Strawberry, Gooden, Tyson and Coleman All Call Me Dr. J...for Jinx.

Jinx! Mush! Cobra! Whammy! The Horns! These are all phrases that have been attributed to me over the years of my sports fan hood.If there was a phenom, I jinxed him.

I never realized the power I had as a youth, but looking back on my career, I have stopped a pretty notable group of sports stars from achieving hall of fame careers.

It all started in 1984 when I was 11 years old and a young fireballer from Hillsborough High School named Dwight Gooden rose through the ranks of the New York Mets. I’ve been a lifelong Mets fan and in the early '80s, Mets wins were few and far between. The advent of Dwight Gooden changed all that.

Days that Gooden pitched were like holidays. At the age of 19 he was possibly the most un-hittable pitcher in the history of baseball. No one could touch him. Even his curveball had a name. In baseball speak, a curve ball is called “Uncle Charlie”. His was so devastating it earned the name “Lord Charles.”

In the sports world he was as dominant as Michael Jordan or Muhammad Ali and his potential was limitless. He was my biggest sports hero. But as most Tampa residents know, it wasn’t meant to be. Drug arrests, DUIs, multiple rehab visits and a jail stint have been the bookmarks to the once great Met. I remember feeling betrayed as a young man for what Doc Gooden put me through, but he certainly would not be the last athlete I rooted for to run afoul of the law.

There’s Darryl Strawberry, another Met phenom who, like Gooden, had the baseball world eating from the palm of his hands. He had the potential to break every power hitting number in baseball but ended up just breaking the law. Cocaine arrests, domestic violence, tax evasion and soliciting a cop for sex are just the surface of a stellar criminal career. Another fallen hero.

There’s Mike Tyson, who at 18 seemed to be the most dominant boxer in the history of professional pugilism. I don’t think I need to list his many encounters with Johnny Law. Just another one of my heroes that couldn’t live up to the hype.

There’s Derrick Coleman, the 6’10” forward who was the consensus NCAA Men’s Basketball player of the year. The New Jersey Nets drafted him with the first pick of the NBA draft out of Syracuse University. How could this go wrong?

My favorite NBA team drafting the best player in the nation from my favorite college team. He could shoot and rebound and even looked to be a revolutionary player. Charles Barkley declared him the “greatest power forward in the league, when he wants to be." The problem? He never wanted to be.

DUIs, assaults and possibly the laziest NBA career ever shattered my hopes yet again. Add to this list, Rashaan Salaam, Pearl Washington, Paul Wilson, Billy Owens, Gregg Jefferies, etc, etc, etc.

It’s not just athletes. It seems that I built a hall of fame career out of putting a hex over everything I find entertaining. From TV shows like The Greatest American Hero and Sledge Hammer to bands like The Pixies and Nirvana to comics like Calvin and Hobbes and the Far Side. If I like them, there will be either an abrupt ending or a long agonizing decline from decent society.

I understand that there is a common element to my misery. It’s that I always go in full steam for the enigmatic star. The potential of youth combined with talent makes for a very addictive drug. When you discover a raw talent you want to see it succeed. You want to say that you were a fan from the beginning.

But in my haste to find heroes early I think I lost the reason that they are supposed to be heroes. Because they earn it by showing character on and off the field. By performing to the best of their collective ability when pressure situations arise. I have pondered this question and come up with nothing. Who is young and talented and plays the game the right way? Who cares about winning and losing but also has character and work ethic?

The answer hit me like a ton of bricks. The Tampa Bay Rays. They are young. They are talented. They have suffered long (relative to their existence) and appreciate everything they have earned.

They have a minuscule payroll compared to their division leading Yankees, yet they are only one and a half games back in the American League East and are seven games up in the wild card standings. Somehow, with all this grit and determination, the Rays can’t fill even half their stadium (another column, another day).

As a transplant from New Jersey, I have rooted for the Rays if only to root against the Yankees, but I haven’t really gotten behind them as far as game attendance goes. I would rather just watch my Mets on Direct TV.

But this year seems to be over for the Mets and I think I can be part of the solution to two problems: their attendance issues and my jinxing power. This team is hungry and since getting a taste of World Series defeat two years ago to the Philadelphia Phillies they are hungrier. So sharing a common enemy is an easy way to make an ally.

Now, I’m still a Mets fan and should the Mets play the Rays in the World Series any year, I wouldn’t think twice about wanting to sweep the Rays out of the playoffs. But there’s something special about this team. So I’m going to root for the Rays to make the World Series and although I can’t say I was there from the beginning, I can say they earned the right to have me as a fan. What’s the worst that could happen?