A Crisis of Fandom

I woke up this morning to something I've never faced in my 25 years of sports fandom: a crisis. But let's start from the beginning.

Thursday night, I get home from work, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, ready to watch my Red Sox go down swinging, or better yet, actually win a game at Fenway.

But after hitting the ON/OFF button on my remote, as my television's pictured cleared, I see they are already down 2-0 in the bottom of the first.

There is nothing more gut punching then being down by multiple runs before you are even up. It takes the crowd out of it, and when it has happened the last few games, it brings about an uncomfortable sense of deja vu.

So I immediately distanced myself from the game. I kept it muted while I made dinner, read, and surfed the 'net, all the while watching the deficit mount. 2-0, 4-0, 5-0, 7-0.

Usually on a Thursday, I watch The Office, then maybe stay up late watching a movie or something, since I usually go into the office late on Fridays.

As the Green Monster was scaled time and time again by Longoria and Co., I quickly lost interest. I turned the game off, played some Xbox, and passed out around 11:15.

Before retiring, I checked the score, 7-4, Big Papi had just hit a three-run dinger. Correction, I checked the score on ESPN.com.

There was my first mistake. I should have turned on the telly, where I probably would have seen the Fenway crowd coming to life, and maybe I would have kept the game on.

Instead, I was treated to my phone going crazy around 12:15, with texts and calls. What did I do? In my stupor I simply turned the phone on silent, and went back to sleep.

I dreamed of walk-off hits, I swear. I dreamt that Kevin Youkilis hit a walk-off, three-run homer to right, giving the Sox the win.

I woke up around 5:00 AM to hit the bathroom, and I quickly clicked on ESPN.com, only to be greeted with the picture you see above.

I then checked my phone, and saw the glorious text messages and calls that had been missed.

Now you see the crisis of fandom. Am I a good fan? I always thought so. I have always believed that watching your team go down in flames is part of being a fan. If you want to celebrate the good times, you better be there for the bad times.

I have forced myself to watch every post-2006 Dallas Mavs playoff loss, to make up for missing the entire 2006 Finals. I was working at a summer camp, with no TV, and I should have been there for my team.

The only time I shut off the TV was in the ninth inning of Game Four of the 2004 ALCS, and I think I could have been forgiven.

I didn't want to watch my team get swept by the team I hate most in the world, so I missed the Dave Roberts steal and the ensuing win.

But I never faced the questions I do now. Why didn't I stick with my team. I did last year, when the Indians pushed us to the brink, because I knew that this was the best Sox team of my lifetime, and I refused to think they would go down without a fight.

And I was rewarded. Now, I don't know what to think. I was in dreamland while the best postseason comeback of all time happened, and it was my team that was on the winning side.

After the thrill of winning left, the questions remained. Why? It's not like I am a 60-year-old New Englander, always waiting for the other shoe to drop, since it happened so many times throughout the '40s, '50s, '60s, '70s, '80s, and '90s.

I'm a fan of the '90s and 2000s. Sure, I lived through 1999 and 2003. But it was such a thrill to see the Sox playing in October that it felt like a win to me.

Has my team's success become so run-of-the-mill that I can just turn them off in a must-win, back-to-the-wall game?

For those of you reading this, hoping for answers, I can offer none. I can only ask questions, and hope the answer will come in time.

Please feel free to comment below, with hatred, compassion, or a mixture of the two.