September 9, 2008
Seattle is Home to Broken Sports and Tortured Fans
The chronically East Coast-focused ESPN crowned Cleveland the most tortured fan base in all of sports last year, before the collective treachery and vindictiveness of the unholy Schultz-to-Bennett takeover cost us our oldest franchise. With the advent of this past weekend's debacle in Buffalo, it’s time for Cleveland to step aside. There’s a new redheaded stepchild on the professional sporting block and its name is Seattle.
Now that O’Dea High School alumni Nate Burleson, the only accomplished wide receiver threat on the Seahawks, is out for the season—after just one game—it's become painfully clear that Seattle is now officially the most tortured fan base in all of sports.
The Mariners are atrocious. We have to read message boards where ethically indifferent Oklahomans taunt us with news of the bastardized Sonics moving. There's the doormat status of our Pac 10 schools and now this. The only thing outside the Storm that Seattle fans had to count on took a serious steps towards pathetic when Nate went down this past weekend with a season-ending injury.
Nate’s knee joins Bobby Engram’s shoulder and Deon Branch’s knee on the list of depleted Seahawk WR appendages—a dubious distinction giving Seattle by far the thinnest wide receiver core in the NFL. The Hawks are left with a bunch of former practice squad players and a handful of rookies who are going to have to find ways to avoid looking as bad as they did last weekend in Buffalo.
Seattle’s need for something positive to rally behind couldn’t be more pressing. We need a winner. Nate’s knee has taken on epic proportions. What started as a really bad year just became a horrible, sick joke.
Cleveland can complain about Elway costing them the Super Bowl. Big deal. How about the refs costing you the actual game once you got there? Cleveland can claim their team was stolen. So what? Ours was stolen, only we haven’t got them back yet. What have you got on that, Cleveland? That’s what we thought.
Of course, this means Seattle is cursed. Maybe it’s all the godless liberals. Maybe God makes it up to us in the form of an enduring music scene. Either way, this autumn got a lot tougher to stomach and we have every right to whine. Congratulations Seattle, we’re the new Torture Town, USA. Now that’s something to brag about.
Photograph courtesy of SeattleScott69 from the Seattlest Flickr Pool
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I can say as a former Clevelander that no place will ever touch Cleveland as the most tortured sports city in America.
The Sonics won a World Championship in 1979. Cleveland hasn't won a championship in anything since 1964. At least the Seahawks have been to a Super Bowl.
Also, look at that list. You have to be a real sports city to be on the "Most Tortured" list.
Cleveland threatened to kill people and commit acts of terror when the Browns moved. Misguided passion, I'd grant you, but at least it's a passion
Seattle yawned, whined a little in true Seattle passive-aggressive fashion, said "Who cares" and had the team choose to move to OKLAHOMA CITY?
I mean, come on.
When the Browns left Cleveland, at least they went to Baltimore, a city with a sporting tradition. The Sonics thought Seattle was so awful for their team that they chose Oklahoma City over Seattle.
On a side note, for the 10-20 people in Seattle who actually care about sports, can this city get a decent sports bar?
Here, you actually have to tell the bartenders to put the home game on. I've been around the block a little, but I've never seen anything like the sports apathy in this town.
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From Bill Simmons's Mailbag column today on ESPN
Q: Brady's out. That really sucks. But it could be worse -- you could be a Seattle sports fan. Let me break it down for you: The Mariners are struggling through one of their worst seasons ever. Our Sonics, the only team to win a professional title in Seattle, moved the team to Okla-friggin-homa and stuck us with the Storm. And the Seahawks -- in Holmgren's final year, mind you -- are now without their TOP FOUR RECEIVERS! Imagine losing Moss, Welker, Gaffney AND Kelley Washington. Plus our quarterback is having back problems (including rumors of bulging discs), and our best running back left last week's game with an injury. Of course, a 6-10 record might win our division, which means we get to lose in Round 1. Oh, and the travesty that was the excessive celebration call on Washington's Jake Locker. But on the bright side … well, I give up. Be thankful you don't live in Seattle.
