I found that in the dollar area at Target here in Springfield last night. That's from a US map place mat for little kids, and it's a pretty good indication of how the world looks at us. There was a lobster off the coast of Maine, the Statue of Liberty adjacent to New York, and for us? A rain cloud. It could have just as easily have been a Starbucks cup or a Microsoft logo, but you get the point (Seattle losing a major pro sports franchise certainly doesn't improve our national image either). As we've heard before from the likes of Jimmy Johnson and Shawn Springs, we're "South Alaska" or "Egypt" in the eyes of the national sports press and frankly to a lot of athletes too.
This actually shouldn't be surprising, given that over a third of all active NFL players are from California, Texas or Florida. Only about three percent of the league's players are from WA, OR, ID and AK COMBINED. So to a wide swath of the NFL, Seattle is just a rainy, cold, remote hippie town. When you combine this with the spectacular bias towards the Northeast-DC corridor among the mainstream sports media, it's not surprising that no matter how good the Seahawks are, idiots will still pick Arizona to win the NFC West.
My pet theory? They keep doing that shit because they HANG OUT IN ARIZONA. They golf there, they hide out there in the winter, they go on vacations there. I have no idea why... I grew up in the Tri-Cities, which is basically Arizona Lite, and it's brutally hot and monumentally boring. But the bottom line is that most athletes and sports writers would NEVER voluntarily visit Seattle. Just listen to schmucks like Kornheiser bleat about having to "fly allll the way out to Seattle." Boo fucking hoo. You occasionally have to visit the
Anyway, since they hang out in Arizona, it's much easier for them to delude themselves that this is the year the Cardinals "break through." Ha.
We've all said some variation of this before, but the only way this will ever really change is if the Hawks bring home that Lombardi Trophy. This year would be a good time, boys.
UPDATE: Just thought I'd taunt Pittsburgh with these interesting statistics... Since 2000, Seattle's population has grown by a healthy 5.5%, while people have been fleeing Pittsburgh like someone released the Superflu there... It has hemorrhaged SEVEN percent of its population since 2000.
That's why those fuckers with the piss-yellow towels are all over the country... They're running from that decrepit armpit of a town as fast as they can!
2 comments:
Every time this topic comes up I think of how Vancouver gets such positive mentions compared to Seattle, even in the American sports press, when they're basically the same place with the same weather the same distance from the rest of N. America. With the Olympics coming up I expect this contrast to become unbearable.
I feel ya, DH, but Vancouver gets that crap too.. Remember the whole Steve Francis debacle with the Grizzlies?
Stupid Douche. Who would rather be in Houston than Vancouver? Idiot.
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