Team Loyalty

maddogg09

Oct 8

I don't get fair weather fans.

You know, the ones with all the gear, know all the latest news and buzz about the team, but as soon as the team suffers a bit of a downturn, off the bandwagon they jump.

I remember being in Sun Devil stadium in Tempe, Arizona the last time Notre Dame won a football national championship.

January 2, 1989.

My Dad and I sat there grinning like cats as Lou Holtz's undefeated Fighting Irish put the finishing touches on their victory over Major Harris and the West Virginia Mountaineers in the Fiesta Bowl.

We had killed off a bottle of Old Bushmills Irish Whiskey and at least a dozen beers.

"We'll be back to the national championship game every year," I remember cackling aloud.

What an asshole.

We haven't been back to the championship game since.

Another hot start this year until we ran into a Louisville team that didn't get the memo that this was a year the Irish would return to the College Football Playoffs.

Nope.

Undersized, but playing with reckless abandon, the Cardinals pushed around the bigger, more publicized behemoths on both our offensive and defensive lines.

All night long.

Speaking of the never-say-die spirit that has been woefully missing from the Manchester United Red Devils' attack, I sat in mass confusion as I watched the Brentford Bees kick the Reds' asses for the first 85 minutes of their Premier League match on Saturday.

Then they send in that young, strong Scott McTominay, and he scores a late brace to salvage a badly-needed victory, and hopefully, get them through this period of missing injured players.

I pledge eternal allegiance to United, but with that being said, Casemiro might be done. He's a step slow, and I'm sick of watching his passes barely trickle their way from his feet.

Ericksen might be nearing his denouement as well. Only flashes of his former brilliance remain.

Marcus Rashford seems to have lost his fire, merely going through the motions as his play is more of a reminder of the failure of the organization to secure Harry Kane or Kylian Mbappe. But it doesn't matter who you have up front if the defense continues their porous Swiss cheese defensive tactics.

Same with Bruno Fernandes, not exactly lighting up the offense with slow-developing Hojlund and the electric Spaniard Garnacho.

Injuries to older players past their prime from crap management of the transfer windows have all played a part in the embarrassment that is MUFC.

But I'll be there every week, with my 10 shirt on cheering the lads on, hoping against hope.

The Domestic Despot has NO sense of the spirit of competition on ANY LEVEL. She is one of those freaks that thinks participation trophies are a good thing, and I am one who will do absolutely ANYTHING and EVERYTHING (except cheat) to avoid losing. I'm not even sure it is about the joy of winning as much as it is avoiding the sting of losing.

Opposites attract?

After thirty-eight years, I guess so.

Stay well.