The Jets bitchfest thread

[TrueBlue4ever]

So here’s a fun article on the stages of rooting against your team. What stage is everyone at?

https://theathletic.com/3144334/2022/02/23/down-goes-brown-the-10-stages-of-rooting-against-your-own-team/

[bb1]

31 minutes ago, TrueBlue4ever said:

So here’s a fun article on the stages of rooting against your team. What stage is everyone at?

https://theathletic.com/3144334/2022/02/23/down-goes-brown-the-10-stages-of-rooting-against-your-own-team/

Behind paywall ,but  we have no hope of  winning the last 2 on the road the way we are playing right now. We get to see how Chevy got fleeced in the Trouba trade tommorow though. I just hope we clean house in the offseason maybe plan on getting a generational player in the 23 draft..that draft is stacked. 

[TrueBlue4ever]

Here is a copy of the article so you can avoid the paywall. And given bb1’s comment about chasing a generational player in next year’s draft and blowing everything up, it puts him anywhere from stage 4 to stage 6. 
 

The NHL is a 32-team league with 32 different fan bases, each of which is unique. Some are big, some not so much. Some are more than a century old, some are brand new. Some are spoiled with years of excellence, some have had their ups and downs, and some never seem to get to be happy at all.

But there’s one thing every NHL fan has in common: We want our team to win.

Sometimes.

That’s the reality of being a hockey fan, especially at this time of year. We can throw around all the clichés we want about how winning is everything, but it isn’t, at least not all the time. And depending on circumstances, winning might actually feel like a problem.

When that happens, you’ve entered a very controversial zone as a hockey fan. You have to decide if you’ll cross a line, and start rooting for your team to lose.

Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily. But it’s a perilous place, one where you want to tread carefully. And since I have some experience in this world, I want to offer you a guide. I’ve prepared a list of the 10 stages of rooting against your own team, so that you can be prepared for what you might face, and for just how deep you want to go.

---

Stage 1: Apathy

We’ll ease into our list with a category that doesn’t really involve rooting against your team at all. Instead, at Stage 1, you just stop caring … temporarily. The season isn’t going well and you know it. You also know that one bad year isn’t the end of the world, and that even the best-run teams will go through it eventually.

You’re fine with it. You’re just especially interested in watching it all play out.

Honestly, this stage can be a pretty reasonable place to be. You’re not bailing on your team. You’re just backing away from committing a ton of time and mental energy to caring about them. You tune out, maybe check back in around the deadline, keep on top of any major developments, and then return to the fold in the offseason, rested and ready to go.

The stage makes our list only because it’s often confused with a fan rooting against their own team. But it’s not. You don’t want them to lose, you just don’t really care if they do.

Stage 2: Rooting for lottery odds (after playoff elimination)

OK, now you want them to lose.

But it’s only because they already have, a lot. So much, in fact, that they’ve been mathematically eliminated from playoff contention. At this point, there’s really nothing left to play for aside from lottery odds, and in the NHL, you get those lottery odds by losing. In a perfect world, we’d have the Gold Plan in place and fans could cheer for their teams to win their way to the top pick. But we don’t, and it sounds like we never will, so fans know how this works.

Even at this early stage, some fans are too loyal to actually hope their team loses. But most of us understand that the league has decided to embrace a system where losing is better for bad teams. We want what’s best for our team, so we act accordingly, even if only grudgingly.

Note: Once you reach this stage, it is 100 percent guaranteed that some random guy will have the game of his life and it will cost your team multiple draft spots, and you’ll kind of hate him for it forever.

The key here is that you only root against your team after they’ve been officially eliminated. Until that day comes, anything can happen. You never give up until the math says you have no choice.

Stage 3: Rooting for lottery odds (before playoff elimination)

OK, according to the math they’re still technically in it, but come on. They’re clearly not going to make the playoffs, and even if they do, they’d only get swept in the first round. That’s not you being cynical — it’s just that you’ve watched this team all season, and you can see that they’re not good enough. Yes, sure, sometimes an underdog will make a miracle run down the stretch, but this team isn’t it, and there’s no point getting your hopes up.

