I remember 1969. 1-13 with Butkus and Sayers. Unbelievable.
The Bears were NFL Royalty at one time. But that was back in our great-great-grandfather days...
Sadly, Chicago sports fans are used to losing. TOO used to it. Love for the team is one thing. Generations of losing is quite another.
Sports franchises do not have to be bad. If they are bad, this is a deliberate act by team ownership. And when teams are habitually bad... generationally bad... team ownership shows how they really feel about their customers – their loyal fan base. And that is not a pretty picture.
If a restaurant serves bad food, customers just wont go back. Maybe some folks will give then a second chance... but many wont return at all. Yet, for sports teams there seem to be different rules in places like Chicago. We keep coming back for more... year after year.
And how do such owners who continue to put out bad teams feel about fans? These owners simply have no regard for them. They have no respect for them. They cynically believe that they can just put bad teams out there year after year and fans will still support them. And in Chicago, we do.
In Los Angeles... teams HAVE to be good or fans just wont show up. And sometimes the teams will just move away from fan indifference. So, team owners in LA show more respect for fans by putting out good-to-great teams in most cases. For if they don’t, no one notices and no one cares. And that’s not a good thing in the Land of Hollywood. And the same can be said for a place like South Florida.
Is this a ‘weather’ thing? In cold towns you just end up supporting your team because there is nothing to do for six months of the year? And in warm places, you don’t have that problem?
Do we value our childhood memories so much in Chicago that we keep trying to relive them year after year even though those memories are long in the past? And do owners have a right to play and use those memories against us?
Sports fandom is meant to be fun. Enjoyable. It is not meant to be frustrating or just another problem laid on top of all our other life problems.
Chicago sports fans will never have good teams out on the venues of play until Chicago franchises have ownership that respects and values us. Otherwise, Disrespect will continue to be their business model and standard operating procedure.
This is the Game Above The Game. The one the Owners play – for our good... or for our ruin.