AlphaLackey
Registered User
I hear ya. When the Jets 1.0 left, I stopped watching hockey until 2011. It seemed we could never get things right for the post season.
I abstained from hockey altogether. I was in a dice hockey replay league that used defunct NHL teams. I got permission from the league to move my team to Winnipeg (originally we were the alt-universe Kansas City Scouts) and immediately got Graves #9 on my old Jets jersey to replace Essensa. That was a fun chat at the sporting goods store, at a time where geeky things weren't cool yet.
I wore that Jets jersey until I got over the grief, and then I started wearing real NHL jerseys from key players on my fantasy team.
I have a Wes Walz Minnesota jersey somewhere, a Guy Carbonneau Dallas jersey somewhere, and a proper Adam Graves Rangers jersey somewhere. Wore them all with pride.
But I was emphatic: I was NOT cheering for these teams. Just those players. Because I knew the Jets were coming back someday.
And until then, I had no favorite team.
Fifteen years, I was steadfast.
Some of my family even here in Winnipeg suggested I embrace the Coyotes. I rebuked them.
They told me the Jets were never coming back. I rebuked them.
My friends were less charitable. Said I was delusional. Insane. Had fan-boy goggles on. Winnipeg was a shit hole. They were never getting a hockey team back.
I rebuked them all.
And then one day, late spring in 2011, well let's just say I had a few phone calls to make.
One of them was an old friend in Calgary I hadn't talked to for years. As soon as he picked up, he told me that he knew I was going to call him today. And why wouldn't I?
And indeed, for fifteen years, I held to two things:
1) The Jets were coming back someday.
2) f*** the Coyotes.
So yes, I would like us to win by about 15 or so. Help the Coyotes on their way to their historic, record-setting season. No other team more deserves to be the first in NHL history to finish 31st overall. Not even Toronto.