The gap between Stage 2 and Stage 3 is a narrow one; there’s a difference between being realistically out of the race and actually being mathematically eliminated, with bad teams sometimes stuck spending weeks in between those two zones. Some fans will insist on staying the course right up until elimination day, but others understand that sometimes you just have to accept reality. Teams like this year’s Canadiensand Coyotes haven’t been technically eliminated yet, but their fans know they’re not making it. So if you were the sort of fan who was willing to bail in Stage 2 anyway, you might as well get a head start.

The point is that you were with them all year long, right up until they made it clear this wasn’t going to be their year. It’s not like you turned on them from opening night.

Stage 4: Rooting for lottery odds (from opening night)

Look, we have to be realists here.

Some teams are unexpectedly bad. But some teams are bad by design, or in some cases by misdesign. If you’ve been a fan long enough, you know when it’s going to be one of those years, and there’s no point deluding yourself through October and November before accepting the obvious. These guys are bad, there’s a great prospect waiting for you at the draft, so let’s just get to losing.

Often, this stage involves obvious tank jobs, like the great Sabres/Coyotes battle for Connor McDavid in 2014-15 that worked out so well for everyone. If your team’s management has sent obvious signals that they’re trying to lose, well, you root for the result your team wants, right? Nothing worse than watching a well-designed tank job go off the rails because of a few lucky wins.

There’s no question that this stage can feel icky. It’s one thing to turn against your team when they’ve already lost a ton of games and fallen out of the race. It’s another to do it early, even when your intentions are good. There will be nagging doubt. This stage isn’t for everyone. But if you’ve got the stomach for it, it can be a perfectly reasonable path to take.

Stage 5: When you want somebody to get fired

Maybe it’s the coach. Maybe it’s the GM. Maybe it’s both of them, or someone else entirely. But somebody needs to be sent packing, and it’s not going to happen if this team keeps fluking out wins that it doesn’t deserve.

And yes, this stage sucks. On one level, nobody should want to see anyone lose their job. But this is also pro sports, where getting fired is part of the deal. If your team has the wrong guy in the wrong place and it’s dragging them down, there’s really no other path to take. It’s going to happen eventually, so you might as well get it out of the way now. A nice little losing streak might just seal the deal, and pave the way to a brighter future. Call it an investment.

Stage 5 can last for a few games, or it could take most of a season. But it’s always temporary, and it ends as soon as the pink slips start flying. The moment the new guy takes over, you can go right back to cheering on your team. Let’s never speak of this again.

Stage 6: When you want the roster to get blown up

The more complicated cousin of Stage 5, this one has the same basic premise. Things are bad, you know they’re not going to be fixed until there’s no other choice, and so you have to root for them to get worse.

The problem here is that old sports cliché: It’s always easier to fire the coach (or GM) than to trade the whole roster. That’s especially true in today’s NHL, where we’re told that trades are impossible, especially during the season.

When you’re at Stage 5 and just want one guy to be fired, any day can be the day that snaps you out of it. Some insider reports that a change is being made, the press conference gets called, and you’re back on the bandwagon by the end of the day. With Stage 6, you’re never really sure how much change is enough. One trade? Two? It’s going to take more than that, but you’re not sure how many moves you need before you’ll feel like it’s worth returning to the fold.

Whatever that number is, the team isn’t good. You know it. Other realistic fans know it. But management doesn’t know it, or at least isn’t willing to admit it, and that won’t change unless the losses start piling up, so that’s what needs to happen. It’s for their own good.

Stage 7: When you realize you kind of hate these guys

This is the more extreme version of Stage 6, and the difference between them can seem subtle.

In Stage 6, you want changes because the team keeps losing and you don’t like losing. In Stage 7, you want changes because you don’t like them. The team is bad, sure, but so is the vibe. You’re just kind of done with this team, at least this particular iteration of it.

Sometimes, you’ll reach this stage because of something specific. Maybe you’ve finally realized the other fans are right and these guys are a bunch of dirty cheap shot artists. Maybe you’ve heard a few too many of the same excuses trotted out in the postgame. There could be some controversy involving fans, or a bigger social issue, or the media. It could be something approaching all of the above.

