The Boston Sports List #2: Most Hated Teams continued

5) Los Angeles Lakers

I considered putting the Montreal Canadiens in this spot, but the Lakers aren’t even in the same conference as the Celtics so I had to go with them. The Lakers are probably the fiercest historical rivals of the Celtics. The two teams have played each other eleven times in the NBA Finals, with the Celtics winning nine of the eleven meetings. The dichotomy between the two teams is so evident even Spike Lee referenced it in Do the Right Thing. In the 80s, the Celtics were the blue-collar, hard working white team. The “Showtime” Lakers were the flashy and flamboyant black team. Each year, the NBA season became a lesson in race relations.

Of course, the rivalry between the Celtics and Lakers dates back to the days of Russell and Chamberlain, with Russell’s Celtics teams always beating the Lakers. Chamberlain may have been the more prolific scorer and possibly the better player, but Russell was the better winner, and he proved it year in and year out, often at the expense of Los Angeles.

Perhaps the greatest memory of the rivalry for Celtics fans was the 1969 NBA Finals. Boston had just snuck into the playoffs as the final team into the Eastern Conference, and 1969 was Russell’s final year in the NBA. The Lakers were heavily favored, but the Celtics managed to bring the series to seven games. In the deciding game, played in Los Angeles, balloons waited in the rafters to be showered upon celebrating fans. Unfortunately for them, the Celtics won the game and the championship and the balloons never came down.

The Lakers are an interesting rival because they’re not even in the same conference as the Celtics and because regular season games between the two teams really aren’t a big deal around here. The sheer number of times the teams have met in the NBA finals and the fantastic battles that have occurred between them make this a great rivalry.

4) Montreal Canadiens

I’ll admit I don’t know as much about hockey as the other major sports, but I do know that the Canadiens hail from a dirty French city and their dirty fans flood Boston nearly every year for playoff games. I also know that the Canadiens have routinely beaten the bag out of the Bruins in nearly every important game the two teams have played since the dawn of time.

Because I really don’t know a lot about the rivalry and the players involved, I’ll leave you with something my father told me many years ago. The Bruins and Canadiens played each other in the semifinals of the 1979 Stanley Cup playoffs, and the series went to seven games. In the final game, in the game’s final minutes, the Bruins were penalized for having too many men on the ice. The Canadiens scored near the end of regulation to tie the game, and went on to win the game in overtime. My father was none too happy. In a daze, he went to take a shower, and not looking, slipped on a bar of soap. Needless to say, he spent the night in the hospital. So the Canadiens nearly killed my father. Fuck them.

3) Pittsburgh Steelers

I’ve been privy to some fantastic moments as a Boston sports fan. The ALCS comeback against the Yankees. The three Super Bowls. The 2008 NBA championship. To me, my favorite moments were the 2002 and 2005 AFC Championship games. There is no greater feeling I’ve ever had as a sports fan than the Patriots waltzing into Pittsburgh and beating the bag out of the Steelers in those games. I hate their fans, I hate most of their players, and I used to hate their coach. They’d actually be higher on the list if it weren’t for the two even more odious teams in front of them.

Steeler fans carry themselves with this absurd sense of self-entitlement and accomplishment, even though they have the highest body fat index of any fan base of the NFL (it makes sense that their stadium is named after a brand of ketchup). Their signature is waving a bunch of yellow towels around for three hours every game. These people make me sick. Watching Brady torch them in 2005 was one of the more gratifying games I’ve seen, just behind game seven of the aforementioned ALCS, especially since the Steelers had snapped the Patriots’ 21 game winning streak.

To top it off, Hines Ward is an ever-smiling crybaby who takes cheap shots at opposing players and somehow always seems to make huge plays. Their former coach, Bill Cowher, is another dim-witted buffoon who never would have won a title was it not for Seattle’s atrocious clock management in Super Bowl XL. And Ben Roethlisberger, affectionately known to every jock-sniffing play-by-play man as just “Ben”…well, I just don’t like him. Here’s hoping the Pats get another shot to send these fat dopes hope unhappy.

