Every now and then, I need to be reminded why I started this colossal waste of my time in the first place. I suppose if I had to pick one underlying motivation for this blog, it has to be the average Boston sports fan.

The average Boston sports fan is intellectually challenged. The average Boston sports fan is incapable of carrying on a serious discussion of any of the local sports teams without resorting to profanity and/or nonsensical non sequiturs. The average Boston sports fan is a bully.

In short, the average Boston sports fan is such a sterling paragon of those admirable qualities we call virtues that I continually reevaluate my belief in evolution, my belief in a Higher Power and the possibility that the Founding Fathers were wise to entrust any portion of power to the people.

Two days ago, I posted and I mentioned that it was much more difficult to root for the New York Giants than it has been to root for the Yankees because the Giants do not have a rivalry with the Patriots. A fair specimen of the average Boston sports fan as described above elected to weigh in with an inspired comment seemingly ripped from the transcripts of the Lincoln-Douglas debates of 1854. Here it is, in all its unexpurgated form:

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "The sports world just keeps getting more depressin...":

Suck a dick. Who do you think cheers for the Patriots, moron? 90%of Patriots fans are Red Sox fans too.

Interesting, isn't it. Because 90% of Patriots fans also root for the Red Sox, somehow the Patriots and the Giants are natural rivals in the NFL. I should, myself, have assumed that the New York Jets would be more likely rivals, given that the Jets play in the same division as the Patriots while the Giants are in the other conference. But that's just me.

I also find it rather amusing that I am the moron because I failed to see the logic contained therein. More astonishing, perhaps, to some reader less familiar with the limited vocabulary for invective found in that curious subset of the human race that is the Boston sports fan is the opening statement. Or perhaps it's just wishful thinking on the part of a segment of my readership.

For years, I have been told that New England residents stand out from the rest of America because they are more intelligent and better educated. As I look back on that sentiment now that I am older and more cynical, I seem to recall every one who told me that being from New England.

Based on the egregious examples of personal misconduct exhibited by Boston fans and Bostonians in general (the infamous episode of pizza throwing at Fenway Park and the fight at the Boston Pops last April leap to mind), I find a disturbing preponderance of evidence against the notion that New Englanders are more intelligent than the rest of America.

I have, to this point, been somewhat unfair. I have a number of friends who root for the Red Sox, the Patriots, the Celtics and a few who even root for the Bruins. They aren't typical Boston fans as generalized here tonight. They are capable of carrying on rational discussions about any and all of the local teams, they do not resort to petty name calling and sophomoric bullying from behind a pall of anonymity. In short, they leave that sort of thing to me. So I apologize to any of my friends who may have been offended by tonight's post.

GREAT MOMENTS IN RED SOX HISTORY #5 - 4/16/07

Ladies and Gentlemen, I realize that it's been a long, long time since I last posted one of these Great Moments in Red Sox History. But there really wasn't a lot I could do with the events that unfolded at the end of last season. The moments were either too insignificant or too catastrophic for me to mock. But that all changed on Patriots Day.

For the past year, I have portrayed Red Sox fans as a tribe of slackjawed morons, hypocrites and tools. And two fans sitting in the grandstand on the left field foul line decided they had to live up to all of the negative characteristics of Red Sox fandom in one shining moment of childish behavior. I'm sure you've seen this highlight a thousand times by now, but it's still worth watching again and again and again and maybe a fourth time.



So here it is, the triumph of Red Sox fan sophistication with the added benefit of Jerry Remy's keen analytical mind. One grown man took issue with another grown man eating a full pizza at a baseball game. In a free country. So the other grown man looked deep within his soul and summoned up every ounce of maturity he possessed. He took that maturity compressed it into a ball of fury, waited until his adversary was distracted by a foul ball and the opposing left fielder and lobbed a slice of the aforementioned pizza at the back of his antagonist's head.

It was a proud moment for Red Sox Nation. I have seen monkeys at the zoo comport themselves with a higher standard of decorum than these men exhibited. Of course when the monkeys are riled up what they tend to throw is a bit more unpleasant than cold pizza, but on the whole they're still better behaved than their less advanced cousins at Fenway.

I wonder what business is it of any fan's if a paying customer wants to eat pizza at a game. When a person goes to a game he or she tends to overindulge in unhealthy food and adult beverages. If the unhealthy food of choice happens to be pizza as opposed to the more traditional hot dogs or peanuts, so what? It's the same problem I have with people who decide that they and they alone are the arbiter of what potable can and cannot be consumed with a given food.

If I order a steak at a restaurant and I choose to have a Miller High Life with it, it isn't because I'm blundering along in the metaphorical darkness just waiting for some superior being to enlighten me as though I were one of the damn apemen from 2001: A Space Odyssey. It's because I like steak and I like High Life. I am what Charles Barkley would call a grown-ass man. I can make my own decisions. People should leave each other the hell alone, that way they wouldn't get a piece of pizza whipped off the back of their domes.

That said, people really hadn't ought to settle their differences by throwing pizza off the back of people's domes either. But what can you do if you happen to be a Red Sox fan and as such only discover your courage when an adversary is outnumbered or has his/her back turned?

To give credit where credit is due, I have to thank the man I go to for my Red Sox info and the man I go to for my Chicago (the sports scene, the city and the band of the same name) information, both of whom sent me the youtube clip first thing this morning. Keep up the good work.

And if that's not enough, Mitt Romney wants you to be his friend. On myspace, if not in real life. If only he'd explain what Elvis ever did to deserve such shabby treatment.