I’m not one to over-exaggerate things, but this weekend I think I experienced the worst possible weekend I could as a fan of football. In school, we study tragedies like Julius Ceaser and Macbeth. 400 years from now students will be studying a play on Grant’s collapse on the second weekend of October in 2022. Let me explain.
Thursday
The misery began Thursday as the Broncos took on the Colts in primetime. The game was not heavily anticipated by anyone. Both teams had far underperformed expectations to start the season. While no one expected much out of this game, somehow the two teams were still disappointed.
The game honestly had no highlights. It was over 60 minutes of punting back and forth. Just when the Broncos would give their fans any hope we would get puzzling plays like this.
It was like the Broncos were allergic to scoring. Somehow even worse than they had been leading up to this game. Russell Wilson would go on to throw another important interception in the red zone on what should have been a game-winning drive, and then fail to convert on 4th down with a wide-open receiver in overtime, but that is not what important. What is important is that the Broncos, my team, managed to lose a game that involved no touchdowns. In overtime.
You should win every game you don’t let the other team score a touchdown. That’s a pathetic way to lose and is frankly embarrassing. It’s so hard to find yourself in a situation like this as a fan. So there’s no way this could happen again just a few days later.
Iowa says “Hold my beer”
Just a couple days after being subjected to Broncos Colts, Iowa and Illinois played the most “Big Ten West” game of all time. Don’t get me wrong. I’m a sicko and kinda like games like this sometimes, but after getting it shoved down my throat in a disgusting loss a few days earlier this was the last thing I wanted to see. Especially considering Iowa had a drive start on the Illinois six-yard line and still ended up with no touchdowns in this game. I’m never going to say anything bad about Iowa Football. They are my team, I’m allowed to be as biased as I want. The Broncos are professional athletes so I’m going to be harder on them. However, I think we can all agree that this was a frustrating game.
It was hard to even conceive the idea of a game possibly replicating what I watched on Thursday taking place again, but that is what I got in this one. Had Iowa won this game I probably would have thought differently of it. I likely would be writing a blog praising Kirk Ferentz for reinventing football by winning two games with no touchdowns. Instead, we are here discussing an unfortunate Iowa loss. The first loss to Illinois since 2008 came in brutal fashion.
What does this mean?
So yes, both of my team’s lost games that involved no touchdowns this weekend. The next question in this process is obviously where does it leave me as a fan?
I certainly wasn’t happy Saturday night following this performance. I was out with friends at the time following the Iowa game and three different people came up to me, patted me on the back, and said “Hey man, everything is going to be ok”. So the wave of depression overcoming me was clearly noticeable to others. I was under the assumption I was concealing my feelings well, but clearly not.
Honestly, it’s still hard to grasp the fact that these two games actually happened now being several days removed from it. Despite the disappointment, I still love my teams and have faith in them to win games. I’m still going to watch every game for the rest of the season and every season following this one.
I’m not a fan of protesting teams due to poor performance. These are the teams I’ve committed to, and I am going to support them through anything. I don’t know if this is a sign of my strong loyalty, or that I have low standards. It’s probably both. Regardless it is my plan moving forward.
My optimistic brain tells me that if this weekend was horrendous then the next weekend has to be good right? I’ve admitted many times that when it comes to my teams I’m delusional and probably overly optimistic, this could be the case here. I’ve already talked myself into Iowa beating Ohio State so fingers crossed.
Every day is a gift. Watching your team lose sucks. Watching your team score no touchdowns is even worse. But football is awesome, every day I get to watch is fantastic.
Scramble Sports 