for the gophers hockey team. it’s great also to go watch the gophers play the sioux in hockey around here and sing the minnesota rouser after the gophers score. alright enough about sports for now. remind me to write about jason stewart’s wedding, alright?
