The mission

Unlike most of you, I don't just adopt the sports teams of any town I move into. New cities actually have the opposite effect on me — I grow to loathe their teams more and more each year. There will always be some franchises — like the Pittsburgh Penguins, the New York Yankees, the Dallas Cowboys, and the Pittsburgh Penguins — for which I'll save my most darkest, most negative feelings. But as I begin my fourth year as a resident of the Boston area, its teams — especially the Boston Red Sox, the Foxwoods Patriots, and the Boston Bruins — have gradually but surely infiltrated my top 10 list of hated sports clubs.¹  All those hats, all those jerseys (I've seen more Papelbon shirts this week in my Cambridge neighborhood than Cal Ripken²  jerseys in my entire life), all those winning streaks and championships... it's enough to make a loyal but tired follower of Baltimore/D.C. sports go into hiding. But I had to make a brave decision. As a large person once asked, "What makes a man? Is it being prepared to do the right thing, whatever the cost?"

As fate would have it, the Bruins will play my Washington Capitals in their first game this coming hockey season, at TD Banknorth Garden. I have my tickets, and this year, I vow to be the best (TD Banknorth) garden pest I can be — supporting my own team in a hostile stadium, fully decked out in Caps garb. As you can probably guess by the seriousness of this issue, the posts on this blog will all have something to do with the general theme of standing up for what you believe in, against all odds and despite what those around you think. I witnessed the Capitals' Alexander Semin do it last season, humiliating supposed superstar goalie Tim Thomas here in overtime.³ And this year, and in years to come, I vow to follow Semin's example and suck the lifeblood from my host city's sports consciousness.

1. The Celtics are basically exempt. That's because my little brother, Doug, and I went to a Celtics game. I'm also OK with the Lowell Spinners for the same reason, but Lowell is far enough away from Boston anyway, right?
2. The greatest player in the history of sports, even though baseball is not technically a sport.
3. Watch goalie Thomas do his best Bonnie Blair impression at the end of the clip.