Did Other Team's Fans Go Through This Stuff?
by CraigConway on Dec 21, 2011 8:28 AM EST
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PrintIt seems that sometimes every time I tell people that I'm a diehard Islanders fan, I also must prepare myself for a defense trial. The team may not put up results but neither did the blackhawks capitals penguins rangers devils many, many teams before that have gone through rebuilds. Did these fans go through the same stuff we go through? If you want to contiune my rant, you're going to have to jump...
Ah! You've made it safely! So nice to know you've joined me here in the land of pissedofffandom. I don't even know how many times I've had to defend the Islanders by stating opinions facts about the team to people that have no idea who Frans Nielsen is (lord save them from his backhand). My most recent debacle goes as follows (dont mind the zatch1227, my old roommate and I split Gamecenter for a few years, it was nice i reccomened doing it with your roommate, but this isn't an ad for Gamecenter twothumbsup)
(How dare you speak of Paps that way)
What the hell dude who symbolizes every other person out there. Why does no one out there know about this team? I knew the Blackhawks in the days of Thibult the caps in the days of jagr (hahahah) the other examples above are division teams, they dont really count as much, but dammit I remember Phoenix pre Tippit. Do these teams go through the same shit we isles fans do? Sadly this post really is aimed at isles fans who want to be pissy with me, and trolls so... awesome. But non the less if I have to tell people how this is garth's rebuild and in now way hewhomustnotbenamedunlessinthewaynativeamericansmighthavetalked man with anger issues' rebuild and how he is not the one that makes crazy trades and horrible contracts (dp was a whole fiasco but since then tell me one bad sign/trade) and how he's only a couple pieces away from what we need.
Thanks for reading, I just like ranting and my friends told me to shove it up some new places I didn't even know existed. So I will leave you with some uplifting words that belong to Patrick Sharp
They're a good team with young, exciting players over there," Sharp said. "We were in that situation a few years ago and they're a dangerous team. We've played them twice now and they're hungry to win. They're on their way. I remember coming in here with Philadelphia years ago, and it's a much different team. They've got things going in the right direction, for sure."
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Sigh....
I go through it often living here in the Pittsburgh area.
Their fans are the most fickle, bandwagon jumpers I think I have ever encountered in my life.
"If the bell needs to be answered, we've got the guys to answer it." "If they want to start something, that's fine."- Trevor Gillies
Twitter: JenWillyard
by JW1970 on Dec 21, 2011 10:59 AM EST reply actions 1 recs
As much as I hate pitts fans that seem to only know team history when the team was good (and not the decade they were god awful), consider:
Do you think if the Isles became a consistent contender in the next few years we’d see anything different? I expect just as many idiots coming out of the woodwork on our end. Unfortunately, idiots typically talk the loudest and most often.
by TA on Dec 21, 2011 3:51 PM EST up reply actions 4 recs
Yeah, it's the damned if you / damned if you don't thing.
If the Islanders become successful, and fans return, you can bet a good amount will be douchebags, ie Pens fans and Bruins fans over the last couple of years. Now that the Rangers look good, there’s Rangers fans popping up around my office. Never said shit about hockey until the past month or so.
I’m sure it has always happened, just before the internet, I never had to deal with it. Now, every goddamn article that’s written, some Pens fan or Bruins fan pops up and talks about how their team has been slighted in some way….
If that happens, will we be the people that talk about how we hate our own team fans?
I despise reading the comments at Puck Daddy
Where some douchebag Bruin fan boasts and gloats and finishes every comment with “GO BOSTON GO.” I know your teams have done well in the past decade or so, but for a long time before that the only thing your city was good for was Good Will Hunting. Please stop pretending Boston’s been on top of the sports world since the colonial era.
by sayvillelax94 on Dec 26, 2011 5:05 PM EST up reply actions 1 recs
Oh I totally agree
You will see ALOT of people with a whole “look at them now” attitude that couldn’t be bothered going to a game even if it was free.
"If the bell needs to be answered, we've got the guys to answer it." "If they want to start something, that's fine."- Trevor Gillies
Twitter: JenWillyard
That't the problem in a nutshell
Honestly, I can think of longtime fans of Penguins, Capitals, Rangers (ick), Flyers (puke) and so on who I enjoy. And can’t blame them for their bandwagoners.
I’m impressed by how many diehard Isles fans remain even after the last two decades … which tells me if this team turns it around we’re going to have a mass of annoying wagon riders on our hands.
Lighthouse Hockey: A flute with no holes is not a flute. A Dane with no holes is Frans Nielsen.
I remember a roommate of mine that had tickets to the '94 Cup Finals and had become a Rangers "fan".
He had never watched a hockey game before he became my roommate the year prior and now he was talking about the Rangers going to the Finals. Now I’m all for having more people enjoy the sport and try not to be a hockey snob, but I told him he shouldn’t even go since he didn’t deserve it. He was going just because it was an event.
The fact that he was oblivious to the fact that some fans deserve to see their teams win and others don’t sort of proved my point. It turns out he scalped the tickets to some real Rangers fans (meaning sucker corporate suit) so they could go to the game and act as if they cared instead. I know some Ranger fans that waited since 1940 to see the Rangers win the Cup again and they deserved it, even if I never wanted to see it happen.
Barely related: my favorite bandwagon-jumping story
October, 2009: A co-worker, who had not at any point in two years ever mentioned a single thing related to sports professional or amateur, shows up to the office with a Yankees cap and jacket. Oh, and at the time, the Yankees were up 3-1 in the World Series!
I told him this was the most egregious sports foul I had ever seen and was highly offended, especially as a fan of a team (guess which one) that had whittled it’s fan base down to practically nothing. He didn’t seem too concerned.
