Mark_Concannon's Blog

The NBA finals start tonight; an old school matchup that has regenerated interest in the pro hoop playoffs. Unlike last June when the clinical and sometimes joyless Spurs faced Lebron and the journeymen(also known as the Cavaliers), the Celtics take on the Lakers conjuring up the good old days of Bird vs. Magic, McHale battling Worthy, Parrish bumping heads with Kareem. It is all well and good to be excited about this best of seven but I must say this: If you weren't wearing Celtics garb last year when the team won 24 games, you don't get to wear it this year when they won 66.

I've seen Boston green all over the place in our area in the last couple of weeks which rekindles one of my pet peeves. If you support a team, you've got to fly the colors through the good times and the bad, not just when "your team" is the top seed in the Eastern conference. I know two people who grew up and now live in Milwaukee who spent part of this decade in Boston. They just happened to be there when the Red Sox won the World Series and guess what? Now they're Red Sox fans. I wonder how fanatical they'd be if the team had gone 77-85. In the late 1970's when I worked in Virginia, I knew someone who told me her football team was the Steelers. I learned a few years later "her team" became the 49ers, then the Cowboys. And although I now have no direct knowledge of this, I am certain she is currently a Patriots fan.

I'm a huge fan of sports fans so go ahead, paint your face, show your colors. But don't change them just to root for a winner.