The world of professional sports would be nowhere without Boston and New York. The two rival cities combine to own 72 championships that are won each year.
Throughout most of the 20th Century New York owned Boston in the Boston-New York Rivalry. The rivalry was so lopsided at one time a fan noted to a friend that “New York and Boston do not have a rivalry. A hammer and nail can not have a rivalry.”*
As we entered a new millennium sports turned around in Boston, starting with the Patriots in 2001, that rekindled the long time rivalry. Since the 2001 Patriots, the Red Sox and Yankees added fuel to the fire in 2003 with Aaron Boone’s homerun in Game seven of the ALCS and then again a year later in 2004 with Jason Varitek and Alex Rodriguez. Come playoff time, with the Sox down 3-0 to the hated rivals from New York and surely looking to go four and out in the ninth inning, Kevin Millar sparked a rally in the ninth against Mariano Rivera to give David Ortiz the chance to be a hero. The Sox would go on to win the next three games and become the first team to come back from a 3-0 deficit. It was at this time the power-balanced shifted from New York to Boston.
What accounts for this shift in power? In the last eight years, Boston has edged out New York, 5-1, in championships by the four major sports teams. It is particularly shocking because The Big Apple has three more professional sports franchises than Boston.
Also we have hit a point in time when all of the Boston teams are at their peak while the top New York teams are struggling. For one rival to sky-rocket while the other treads water is quite an anomaly.
The Yankees are in the process of rebuilding their less than fertile farm system with talented, young pitching which will take, at least, a few more years. They have some promising young prospects, such as Philip Hughes and Ian Kennedy but the Red Sox already have their youngsters, Clay Buchholz and Jacoby Ellsbury, gaining valuable major league experience. It looks as if the Red Sox are going to be on top of the American League East for years to come and 2007 was not an abberation.
While the Boston Celtics struggled to win just 24 games last year and even losing 19 straight games at one time during the season, the 2007-2008 Celtics boast the best record in the NBA, at 33-8. After a draft day trade, in June of 2007, to acquire former Seattle Supersonic Ray Allen, the Celtics then sent a package of their young players to Minnesota for the Timberwolves big man Kevin Garnett. Allen and Garnett have complimented Celtics captain and shooting guard Paul Pierce well and are starting to remind fans of another Big Three that wore Celtic green (Bird, McHale and Parrish). Meanwhile the Knicks are the laughing stock of the NBA. Knick players have lost the respect of their head coach with his off-the-court legal battles and are struggling at the bottom of the Atlantic standings at 13-28.
After a slow start to the beginning of the season the New York Giants are red-hot, winning their last 10 road games, including three consecutive playoff wins – on the road. Talk about the road-field advantage! They should not and will not be taken for granted in the Super Bowl. Since Jeremy Shockey went down, Eli Manning has had quite a turn-around, going from a first-round bust to a quarterback making his first appearance in the Super Bowl. Head coach Tom Coughlin went from a man whose job was in jeopardy at the beginninf of the season to a man who is probably going to be staying in New York for a while. I do not know how you can not appreciate a guy like Tom Coughlin. (Plus he was a BC guy. I have some loyalties there.)
But the other team who plays in the same stadium has failed to live up to the expectations that were set on them at the beginning of season. After reaching the post-season the year before in Head Coach Eric Mangini’s first season, the J-E-T-S JETS, JETS, JETS failed to reach .500 this season. They finished their season at 4-12 and are part of the reason why the Patriots are undefeated. You do not want to wake a sleeping giant.
Spy-Gate did just that. It woke up a team who was already projected to be in Super Bowl and what does that lead to? It leads to every other team in the National Football League being embarrassed by the New England Patriots. Earlier in the year the Patriots outsmarted the San Francisco 49ers, the Oakland Raiders and the Miami Dolphins. They currently have the seventh pick in the NFL draft from San Francisco (so much for the NFL’s punishment), acquired Randy Moss from Oakland for a fourth round pick and Wes Welker from the Dolphins. The Pats humilated the majority of the teams earlier in the year and played like a championship team in latter half of the year to get to where they are right now - 18-0. The question must be asked, how high will the hatred of the Patriots rise when the Pats go 19-0, win their fourth Lombardi Trophy in seven years and have the seventh pick in the 2008 NFL Draft? I just have one response to all the Patriot haters out there: it is not New England’s fault your franchise can not manage their organization properly.
Now it can be said that “Boston and New York do not have a rivalry; a hammer and nail can not have a rivalry.”
(* A friend of McDaniel College's history professor, Dr. Bryn Upton, told this to Upton.)
No comments:
Post a Comment