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Friday, Jan 9, 2009
You think the curse of the Red Sox is bad? The Pats wish they were the Red Sox. And so do their fans.
Feb 2, 2002 | No one is happy. It's about halfway through the third quarter and the Oakland Raiders appear to have the conference playoff game well in hand. It seems for all the world that the New England Patriots have done what Boston-area teams seem to do best: raised everyone's hopes only to cave in during a game they were supposed to win.
But it's never quite that easy with the Pats. So while the roomful of guys who are, for the moment, calling themselves Patriots fans are decidedly unhappy, so am I, the single Raiders fan in the crowd. I'm unhappy because I, too, have been watching the Pats all my life. I'm unhappy because I know the Pats are going to come back and win it. They have to. That's what they do when everyone has given up on them.
"I knew it," says Bill, probably the purest Pats fan in the room. He leans forward and thumps the arm of the couch lightly with his palm. The Raiders are again moving the ball downfield in spite of the much-hyped Patriots defense, and in spite of the snowstorm that was supposed to spell doom for Oakland. "It's all over now," he says. "We might as well go home. I knew it."
I laugh a little bit. It starts out amused, but comes out sounding nervous.
"You know what, man," I say. "There's an awful lot of time left in this game. They're not down by that much. This is still anybody's game."
I'm hopeful this will turn out to be nothing more than generous reassurance, something to offset the quiet gloating I hope to do later. But it's also an incantation, an offering to the football gods. Maybe if I say the Patriots still have a chance that will break the spell. Maybe if I trick the universe into believing there's someone out there who still believes the Pats can win, fate will hesitate from intervening long enough for the Raiders to sew this thing up.
"Shut up," Bill counters. "Your Raiders are gonna win, OK? I admit it. You were right, they're gonna win. So shut up."
Jack, who's sitting nearer to me than Bill, opens his mouth for the first time since halftime. "They can't come back," he says. "I wish they could, but they can't." He retreats back into silence. His arms are crossed tight and high across his chest. His face registers the kind of pout you typically only see when he blows an easy putt or registers an empty hand in a game of darts.
Under less tense circumstances, I'd have pointed out how much Jack's outlook on the game has changed. He did, after all, spend the week e-mailing me various stats, theories and weather forecasts that "proved" the Raiders couldn't possibly win this game.
Rob and his wife, Jackie, have retreated to the kitchen where they're playing with Jack's dog and making as much noise as possible. They want everyone to know they don't really care about the game. But we all know the truth: Neither of them can bear to watch the Pats lose yet another big game.
Glum faces and talk of heading out before the snow gets too bad fill the living room. As far as everyone is concerned, the Patriots have officially crapped out.
And the attitude here only reflects what's taking place in Foxboro Stadium, where it seems the only Pats fans who aren't booing are the ones walking to the exits.
There's nothing new about the scene here in Douglas, Mass., or the one in Foxboro. Indeed, both capture the very essence of what it means to be a Patriots fan.
Bill is as close to being a tried-and-true Pats fan as anybody I've ever met. He doesn't follow any other team. He begins every season with at least some hope that New England will at least finish 8-8. He spends every draft day hoping the Patriots will finally make a good decision, will finally pick up that one great piece that completes the puzzle the team seems to have been working on for decades.
Even Bill doesn't expect much, though. And he's fairly quick to turn his attentions to other sports once the Pats season goes into a tailspin (usually by Week 5).
The rest are like me. Just about every New England football fan I've ever met is like me. We get excited when the Pats do well, but we never expect anything to come of it. We never commit to the Pats until there's nothing else to do. We have our other teams and they come first. It's the Raiders for me. Jack likes the Denver Broncos. Rob follows whatever team has his favorite player of the moment. Come playoff time, if our primary teams are eliminated and the Patriots are still playing (this happens about once a decade), we become hesitant Pats boosters.
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