I hate the Riders
author: matt wincherauk | editor-in-chief
Tell ’em how you really feel
For a Saskatchewan resident, I realize that the title of this article might send a lot of people into a tizzy. So I’ll begin by clarifying what I mean by “hate.” I don’t hate the Riders like I might hate the New York Yankees or the New York Jets, being a Red Sox and Patriots fan. This hate doesn’t come from a place of cheering for another team, but rather because I’m just tired of seeing, hearing, and thinking about this team.
I believe that I have only watched a couple quarters, but that’s only because the Riders have become nearly impossible to watch without cringing at how inept they are. Let me take you through an account of my most recent run in with the Riders during a game.
This past weekend, instead of watching the Riders play the Bombers in the Labour Day Classic, I stained our deck at home. My mom even went inside to grab the radio to listen to the game while we worked, and I seriously considered staining my ears in the hope that it might block out the noise and the disappointment emanating from the radio.
Despite their catastrophic start, they actually managed to come back, only to lose in the most heartbreaking way. I envisioned the series of unfortunate events that occurred sped up to double speed, with the Benny Hill theme playing in the background. This originally was quite hilarious to me, before I made the realization that this debacle was all I was going to hear about for the next week. Sure enough, within the first ten minutes of walking into the office on Monday, I was asked by our sports writer if I watched the game, before hearing about the dejected state that the result put him in. It’s gotten to the point that I mentally check out every time the Riders come up in conversation. [Editor’s note: Well, that explains the blank stares I keep getting]
Sometimes I start to feel bad for the Riders, and the position that they’ve found themselves in after two years of what equates to a drunken haze. There was a time when I enjoyed watching them play football, and felt actual joy when they succeeded. I vividly remember the last Grey Cup win; celebrating with everyone on Albert St. Unfortunately, those days are long gone. The team is simply no longer likeable; the team no longer has the air of either dominance, nor the endearing nature of being the underdog you want to see win, and the fans have become obnoxious in their attempts to be the best armchair quarterbacks they can possibly be. I’d love to see them rise to prominence once again, but I feel like these past couple years have left such a lasting memory of how painful it is to be a part of this circus.
Maybe it’s a good thing that I’m a Boston sports fan that doesn’t live anywhere near Boston. I can only imagine how badly I would want to strangle someone when they talked about how Tahmmy Brady has lost it, or why the Red Sox bullpen needs to be shot from a cannon into the sun. Wait, I actually agree with that last one.