#2) New York Yankees

Protocol dictates the Yankees have to be here somewhere towards the top. And though I did used to seethe with rage when I’d see Johnny College in a Posada jersey or watch highlights of dickhead Paul O’Neill running his mouth during yet another Yankee win, my feelings have largely cooled towards them. Certainly, the Red Sox winning the 2004 championship, defeating the Yankees in stunning fashion along the way, contributed greatly to this. I think it was Bill Simmons who wrote, “The Red Sox and the Yankees are just two baseball superpowers who will always be in each other’s way”.

And he (or whoever said it) is right. The Sox aren’t the plucky underdog anymore. They’ve conquered the demon and added another championship and another ALCS appearance to their recent resume. They’re expected to be in the World Series every year. One could argue that the Red Sox are the class and envy of Major League Baseball, not just because of their storied history and recent success, but because of the way they are able to build their team. Not only can they sign just about any free agent they want, but they also have a tremendous farm system and a very strong coaching staff and front office. These aren’t the Red Sox who lost the heartbreakers in agonizing fashion; they’re not even the underachievers of earlier in this decade who hated playing with each other (the “25 players, 25 cabs” Red Sox of 2000-2002). This team is different, and will forever be different. Because of that, we’ve been spoiled. And because of that, I can’t hate the Yankees as much as I used to. They used to be the toast of the league. Now the Sox are.

Obviously, I don’t care much for the Yankees. I wish that old bastard Steinbrenner would expire already and that his loudmouth idiot son would follow him. A-Rod’s “what did I do” routine after slapping the ball from Arroyo’s glove in 2004 made me forever hate him. My friend and I equate Mark Teixeira’s perennially puzzled-looking face to that of a meathead college lacrosse player (no offense if any of you are reading). I don’t understand how Mariano Rivera has one pitch and no one can figure out how to hit it. I think it’s hilarious that they tore down one of the most hallowed arenas in the world for nearly an exact duplicate, and the tickets closest to the field cost so much money that no one will sit in them. Also, the Yankees have taken more time off of my life than any other franchise in any other sport, so I don’t like that, either.

But the Red Sox season would not be as fun without the Yankees. We wouldn’t have yearly tight pennant races, we wouldn’t have half the drama in the season that we get when the two teams square off, and we simply wouldn’t be Red Sox fans without the Yankees around. The Yankees’ mere existence provides me with too much excitement to hate them more than any other team. I’m afraid that honor goes to…

#1) New York Jets

Remember earlier, when I wrote that I respected Derek Jeter because I expected him to come through in big situations, and I didn’t respect A-Rod because I know he’ll fail? I respect the Yankees because of their history and because I know they’re a formidable opponent and that the Sox are in for a dogfight when they play each other. I don’t respect the Jets because they’re a gaggle of crybabies who never come through. That and their fans are sub-human.

They won a Super Bowl sixty years ago and still expect people to care. Since that time, Joe Namath, the hero of that Super Bowl, embarrassed himself forever on live TV. They haven’t won a meaningful game in ages. They swiped head coach Bill Parcells away from the Patriots on the eve of Super Bowl XXXI, providing a completely unnecessary distraction right before the (then) biggest game in Pats history. He then took a flight back to New England by himself, cleared out his office, and joined the Jets right after. Shithead.

Their big attraction is “Fireman Ed”, a bald moron who sits atop a fat moron and leads a “J-E-T-S Jets Jets Jets” chant that the delusional Long Island/Jersey Jets fans lap up. Jets fans are brilliant because they’ll constantly tell you about how much Brady sucks or how the Jets are going to win the division with whatever retard they have at quarterback/head coach. They have no evidence to back anything up and then act aghast when the team inevitably goes 6-10. They turned on Chad Pennington before he even turned bad, though he was probably the best quarterback they’ve had in ages. Amazingly, the Jets dumped him for Brett Favre and Pennington ended up winning comeback player of the year for Miami last season (and leading the team to an AFC East title).

The most egregious sin the Jets created was unleashing Spygate on the world. What was a fairly trivial matter eventually exploded into a media circus that threatened to overshadow the Patriots’ undefeated season and caused another needless distraction right before the Super Bowl against the Giants. I can ignore the idiocy of Jets fans and the endless string of bad decisions and poor play that has plagued the franchise for years. But I can’t ignore the fact that the Jets attempted to tarnish the legacy of my favorite football team, and the great accomplishments I’ve seen them achieve. For that, they get the top spot.

John Lacey