I was informed of Fulmer's news at 11:06 am and received three more emails in the next 20 minutes. I sent the link immediately to my Michigan-bred, non-SEC-school-attending boyfriend, who almost immediately sent me this completely unrelated link. And leave it to me to find some compelling, if vague, parallel between the residents of Charlotte/Detroit and … UT fans. Yeah, bear with me here.
Coming into the 2008 season, everything was a toss-up. We were coming off a decent season, so hopes were high. Pre-season rankings were no more portentous than the broken 8-ball at Caribou Coffee. But, in a kick, we had our first clue: the overtime loss to UCLA was a telling blow; a weak team in a strong SEC East that couldn't even win against a Pac-10 team? I think every other SEC team won that week except one of the Mississippi's. But! fans retained hope; a win against UAB made us 1 and 1, after all. Better than the other Big Orange of the Big East, right?
But after the loss to Florida… oh, the stupid mistakes, the humanity. After the second turnover in the red-zone, knowing fans' eyes collectively glazed over; we knew we were destined to spend the rest of the season like AA-listers trying to get into an A-list club. How fitting, Crompton fumbling near the end zone like Foster did against JoePa and his Lions to round out the 2006 season -- a smacking kiss of death. Only this time, the kiss symbolically ends our season only 3 games in.
Here, at this point, perhaps the Vol fan base could look across at the residents of mid-Wachovia mess Charlotte, seeing their wide-eyed and somewhat dazed, glossy look, and say that emphatic, gooey smattering of words…
"I know how you feel."
And to be sure, it felt horrible. We knew that a remaining schedule with Auburn, Georgia, and Alabama to tick off the list wasn't promising. We were starting to despair a little. Only on the inside, though. Our inside monologues were yelling, "Our football tradition! Our great football team! The foundation of our school and our pride! What to …do??" while our outside voices would only admit in murmurs, "…yeah man, we blew like a windsock. We should have… And he… Oh well. Meet you at the bar tomorrow for the Titans game?" The foundation was weak. We weren't sure what we were standing on. Tradition? Habit? Refusal to acknowledge the hole we'd dug ourselves? Refusal to climb in? There was still hope, though. The season wasn't OVER over. We could still come back.
I daresay Charlotte feels the same way now. Standing on habit and a strong will to ignore the real effects of Wachovia's "demise" and the economy's uncertain future. Charlotte's uncertain future. We still have the rest of the season to play out; we just need to take it one game, one play at a time.
To the north, Detroit stands today where UT fans are now. They both know they suck. And at the one thing they were supposed to be good at -- car-making and play-making. They failed to recruit the right resources and now they're stuck up shit creek, and they know it.
So what -- they do something about it! Fire Fulmer! Down with Kilpatrick. They will not run down the middle anymore on 3rd and long…! And, most importantly, they still have their pride. Yes, pride! It overcomes so many things. It ignores so many faults. And, my god, it is so exonerating. Orgasmically exonerating. It vindicates why you are what you are. Yeah, I know [chosen association with football team or city] seems dumb right now. But I'm so damn proud I need a big, ugly, generic, white sticker to put on my minivan. And I'll probably keep it there till my kid turns 30. America! fuck yeah.
Which brings me to an actual point, which is not that Charlotte is really like post-Florida-loss UT fans, or that Detroit is really like post-Fulmer UT fans (it is just football, anyway, as opposed to actual money and jobs and steel). But that pride can be blinding. You know the ones -- those people who start being proud just to be defiant -- they're the ones who get to be real pains in the ass. The line can be thin. Watch yo self!
Oh yeah, also, my other point is that the guy who wrote the article seems silly. Because it's not like people who live in Detroit have a better attitude than Charlotteans out of choice. Michiganders have been through years of sludging through the dredge, while North Carolinians have not. If Charlotte (yes, yes, god forbid) did get to the stage that Detroit is in, then I am sure that the people who haven't already flown the coop would have the same resolve as those in Detroit now. What other choice is there, really? Charlotteans right now know the weight of… well, everything. I think it's fine to be concerned. We can ignore it on the outside and give our perfunctory sheen of everything-will-be-all-right-ness, but our insides know that anything can happen. Why deny it? Pride (of any kind) and concern are not mutually exclusive.
The kind of camaraderie that Maddrey sees in Detroit is the kind of camaraderie that you see in people who have collectively been stomped on, over and over and over again. It's the way we poor, poor UT fans feel now. Collective pariahs of the SEC. Collective resolve. And yeah, we didn't personally get fucked or anything… but we cheered… a LOT. And developed ulcers. and stuff.
We finally got to that point… the point we've watched so many other "lesser" football programs succumb to: the point when we suck so bad that the coach must die.
And listen, I know he's a great guy. But it's kind of like how I feel about Bush. I'd love to go get a beer with him, but I don't want him leading things I care about anymore… such as the country whose rules I am subject to and the football team I am mentally brainwashed to love like … this video.
I hope you made it to the end, because that's the best part. Yeah, not the actual article i found it in itself (though it is good - thanks gach), but the video a few comments down.
And of course I guess I should say something like, Go vote tomorrow! Yay, America! But listen. It's my duty to vote, which I already did. It's not my duty to tell you what to do. Really what it comes down to is that I have spent many many hours learning about these candidates … I'm not spending more time writing about it (I will instead spend time writing about unlikely comparisons between the football world and the real world.. yeah, whatever. don't judge). I will only say that I agree with the CLT observer's opinion on candidate for President and NC governor. And vote for the Parks & Rec bond. Yay Rec.
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