It's A New York Thing

Being happy that the Giants are doing well because they're a New York team is like rooting for Canada in the Olympics because they're in the same hemisphere as the United States.

Folks from "one team towns" don't get to root for their team and against another right in their own backyard. 

I find no joy in the Giants success. In fact, with the Jets not in the playoffs and the Giants doing well I am miserable. When I gather enough strength to watch I pray they fail. When they do well I scream and turn the game off. I can't stand it. If I sound jealous then I am guilty. Guilty as charged.

The Giants moved to Giants Stadium in New Jersey in 1976. The Jets followed them out there in 1984. No, they didn't change the name of the stadium when the Jets played there. Acck!

I hope the Giants get blown to pieces by the Packers on Sunday. When they lose I will breathlessly and repeatedly mutter, "yes, oh yes..." as I do my Aaron Rogers touchdown dance over and over (discount double check!). My boys will shake their heads saying in disgust, "Dad, you're terrible". They're young and have lived in a number of different "one team" cities so they don't understand, "The New York Thing".

The Jets and Giants play in different conferences so their regular season meetings are far and few between.

To root for the Jets is to loathe the Giants. Y'see, I'm a New York fan who roots for one, ONE New York team and NOT both. I love the Yankees and the Met's eternal misery is divine. I root for the Rangers and LOL at the Islanders.  "Oh, but you should be happy that the Giants are doing well because they're a New York team". Wha?? Being happy that the Giants are doing well because they're a New York team is like rooting for Canada in the Olympics because they're in the same hemisphere as the United States.

The baseball Giants and Brooklyn Dodgers both left NY for California after the 1957 season. My father felt as bad as Giant and Dodgers fans did because there was no one left to root against. Until the Mets came along in 1962.  

It's all my father's fault. He taught me to hate the other team in town. He hated the Mets. He also hated the Dodgers and the (baseball) Giants. Back in his day you had your New York team and you rooted against the other New York team(s). Just the way it was and they way I am. It's a New York Thing.

There was a time, long ago, much to the lament of Rangers faithful, when the Islanders dominated the NHL. Oh, the pain. The pain.

The closest thing I experienced to that storied Yankees-Dodgers-Giants rivalry was Rangers-Islanders in the late '70s and '80s. There was nothing like the day of a game chiding on Islanders fans and piling it on even more the next day if the Rangers won. Like in 1979 when the Rangers beat the Islanders in the semi finals in six games. Never mind that the Rangers got killed the finals and the Islanders went on to four straight Cups. Ranger fans sure took it on the chin with the Islanders success from 1980-1984; four Stanley Cup wins in a row and five straight trips to the finals. Are you kidding me? But that was all part of the fun of being a NY sports fan. It's sad what the Islanders have become and it looks like they will be moving off Long Island after 2015. The Islanders suck so bad and have sucked so bad for so long I almost, almost feel sorry for them.

The Rangers have one Cup in the last three generations while the Islanders have four. Somehow, that one Rangers Cup is more significant than the Islanders four. It's that New York Thing.

When the Rangers finally won the Stanley Cup in 1994 it ended a Fifty-Four year drought for the Broadway Blues. By then the Islanders were just in the beginning stages of their remarkable generation long swoon. That made that Cup even more delicious for the Ranger faithful. Never mind that the Rangers won only one Cup; that one Cup was somehow more significant than the four in a row the Islanders had won. Why? It's a New York Thing.

No matter which way you look at it this was not a good day to be a Yankee fan.

This New York Thing does get dicey though when the New York team you root against plays another team you despise. In 1986 the Mets played the Boston Red Sox. Oye vey. Since to be  a Yankees fan is to hate the Red Sox, Yankee fans were screwed because we can't root for the Mets. Ugh. I think in the end us Yankee fans were happy to see Boston NOT win rather than see the Mets win. The Mets becoming the faceless team that beat the Red Sox.

Noooooooo!

When the Giants played the Patriots in the 2008 Super Bowl it was the same thing. To be a Jets fan is to hate the Patriots. I was very happy that the Patriots lost but to lose to the Giants? Sadness. 

My hero

Sunday I will channel my inner Lombardi, put a block of cheese on my head and blanch a tonsil everytime the Packers score. Go Packers!