Keidel: Yeah, I'll Eat Some Crow, But Just Remember I Told You So
By Jason Keidel
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When I wrote my heartfelt monologue on my beloved black and gold, admitted both my neuroses and rabid regret that we would likely gag against the Jets, I was branded all manner of moron, among many nuclear nouns not fit for family programming.
Now that the nightmare became a savage, rancorous reality, Jets fans have slithered out like snakes from the yearlong rocks under which they've hid, telling me they told me so, when, in fact, I was assured by those same people that I was inane and insane for fearing a loss on Sunday.
My disdain for Fan Guy is renowned. But now it seems Fan Guy and Jets Fan are more closely related than I ever even pondered, two twigs on one branch from the same family tree.
You've carpet-bombed my social media outlets. I'm still sifting through the debris. It seems I'm an idiot, loser, and a hack. Even a dear friend of mine, who actually works with me at CBS, suggested that God Himself hates me. This is an otherwise bright, logical man who happens to be cursed with the Gang Green disease, touched by the Fan Guy virus. Like Ebola, we're still not sure if Fan Guy disease is airborne or if you must scrape skin or bodily fluids. I will urge him to find the nearest ER to WFAN's HQ on Hudson Street. I care about the man and am deeply concerned. Does he have Aetna? Cigna? Blue Cross/Blue Shield?
All of you have forgotten that I was seriously concerned about this game, that my squad softly nestled between the Ohio, Allegheny and Monongahela have a habit of gagging when guaranteed a win.
Remember we got beat by the Buccaneers -- at home! And Tampa is buried deep down the bottom rungs of the league. It came across like paranoia, but you, of all people, should know that you are innately and intimately familiar with your team. You know their idiosyncratic actions, their neuroses, their ability to beat whom they shouldn't and lose to those they cannot.
But worse than any obscene soliloquy from the online tough guy, worse than any vulgar missive from the guy who doesn't even have the guts to use his own name or picture, it's the visceral ignorance of the Jets fans who fans out throughout the five boroughs and beyond. You actually act like you won the Super Bowl on Sunday.
Did I sign up for this? Sure. Not only am I a member of the media and the peculiar medium of Internet columnist, I also called out the Jets on a weekly basis. But nearly none of my assertions were inaccurate.
You still haven't won a Super Bowl since the year I was born. After a surprising resurgence, two AFC title games in Rex's first two years, you've gotten exponentially worse. You're still 5-19 against my beloved black and gold. And you're still 2-8 and barely above the Raiders and Jaguars as the worst team in the sport. You're not even the best team in your own building, which is saying a lot when your roommate is the 3-6 Giants.
I want to feel for Fan Guy, whether it's pity or sympathy or empathy. But his epic ignorance just won't allow it. If the roles were reversed and the 1-8 Steelers beat the 6-3 Jets, I would not form a conga line down.
Maybe you've rammed your head against the wall so many times you've built those brutal proteins in your brain, thus rendering you inert in physical and metaphysical ways that can only be measured by medics. Maybe the aggregate pounding of beer, pretzels, and pills has taken its inexorable toll on your soul.
Sour grapes? Damn right. I hate losing in general and to the Jets in particular. We should be ashamed. Big Ben played like Andy Dalton. At the end of the season, when we're jostling with the Browns or Baltimore, we will recall this game with putrid self-loathing. The Browns. What kind of world allows for the Browns to be in first place past September? LeBron switched cities, not sports. None of this makes a modicum of sense.
I've given up on Fan Guy. But you, the otherwise logical, linear Jets fan who was accidentally born into the Gang Green gene pool, your father's unintentional child abuse of raising you a Richard Todd fan, should know better than popping out the pompoms in November, which makes you nothing more than clearly second-worst rather than the worst.
Have fun. I'm largely ignoring Facebook and Twitter. Whatever. When the first frost coats the cutgrass and we smell the smoky fragrance of a fireplace, my beloved black and gold will be playing a meaningful football. And you will not.
Not that you know the difference. You won the Super Bowl on Sunday.
As they say in social media ... smh ...
Follow Jason on Twitter at @JasonKeidel
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