"He's depriving some small village of a pretty good idiot" - Mike Milbury on Ziggy Palffy's agent. On Twitter: @Dan_of_Science
I'll bet you
the Leafs break the rags record (54 years) for longest cup drought in nhl history…45 years this June for toronto, 9 more seasons and the record is theirs…of course the rags will get that record back in 2049.
by CanadianIsleslifer on Dec 25, 2011 7:14 PM EST up reply actions 1 recs
Honestly, I can think of longtime fans of Penguins, Capitals, Rangers (ick), Flyers (puke) and so on who I enjoy
Oh for sure.. but those are the guys who love the game and not just a team. My best hockey-knowledgeable friend is a Leafs fan (so we’ve spent a few years sharing misery). He even has a Tucker jersey. Yet I have no desire to strangle him because he knows his way around the league. Naturally, his wife, who knew nothing of hockey before meeting him, is now a pens fan.. so her, i’d strangle.
by TA on Dec 22, 2011 5:50 PM EST up reply actions 3 recs
Thank you for that quote
made me feel a little better
by rck88 on Dec 21, 2011 1:33 PM EST reply actions 1 recs
when i read the quote
i smiled. then i remembered it took them another two years to do anything special. and my smiled faded but luckily not into a frown.
God loves all creatures great and small, geographical locations however are another story.
As a long time Hawks fan... Yes, it was rough.
As a long time Isles fan… Yes, it is still rough.
There is a problem with outliving your enemies, it usually means that you have outlived your friends as well...
Honnor thy father - D. Vader (Robert Asprin, Myth series)
by burpchelischili on Dec 21, 2011 6:30 PM EST reply actions
I didn’t become an Islander fan till the mid 80’s. I missed out on the “salad days” (what the hell does that even mean?). Since then I have lost a lot of hair and gained much cholesterol. But still I remain loyal. Many people, including Mrs. Icefan ask me why I stick with them. I say, how can you not?
Mets...
When your family raised you as a Mets fan, it’s hard to not root for underdogs, and since I can remember (I was born in ’84), the Islanders have been the underdogs. Kind of just fits.
by dunnowhat2type on Dec 23, 2011 11:38 AM EST reply actions
Maybe thats my problem
I love underdogs…..Jets, Mets, Islanders.
"If the bell needs to be answered, we've got the guys to answer it." "If they want to start something, that's fine."- Trevor Gillies
Twitter: JenWillyard
by JW1970 on Dec 27, 2011 9:10 AM EST up reply actions 2 recs
I think I blamed our entire '94 season on Hextall.
At least the play-offs. I was very young and that might not have been the case, but that’s the way I saw it back then. I remember all the Rangers fans with there brooms at the coliseum, that was my first heartbreaking sports experience. I continued to watch until about 2000, which is around the time I started high-school and smoking pot full-time. Well, then I got inspired by the ’08 Detroit Lions. Watching them lose every game, I became a fan of them and it rebuilt my love for the Islanders.
by Clarke W. Griswald on Dec 28, 2011 9:03 PM EST reply actions 1 recs
I'm with you
I couldn’t agree more, Clarke. Sounds like we are very close in age and I too recollect the many brooms that day as well as my boiling frustration with Ron Hextall. I’d have to agree that that was probably my first heartbreaking sports moment… which was shattered only a few short weeks later when Messier led “them” to the promised land. At 7 years old, I sobbed in front of the TV for 2 hours while they hoisted the cup and circled the ice…..
If it wasn’t for your last two comments I’d think we were the same person. I have never been inspired by the Detroit Lions, and I wasn’t full-time until a year into college ;)
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1979-80
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May 24, 1980: Tonelli to Nystrom. At long last, the steady build of the New York Islanders from expansion doormat to surprise semifinalist to annual contender reaches the promised land: Buoyed by a late season trade for Butch Goring that gave the team the depth up the middle GM Bill Torrey had been seeking, the Islanders knock off the Philadelphia Flyers in six games.
The victory justified the faith in coach Al Arbour who guided them from their second season to their first Stanley Cup seven seasons later. The Islanders would not be the first expansion team to win the Stanley Cup, but they would be the only one capable of a dynasty.
1980-81
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May 21, 1981: This time it was much easier. After falling to "only" 91 points in the 1979-80 season, the Islanders returned to their division title tradition, piling up 110 points -- a whole 13 points over second-place Philadelphia.
Between the quarterfinals (where they beat the upstart Oilers in six games) and the finals, the Islanders reeled off eight consecutive wins -- with a four-game sweep of archrival Rangers in between. As they defeated the Minnesota North Stars in five games for their second Cup, their goal difference in the final was a combined +10.
1981-82
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May 16, 1982: Another year, another landslide title. The Islanders won the Patrick Division by a whopping 26 points over the second-place Rangers, and were seven points clear of their nearest competition for the President's Trophy, the still-not-quite-ripe Edmonton Oilers.
A first-round scare against the Pittsburgh Penguins turned in the Isles' favor thanks to John Tonelli's heroics, and a true dynasty was on its way: Past the Rangers in six games, then an eight-game sweep of the Quebec Nordiques and Vancouver Canucks to run away with the Stanley Cup.
1982-83
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May 17, 1983: Not so fast, whipper-snappers. The Edmonton Oilers' steadily rising challenge for league supremacy took them all the way to the finals for the first time, where the New York Islanders summarily dispatched them in a four-game sweep. For the Islanders, the Dynasty was secured. For the Oilers, it was a powerful lesson in where talent ends and the demands of playoff hockey begin.
Four years, four Cups, 16 consecutive playoff series wins (a record that would grow to 19 until the rematch with the Oilers the following year). Mike Bossy scored 60 goals yet again, and Wayne Gretzky became acquainted with Billy Smith's crease.
