The New York Sporting Scene

We interrupt this bloggy version of March Madness to bring you this mostly unrelated Cole Slaw Blog content ...

It's no secret on this blog that I'm originally from some other place. But I still consider New York to be a good sports town. I just don't care for, well, pretty much any of the local teams. I make two exceptions (and we're going to revisit this topic someday, you can be sure).

1. The Mets. Incompetent and likeable. I think of them as the fuckup cousin you see at family gatherings. They're great to get drunk with and have a blast doing ill-advised things. If the Mets were actual relatives, you would careen around empty fields in their Honda, take their boat out on the lake at one in the morning and possibly help them throw rotten apples at someone's house. And you'd love every minute of it, especially because you could bail at any second, mostly consequence-free. Mets games are awesome, until you get too invested and realize that your own life provides enough problems, and that bandwagons sometimes wind up in flames at the bottom of a ravine. I own a Mets hat.

2. The Islanders. Make all the Strong Island jokes you want. I watched the Islanders torture a friend and roommate for four years. My heart went out to him. This team exists apparently only to make the lives of its fans miserable. As a Cleveland fan, I can't help but sympathize _ the Islanders are like the 1987 Indians, the 1981 Cavaliers or ... well, basically every Browns team since 1999. Moving to Baltimore would be sweet, sweet release for the team's fans, and yet, they'd probably react the same way Browns fans did. You can't not like that kind of dedication. The Chris Simon thing is just icing on the cake. Cleveland should add Uniondale to its list of sister cities. There's no way things on the sporting scene can be as bad in Ljubljana, Miskolc or Taipei City.