hawksfansinceday1":1zl2k1ck said:
I'm 57 and not getting any younger. Radish is in his mid-60s I believe. DrDiags like a year older than me. There are others here and in Seahawks Nation in the same boat. We've seen a lot of close but no cigar so forgive us if we need to take at least one step back to preserve our football hearts.
So you're telling me all we need is for all of you old farts to kick the bucket, then the rest of us can move on from this cursed existence? I KID, I KID!
Great post, David. I feel you on all of that. But as a lifelong Seattle sports fan, I also 100% understand and feel all of the nervous energy that's been coming from the site the past couple days. Negativity guards us against setting ourselves up to be let down. It's in our blood, it's in our DNA. Even if the team was undefeated going into the playoffs or Super Bowl, I'd have a nervous feeling in my gut until the game was over. I seriously wanted to scream at the guy who made the Dikembe Mutombo post today. You really think us Seattle sports fans need reminding of this?!?!?! (deep breathes. exhale. go to your happy place, Jordan.)
Ok, where were we...
Where I think a lot of people went wrong was getting too far ahead of themselves way too early. I'm not saying that they shouldn't have had Super Bowl thoughts. But at a certain point it went from Super Bowl hopes to Super Bowl expectation. And with that, you create and build an unrealistic perspective and unreasonable ability to deal with adversity (IE a home loss to the Cardinals that didn't exactly end your season). I've been bothered by the overall tone of the city the past month of expecting the Super Bowl. All of my family and friends who aren't even that big of fans have been acting as if it was just a countdown. The Super Bowl isn't a right of passage. It's something that must be earned. We've seen the stats about how little the #1 seed means in terms of making it. We've seen year after year of huge upsets in the playoffs. Why should we expect to get it so easy? Of course, with our HFA, us getting the #1 seed is a bigger deal than for most. But it's not a free pass to New Jersey. It still has to be earned.
I am just as nervous as most about next week. But I am still confident in our team taking care of business. I can't see them losing back to back home games with so much on the line. And if they do, then I guess HFA and the #1 seed wasn't all we cracked it up to be.
Nothing worth having in life is easy to attain. Otherwise every would have it. The same is true for everything we as Hawks fans desire. Buck up, guys. Playoffs start next Sunday.
Go Hawks.
