I’m feeling meta again, so bear with me. I really dislike how writing columns forces me into having opinions about things. See, there’s another one, I’m doing it again.
It’s off-putting. I feel like I’m yelling. I don’t like pushing opinions and rounding off sweeping generalizations one after another.
Yet as deadlines approach, I gravitate.
For the most part, I don’t think I have super strong opinions to begin with; that’s why everything you get from me comes with levity. Of course I have preferences – everyone does – but politicking and soap-boxing aren’t my favorite hobbies.
Nonetheless, I’m now required to have an opinion about opinions. Fine. I think some people throw opinions around too loosely and often misuse them.
A great example of this is how sports fandom in the Midwest includes strong opinions and feelings of hatred.
Packers fans watch Bears games just to make sure Chicago loses. Cubs fans go out of their way to remind Milwaukee fans when the Brewers lose. It’s called misplaced hate, and it’s rampant in this region.
I’m not saying I don’t have inklings of it myself, but that it’s strongly pronounced here. It was a culture shock.
And don’t give me that hogwash about my hometown Philadelphia fans throwing snowballs at Santa Claus. The snowstorm that day was so bad the halftime parade float with Santa couldn’t make it out, so a 20-year-old fan in a Santa suit ran onto the field near the cheerleaders. It was only natural to pelt him with snowballs.
Now you know.
If Brewers fans were rational, they’d love the Cubs for the mere fact that they never win the big ticket. They are dependable losers. Don’t hate.
There’s no room for you to hate other teams if you love your own team with all your heart. No room.
This sporting example of misplaced hate is something I’ve been dying to bring up, but I felt like I had to go enough weeks without mentioning anything sports-related first.
If I had my good pal Erik Schmidt’s column over on page 16, this would be old news. I don’t mean to call Erik out, but I do.
Just look at him. He probably took that mug shot 20 times before he let them use one. Oh yeah, and that “Pukey Pants” line I used awhile back was in reference to him too, so if you see any “Dumpy McDumpedersons” in his column, I’m your man.
I’m sure Schmidt loves this extra attention, being the longest-tenured Tribune columnist. Yet, I’m the only one who remembers to spell his name properly. Everybody else seems to forget three very specific letters in his last name. Figure it out and get back to me. There’s no truth to that, but it was well-contrived, so it’s staying.
You see what I did there? I pretended to mock Erik because of my hidden jealousy over him getting to talk about sports every week.
That’s just another tiny example of misplaced hate, which leads me to the biggest example.
The world’s greatest target of misplaced hate is the one and only … Tim Tebow.
I wanted to be Tebow for Halloween, but I can’t even pretend to be that awesome.
For some reason, more than half of sports fans abhor the guy, and I’ll tell you why: People don’t want to believe. They hate him because he’s too good to be true.
The guy is a winner, but people unjustly wrote him off before he graduated. And for those deterred by his faith, it’s not like Tebow is the only NFL player who believes in Jesus.
In a way, Tebow is kind of like Jesus with all this persecution (although vastly relative). And this Broncos team places less talent around him than any team he’s ever been on. Not to mention they just shipped out his only established receiver. They set him up to fail while creating the illusion of giving him a chance.
To paint a new picture, I wrote most of this before Sunday, so I was watching the game in hopes of substantiating my column. When the comeback started, I was going berserk. Screaming at the TV, doing push-ups, making sure the neighbors weren’t watching, etc.
And thank Jesus — I mean, Tebow — I mean … Yeah, Tebow — that the Broncos finally had to be aggressive at the end. For the first 50 minutes, their offensive play calling was so wildly conservative, you’d think offensive coordinator McCoy’s playbook was the constitution.
Sure enough, once you let the kid off the leash, he got the Bronco’s first franchise win in Miami. It was spectacular no matter how bad the Dolphins are.
#BringTebowToMadness. Start trending.
But first, one last opinion: I’d rather have Tim Tebow than Jay Cutler. I would not, however, choose Tebow over Aaron Rodgers. Don’t be ridiculous.