An Epic Loss
As we all know, it’s only a game.
Yeah, sure, and Bill Gates is just a software salesman.
With the nation in the throes of a presidential election clearly we should have more important things on our minds. During the week when we are supposed to pay attention to civil rights, social justice and other great issues associated with the life of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., it seems almost abhorrent to waste our breath and energy on a football game.
Nothing unifies Milwaukee and the state of Wisconsin more than our devotion to the Green Bay Packers. Our state may be divided between Democrats and Republicans, haves and have-nots, urban and rural, etc., but our identification with the Green and Gold is just about universal. So what transpired at Lambeau Field on Sunday has got to be Topic A this week, at least until we all process what happened, as best as possible, so we can move on to other things.
First of all, I have something to put on the record. I grew up in New York but I was rooting for the Packers to advance to the Super Bowl and beat the Patriots. As a native of Queens, I have always considered myself a fan of the Mets, Jets and Knicks. All three teams won their respective championships within a year and a half of my tenth birthday. That kind of celestial alignment has a way of imprinting a lifelong connection between a boy and his teams.
When I moved to Wisconsin eight years ago, I had been told that the state’s association with the Packers was unlike anything I had ever experienced. I was a bit skeptical since New York fans are pretty intense themselves. Also, I had lived in the Washington, DC area for 15 years and that community’s association with the Redskins is also remarkably monolithic.
But there are many more transplants in the New York and DC areas so the percentage of devoted fans is much higher here so I can confirm that the devotion of Packer fans exceeds any team loyalty I have witnessed.
I’ve grown to cheer for the Packers and their remarkable run this year was great fun if ultimately heartbreaking. The epic loss on Sunday was doubling disappointing because they were Favred to win, (excuse me), favored to win and they were playing in the welcoming surroundings of a home field.
But following a closely fought contest that went into overtime, it will be the Giants who advance to the Super Bowl. Surely, there is no need to recount the details but it was an interception thrown by the great number 4 himself that gave the Giants kicker the opportunity to redeem himself for two earlier misses and score the winning field goal.
Ouch. So now Packer nation must lick its wounds and breathlessly anticipate next season. The team is young and its future is bright. The big unknown, of course, is whether or not Favre will return. He will undoubtedly take some time to confer with his family and make up his mind, hopefully sooner rather than later. Clearly, he can still perform at the highest level, he still plays with the enthusiasm of a school kid, and his legions of fans will be devastated when he decides to call it quits. But only he can make that call and the rest of us can only wait.
One last thought on the game. It was thrilling! Most of the experts were predicting a Packer victory given the home field advantage, the weather, injuries to key Giants, and, of course, the quarterback matchup. But both teams were well-prepared and the game remained close until the very end. As in a bruising heavyweight title fight, the Packers and Giants threw everything they had at each other. Ultimately, only one team could win and, alas for the Packers and their fans, it was not them.
Come to think of it, that’s a lesson that ought to be learned by the combatants in the supposedly more important game of politics. Don’t we all hope that the candidates give the elections their very best effort, play clean, and commit to being good sports once the voters determine the outcome? Wouldn’t that be nice?
For many, the Packer loss brings the end of the football season and some will look for a new sport to follow. Perhaps now is the time to focus attention on the political races, which are promising to remain competitive far longer than many expected. In the parlance of sports, and with apologies to the late Phil Rizzuto, as channeled by the great bard Meat Loaf, “we’ve got a real pressure cooker going here.”
In closing, I’d like to call your attention to the words of Ernest Lawrence Thayer who wrote the legendary Casey at the Bat, way back in 1888. Baseball, football and life are not perfectly interchangeable but Thayer’s poem seems to match the pall that set over Wisconsin at game’s end Sunday.
No Joy in Mudville, indeed.