Somewhat weirdly, it’s possible to reach this stage even when a team’s record says they’re playing well. (Ask any current Leaf fan what will happen if they lose in the first round again.) You might arrive at this stage when a team has been stubbornly staying the course for years, and you hit a tipping point where you just want them all gone. It can be a progression through the other stages, or in the case of some sort of major scandal like this year’s Blackhawks’ story, a rapid ascent.

The key is that Stage 6 isn’t personal. Stage 7 very much is. You’re sick of this team, you want everyone out, and you’re not going to root for them until it happens.

Stage 8: Apathy, part two

This is what comes next when you hit Stage 7 but nothing changes. There really isn’t anywhere else to go. You used to hate these guys, but hatred at least meant you still cared. Now you can’t even muster that. You raged against the machine, nothing happened, and now you’re done.

Make no mistake: Despite the similar names, there’s virtually nothing connecting this stage to Stage 1. Back then you stopped paying attention, but it was always going to be temporary. You’re well beyond that at Stage 8; it’s a far darker place to be. You’re pretty close to being done.

If you reach this stage, your fandom is at a critical moment. If something doesn’t change very soon, this might be it.

Stage 9: You quit

The natural progression from Stage 8.

You’re done. There’s not much more to say. Hopefully, you gave your team plenty of chances. Stage 9 should never be a rash decision. But at some point, enough is enough. Life is too short to make yourself miserable, or to let a pro sports team do it for you.

In theory, reaching this stage means you’re no longer rooting against your team, because you don’t care anymore. But in reality, anyone who gets this far doesn’t want their team to win without them. Imagine being a Red Sox fan who bailed after the Aaron Boone homer in 2003. Nobody wants to be the fan who’s pounding on the doors of a bandwagon they just abandoned, desperately begging to be let back on.

A truly noble fan would leave quietly, wishing those that are staying behind the best. It should go without saying that none of us are noble. If we’re leaving, we want to toss a match over our shoulder as we go. And taken to an extreme, that can lead us to our final stage …

Stage 10: Actively wanting to see just how bad it can get (aka Sicko Mode)

Not to be confused with these guys, the fan who’s managed to get all the way to Stage 10 is truly disturbed. They’re not even really a fan anymore, at least in the way we think of the term. They’ve transcended that experience. Their team has spent years, maybe decades, force-feeding them angst and misery, so much so that now it’s all they know how to consume. It’s what they feed off of now. And they want more.

Oh, the team has a new franchise player? Let’s see him tear his ACL. They’ve made the playoffs? Let’s blow a 3-0 series lead. A can’t-miss prospect who’s absolutely guaranteed to become the greatest hockey player ever? Lifetime deal in the KHL, baby. The owner is a hopeless moron? Have him name himself coach and GM. No matter how bad it gets, it needs to get worse. So much worse.

These people are depraved.

They’re also extremely rare. Oh sure, many fans might spend brief amounts of time as a Sicko Mode tourist, but very few ever stick around permanently. You might think you’re there now, but you’re probably not. And that’s a good thing, because it means you can still be redeemed. There’s still good in you. There’s hope, somewhere, even if it’s hard to find.

There’s always hope for an NHL fan. Until you reach Stage 10. And if you do, may the hockey gods have mercy on what used to be your soul.

[SpeedFlex27]

Stage 5 & 6. 8. Both management & coaches have had their chance. It's time for a change  after 11 years. The problem is our owner & how committed he is to winning or continually rewarding his friends even when they fail. 

[Goalie]

They spent to the cap. Everyone praised the off season moves. This team quit on Paul and don't listen to Dave

It's obviously a in the room issue 

[SpeedFlex27]

41 minutes ago, Goalie said:

They spent to the cap. Everyone praised the off season moves. This team quit on Paul and don't listen to Dave

It's obviously a in the room issue 

Ownership will do diddly squat. I'd love to see what another GM would do & the things he'd change.

Chipman owns or his family owned car dealersships around Winnipeg. I'd loved to have worked for him. Even failure is rewarded. Don't sell a car this month? Hey, we'll just double your salary. No worries.

[TrueBlue4ever]

5 minutes ago, SpeedFlex27 said:

Ownership will do diddly squat. I'd love to see what another GM would do & the things he'd change.

