Texas Fandom

Texans are born and bred with football. No sport is more important to us here in The Republic but, moreover, Texans love Texas. I thought I would be in for a real "thrill of victory, agony of defeat" kind of moment, no matter the outcome of the NBA Championship Series. On Monday and Tuesday, you could hear nothing but talk of the Mavericks and their home advantage, that Stackhouse was back, that there was no way in hell the Heat could beat the Mavericks in Texas. The game, and the series, was fun to watch, and the Heat deserve every second of glory they earned. But they beat the Mavericks in Texas, and I guess I expected to experience, at least, the ire I experienced last Thanksgiving when Denver came into Texas Stadium and handed the ball to Thunder Ron Dayne, and promptly won the game. Instead, I heard plenty of statements like "the better team won" and "Dwayne Wade sure is good." These are not statements that come from Texans' mouths.

If the Dallas Cowboys lost a closely-fought Super Bowl because of a few questionable calls, I truly believe the collective anger would cause the entire state of Texas to spontaneously combust. In this case, you could barely light a match through the apathy. There are plenty of true Mavericks, Rangers, and Stars fans in this area, and they have all my respect. If I had to wade through endless coverage of Dallas Cowboy mini-camp to get to coverage of my 1st place Rangers, I'd shoot myself in the face.

The conclusion I've come to in seeing this pathetic display is that, in non-football related sports activities, a Texas team will have the support of Texans only so long as they win and, if they lose, they are barely acknowledged. Better despised than ignored, and I feel sorry for all the true baseball fans in Texas when the Rangers are still playing meaningful games in August and a near-loss to the Cardinals in the Cowboys' last preseason games takes precedent in the Morning News.