Curse This!

The life of a Chicago sports fan. It certainly is not easy. From a far, one may consider the Chicago fan to be fortunate. Reason being the Chicago fan has a plethora of relevant professional sports teams. Between the Chicago Cubs, Chicago Bulls, Chicago White Sox, Chicago Bears, and Chicago Blackhawks; Chicago fans have a team to satisfy their needs for all four seasons. But, unless you are a Chicago sports fan, no one will ever understand why many Chicago sports fans feel their sports franchises are overcome by some supernatural power.

This supernatural power is a word that many followers of Chicago sports teams despise. Cursed. Just the mere mention of the word cursed and I immediately overcome with a feeling of resentment and disdain for the Cubs’ teams of old. Just name any anomilie and the word curse would probably be a good explanation–billy goats, black cats and all. But it was not until Saturday April 28th, 2012 at approximately 5 o’clock in the evening that I became a believer of the word “cursed.”

Saturday started no different from any Saturday for me. A wake-up call from my girlfriend, followed by a hour of cleaning the basement at my house in preparation for a bachelor party that was being thrown at my house on Saturday night. The plans for the day were to go paint-balling, and then retreat back to my house for a night of playing cards and watching basketball. The Indiana Pacers Vs. Orlando Magic is currently on the television in my basement. This where I should note that the bachelor’s party is being hosted by my stepfather, honoring one of his co-workers. Drunk men talking sports, and women; their are bound to be endless stories to result from tonight.

But lets rewind the story back to just before my stepfather and I left the house to meet the guys at the paint-ball location. To confirm the source of entertainment–enter the bachelor party stereotype here–I was told to DVR the Chicago Bulls game. There is no time to mention the flaws in why the number one seed in the entire NBA playoffs is playing game one of their playoff series at noon. But I set the DVR, and then depart for paint-balling. While paint-balling, we were under strict rules to not check our smartphones in an attempt to see what the Bulls were doing.

We all obliged by the rules and left our smartphones in the car. But by the time paintballing was over, we all were eager to get back to the house and watch the Bulls game. There we were huddled around the TV in my basement watching the Bulls dismantle the Philadelphia 76ers in game one of the first round of the Eastern Conference Playoffs. Everything was good, until the mood changed. The mood changed around the final minutes of the Bulls and 76ers game. Reigning NBA MVP and Chicago Bulls superstar Derrick Rose planted as he was driving to the basket, and almost simultaneously, Rose fell to the ground grabbing his left knee in pain. The intial reaction from the men in my basement were filled with expletives–choose one and you would probably be correct. Our reactions were only magnified when it was later reported that Rose has torn his ACL in his left knee and will miss the rest of the playoffs.

This has been a scenario that Chicago sports fans are all too familiar with. The Chicago Blackhawks were eliminated by Phoenix Coyotes in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. In that series, the Blackhawks lost forward Marian Hossa after Hossa was the victim of a dirty hit by Raffi Torres.

After the first 10 games of the season, the Chicago Bears were 7 and 3. The Bears did not make the playoffs and finished with a record of 8 and 8. What happened? Jay Cutler broke his right thumb and the Bears went from being contenders to pretenders.

The Chicago Cubs and Chicago White Sox have just began to embark on their respective 2012 seasons. It is only a matter of time that both teams will suffer some form of significant injury. Who will it be for the Cubs? Castro? Rizzo? Jackson? Garza? Take your pick.

There is certainly something in the Lake Michigan water. Are all Chicago sports teams cursed? If you asked me prior to Saturday, I would have said one would be crazy to think that. May be the consequence of Chicago having a plethora of significant sports franchises is that the teams will be plagued by some supernatural power that keeps that detours their fans from the pursuit of happiness. Whatever the case is, I feel slighted to curse out all curses.