Chipman owns or his family owned car dealersships around Winnipeg. I'd loved to have worked for him. Even failure is rewarded. Don't sell a car this month? Hey, we'll just double your salary. No worries.

Yes, I’m sure that irresponsible business strategy is how he amassed his fortune which allowed him to afford a pro sports team. Where’s an eye roll emoji when you need one? 
 

 

[SpeedFlex27]

1 minute ago, TrueBlue4ever said:

Yes, I’m sure that irresponsible business strategy is how he amassed his fortune which allowed him to afford a pro sports team. Where’s an eye roll emoji when you need one? 
 

 

Not the first owner who fucks things up by forgetting what got him to where he could afford a pro team in the first place.

[Goalie]

They literally have lost millions the past 2 years... millions. They want to win hence why cap team in the no fans Era and this year. 

Turns out the leaders in the room gave up. Is that on Chipman? Chevy? They ain't in the room

 Connor Stastny Dubois Ehlers A Lowry and even Morrissey have hinted at this.

Chipman and Chevy aren't on the ice. Eventually you gotta look there cuz that's where the real problem is. 

I've been in dressing rooms playing sports where certain people get favored by coaches and others can do no good by them. This has been festering for a while now.

[HardCoreBlue]

On 2022-04-18 at 9:19 PM, TrueBlue4ever said:

Here is a copy of the article so you can avoid the paywall. And given bb1’s comment about chasing a generational player in next year’s draft and blowing everything up, it puts him anywhere from stage 4 to stage 6. 
 

The NHL is a 32-team league with 32 different fan bases, each of which is unique. Some are big, some not so much. Some are more than a century old, some are brand new. Some are spoiled with years of excellence, some have had their ups and downs, and some never seem to get to be happy at all.

But there’s one thing every NHL fan has in common: We want our team to win.

Sometimes.

That’s the reality of being a hockey fan, especially at this time of year. We can throw around all the clichés we want about how winning is everything, but it isn’t, at least not all the time. And depending on circumstances, winning might actually feel like a problem.

When that happens, you’ve entered a very controversial zone as a hockey fan. You have to decide if you’ll cross a line, and start rooting for your team to lose.

Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily. But it’s a perilous place, one where you want to tread carefully. And since I have some experience in this world, I want to offer you a guide. I’ve prepared a list of the 10 stages of rooting against your own team, so that you can be prepared for what you might face, and for just how deep you want to go.

---

Stage 1: Apathy

We’ll ease into our list with a category that doesn’t really involve rooting against your team at all. Instead, at Stage 1, you just stop caring … temporarily. The season isn’t going well and you know it. You also know that one bad year isn’t the end of the world, and that even the best-run teams will go through it eventually.

You’re fine with it. You’re just especially interested in watching it all play out.

Honestly, this stage can be a pretty reasonable place to be. You’re not bailing on your team. You’re just backing away from committing a ton of time and mental energy to caring about them. You tune out, maybe check back in around the deadline, keep on top of any major developments, and then return to the fold in the offseason, rested and ready to go.

The stage makes our list only because it’s often confused with a fan rooting against their own team. But it’s not. You don’t want them to lose, you just don’t really care if they do.

Stage 2: Rooting for lottery odds (after playoff elimination)

OK, now you want them to lose.

But it’s only because they already have, a lot. So much, in fact, that they’ve been mathematically eliminated from playoff contention. At this point, there’s really nothing left to play for aside from lottery odds, and in the NHL, you get those lottery odds by losing. In a perfect world, we’d have the Gold Plan in place and fans could cheer for their teams to win their way to the top pick. But we don’t, and it sounds like we never will, so fans know how this works.

Even at this early stage, some fans are too loyal to actually hope their team loses. But most of us understand that the league has decided to embrace a system where losing is better for bad teams. We want what’s best for our team, so we act accordingly, even if only grudgingly.

Note: Once you reach this stage, it is 100 percent guaranteed that some random guy will have the game of his life and it will cost your team multiple draft spots, and you’ll kind of hate him for it forever.

The key here is that you only root against your team after they’ve been officially eliminated. Until that day comes, anything can happen. You never give up until the math says you have no choice.

