LADIES LOVE OBSCURE RIVALRIES: The Bears vs. America's Team, Fate, and Destiny

By Dan Raspatello, draspatello@rivalfish.com

On Sunday evening after the Chicago Bears beat the New Orleans Saints like an Italian mother with a wooden spoon after her son showed a sign of disrespect, I walked down Clark St. in Wrigleyville high-fiving every person I saw to a chorus of horns and yells. At this moment I suddenly realized that no baseball team winning the World Series could ever compare to this. Usually when I am walking down a Chicago street with a Cubs hat on, half the people love me, and the other half decide to vocalize their opinion on what my sexual orientation is. In ’05, when the Sox won The Series, half of the city was miserable, and the half that was happy was to busy rubbing it in the miserable half’s faces to appreciate it. This time, Chicago is a big Cluster Fuck of joy. Sox fans, Cubs fans, and even my dad, the last known Blackhawks fan alive, were embracing each other like their Ecstasy pill had just kicked in. However, there was not a single person in America that wanted the Bears to beat the Saints or thought the Bears could beat the Saints except for the residents of the Second City. Only Chicagoans know how the Bush supporters in 2000 felt when everybody was preparing to swear in the world’s best dancer, Al Gore (but I bet he does a sweet Robot).

The Bears vs America’s Team, Fate, and Destiny: There has not been an American professional team to win this big of a game with less of America on their side since the Arizona Diamondbacks won the ’01 World Series. With Patriotism as high as my brother at Bonnaroo the Diamondbacks upset the New York Yankees less than two months after some pissed-off terrorists flew planes into the World Trade Center. In the fall of ’01 the Yankees, Patriotism, Bush, The Patriot Act, hating Muslims, and upside-down-backward visors were all equally the most popular thing in the USofA. To make the ’01 World Series even worse for the new found Patriots in America was the fact that team that beat their beloved Yankees boasted a large amount of fans that had to watch the game on ESPNdeportes while trying to memorize their fake Social Security Numbers.

After Hurricane Katrina, the Saints became the new team that mainstream America had to love or feel guilty about. As the Saints became a dominant team throughout the year, every person became a fan. Then the Saints were one win away from the Super Bowl and every TV network was preparing the best Feel Good Story imaginable to capitalize on it. But the Bears beat the Saints, sending them home to New Orleans, and 98% of America was crushed and ready to compare Urlacher to the likes of Osama Bin Laden and Hurricanes. I am just waiting for Kanye West to make a public announcement declaring that the Chicago Bears' players don’t like black people. Instead of an epic battle of a Saint against a Patriot (which, according to The Patriot Act, are the same thing) you have a Horse against a Bear.

The Bears vs. Sports Analysts: If you would have turned on ESPN during the past month you would have thought the Bears were a lucky 8-8 Wild Card team that limped into the playoffs instead of a team that led the NFC from start to finish and won the NFC by an impressive 3 games. The analysts made it seem as if the Bears were lucky enough to beat the depleted Seahawks, but would get blown out of the water by the prolific Saints Offense. After a while, some Bears fans started to lose faith in their hometown boys. Can you blame them? Most of the so-called experts said that Isaiah Washington from Grey’s Anatomy had a better chance of the tabloids letting go of his comment about homosexuals than the Bears had of winning. For a second I even began to doubt the Bears' chances. I mean, they lost their Pro Bowl Safety and Defensive Tackle, and Rex Grossman was looking like he couldn’t fight his way out of a wet paper bag.

But then, the Friday before the Saints game, I turned on SportsCenter and Sean Salisbury picked the Saints to blow out the Bears by double figures, and the Professor, John Clayton, took the Bears to win. After Sean Salisbury took the Saints in a route I knew the Bears were headed to the Super Bowl. Sean Salisbury can predict the NFL as well as Mush from A Bronx Tale can gamble (“Put him in the bathroom!” – Sonny). Just ask the Carolina Panthers how they feel about Salisbury giving his preseason prediction that they would win the Super Bowl. Salisbury, your abilities to play football and analyze it are way too similar in their crappiness. Salisbury, I speak for the rest of Bears fans when I say, "Get the hell off of Chicago ESPN radio, and please predict the Colts to win the Super Bowl."