-- Dan Gomez, Seattle
SG: I have to say, that made me feel a little better. Maybe the good people of Seattle should form an organization called "It Could Be Worse," in which they send e-mails to suddenly traumatized sports fans from other cities to talk them off the ledge.
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Let us all agree not to cry for Boston/New England fans.
Red Sox - 2 World Series champs last 4 years
Celtics - last years NBA Champs
Patriots - 3 Super Bowls last 7 years
For whats it's worth, Boston fans now are no different than Yankees fans; different shadings of the same douchebag, except Yankees fans don't still have the pricetags hanging down from their caps.
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Ruffhauser,
What control do I have over Clay Bennett relocating the team?
I didn't settle out of court and I am not Howard Schultz.
If Cleveland is so real why did you leave it to come here?
I was born going to see the Seahawks at the dome. The loudest venue in the NFL then, like Qwest Field the loudest venue in the NFL now. The Seahawks are a big deal here.
Your not from here so maybe your ability to judge Seattle sports history is a little off, but many people like you invaded WA over the past twenty years so now the real fan base is dilluted with haters like yourself.
It's not my fault you moved here.
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I felt strongly enough about this to actually register so I could comment.
I've lived in and love both and I have to say Seattle has nothing on Cleveland for tortured sports scenes. Clevelanders have been beat down so much, that sports is about the only source of civic pride. Seattle has so much going on and so many thriving businesses and neighborhoods. Cleveland is a poor rust belt town with three major sports teams, and is usually only embarrassed in the national media. If it's the only thing you got, it means a lot more.
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Jesus, someone is taking this the wrong way.
Not that I need to justify myself to this person, but here goes.
Cleveland is a dump with no future.
Seattle is beautiful with unlimited horizons.
Thats why I moved here.
Feel better? A little less insecure now?
Back on topic: Most of my Seattle friends here agree that Seattle fans do not hold a candle to the passion of fans "back East".
For crying out loud, I've been "shush-ed" at a baseball game here. Maybe you need this perspective.
As far as the rest of your bitter and hateful comments, maybe you need to get real. Most people who live in Western cities are from somewhere else, but thanks for showing me some love as a new person.
And by the way, "You're not from here" is the Seattle equivalent of a "your mama" comeback.
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fkearney8 has got it right. Your sports allegiances are set at an early age, when your dad takes to your first ballgames.
However, you can take you passions with you if/when you have to leave. The Internet/chat groups and satellite TV go a long way towards this.
In Cleveland, there is nothing else to do but drink and watch sports. It's a sad, depressing place with a cityscape out of some Mad Max, post-apocalyptic movie.
In Seattle you can hunt, fish, camp, waterski, or a million other things outdoors. The weather here is seldom bad enough to preclude you from doing outdoor activities.
People here whine about the rain, but I tell them, "Until you have to dig your car out of a foot of snow just to go to work, you have no idea how good you have it"
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I agree people in Cleveland have less to live for I just think Seattle has had worse luck overall.
Maybe when Cleveland loses Lebron like we lost Arod, Randy Johnson, Griffey and everybody else in their prime, there will be a more level comparison.
Getting screwed out of a Super Bowl is incomprable for the record, call me whiney, thin skinned, whatever but until it happens to you there's no explanation.
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As a neutral observer at the time, the Hawks did get jobbed out of a Super Bowl. However, losing A-Rod, Big Unit and Griffey were stupid front-office moves, which to me is a lot different than bad luck on the field of play.
LeBron will leave Cleveland one day soon, and Cleveland fans can then say "We had the greatest player of his day and won zip", which will just further the inferiority complex.
FWIW, the Browns were the Buffalo Bills before the Buffalo Bills.
Back in the 1950's, Cleveland was the first NFL team to lose 3 straight championship games. People cry for Buffalo's bad fortune in Super Bowls, but like most things involving bad sports luck, Cleveland had long beaten them to it.
Believe me, I know my Cleveland sports martyr-dom. It's all we have.