Shadow Sports

I was reading Joe Posnanski's latest article (which is good, as always) and something struck me.  Ever since he came out with his Jerry Sandusky initial reaction and Joe Paterno commentary I've felt different about Joe Pos.  His Paterno take was completely sensical - Paterno led a complete life, this one incident is one thing among many, don't rush to judgment, etc. - but it left me dissatisfied.  And everything I have read from him since then has been a shadow of his former work.  Not that the quality is diminished - but its effect on me certainly has.  I am reading his words through the shadow that has been cast by his opinions about the Penn State saga.

And that helped me realize my problem with hockey.  I have always been a Red Wings fan.  While the Tigers were struggling, Detroit became Hockey Town.  My room was plastered with Wings posters, replicas of the Detroit News and Free Press front page spreads showing Steve Yzerman hoisting the Stanley Cup.  I can still his his toothless grin, the embodiment of joy and accomplishment...but since the 2004-05 season was lost to the lockout, nothing has been the same.  The Wings have won the Stanley Cup since then, and have always been at or near the top the league - so it isn't from lack of success.  I did move across country, so that surely has something to do with it, but more to the point - the sport as a whole is a shadow of its former self.  Losing an entire season^ made it like a whole new sport once it returned.  The players changed, the economics changed, everything changed.  And there just wasn't any room for a whole new NHL.

^ And what about the THREE seasons lost due to the Rich Rod experiment in Ann Arbor?  I was not a faithful UM follower toward the end of the RR era, and I am just now starting to get back on board.  And I did not miss a game for close to a decade, either sitting in the student section or watching as each game was televised nationally every week.


This shadow-NHL is changing again, drastically realigning the divisions.  I hope they bring back the old-school division names^ - Norris, Adams, Patrick, Smythe - but that would just be a novelty to me.  I don't know when the shadow will lift, but for now, it has me viewing hockey from afar.

^ Anything but Leaders and Legends.  Please.


I see that same shadow falling on the NBA now.  The Pistons are making moves, the league landscape is changing, and when basketball starts again, it will be hard to remember last season.  Sports are a welcome distraction from the daily grind and common bond between fellow fans throughout the world - but when the shifting sports landscape is distracting in itself, and the common bond is broken because the team you once knew is unrecognizable...that is when the shadow has fallen, and that sport threatens to fade into obscurity.