Stage 3: Rooting for lottery odds (before playoff elimination)

OK, according to the math they’re still technically in it, but come on. They’re clearly not going to make the playoffs, and even if they do, they’d only get swept in the first round. That’s not you being cynical — it’s just that you’ve watched this team all season, and you can see that they’re not good enough. Yes, sure, sometimes an underdog will make a miracle run down the stretch, but this team isn’t it, and there’s no point getting your hopes up.

The gap between Stage 2 and Stage 3 is a narrow one; there’s a difference between being realistically out of the race and actually being mathematically eliminated, with bad teams sometimes stuck spending weeks in between those two zones. Some fans will insist on staying the course right up until elimination day, but others understand that sometimes you just have to accept reality. Teams like this year’s Canadiensand Coyotes haven’t been technically eliminated yet, but their fans know they’re not making it. So if you were the sort of fan who was willing to bail in Stage 2 anyway, you might as well get a head start.

The point is that you were with them all year long, right up until they made it clear this wasn’t going to be their year. It’s not like you turned on them from opening night.

Stage 4: Rooting for lottery odds (from opening night)

Look, we have to be realists here.

Some teams are unexpectedly bad. But some teams are bad by design, or in some cases by misdesign. If you’ve been a fan long enough, you know when it’s going to be one of those years, and there’s no point deluding yourself through October and November before accepting the obvious. These guys are bad, there’s a great prospect waiting for you at the draft, so let’s just get to losing.

Often, this stage involves obvious tank jobs, like the great Sabres/Coyotes battle for Connor McDavid in 2014-15 that worked out so well for everyone. If your team’s management has sent obvious signals that they’re trying to lose, well, you root for the result your team wants, right? Nothing worse than watching a well-designed tank job go off the rails because of a few lucky wins.

There’s no question that this stage can feel icky. It’s one thing to turn against your team when they’ve already lost a ton of games and fallen out of the race. It’s another to do it early, even when your intentions are good. There will be nagging doubt. This stage isn’t for everyone. But if you’ve got the stomach for it, it can be a perfectly reasonable path to take.

Stage 5: When you want somebody to get fired

Maybe it’s the coach. Maybe it’s the GM. Maybe it’s both of them, or someone else entirely. But somebody needs to be sent packing, and it’s not going to happen if this team keeps fluking out wins that it doesn’t deserve.

And yes, this stage sucks. On one level, nobody should want to see anyone lose their job. But this is also pro sports, where getting fired is part of the deal. If your team has the wrong guy in the wrong place and it’s dragging them down, there’s really no other path to take. It’s going to happen eventually, so you might as well get it out of the way now. A nice little losing streak might just seal the deal, and pave the way to a brighter future. Call it an investment.

Stage 5 can last for a few games, or it could take most of a season. But it’s always temporary, and it ends as soon as the pink slips start flying. The moment the new guy takes over, you can go right back to cheering on your team. Let’s never speak of this again.

Stage 6: When you want the roster to get blown up

The more complicated cousin of Stage 5, this one has the same basic premise. Things are bad, you know they’re not going to be fixed until there’s no other choice, and so you have to root for them to get worse.

The problem here is that old sports cliché: It’s always easier to fire the coach (or GM) than to trade the whole roster. That’s especially true in today’s NHL, where we’re told that trades are impossible, especially during the season.

When you’re at Stage 5 and just want one guy to be fired, any day can be the day that snaps you out of it. Some insider reports that a change is being made, the press conference gets called, and you’re back on the bandwagon by the end of the day. With Stage 6, you’re never really sure how much change is enough. One trade? Two? It’s going to take more than that, but you’re not sure how many moves you need before you’ll feel like it’s worth returning to the fold.

Whatever that number is, the team isn’t good. You know it. Other realistic fans know it. But management doesn’t know it, or at least isn’t willing to admit it, and that won’t change unless the losses start piling up, so that’s what needs to happen. It’s for their own good.

Stage 7: When you realize you kind of hate these guys

This is the more extreme version of Stage 6, and the difference between them can seem subtle.

In Stage 6, you want changes because the team keeps losing and you don’t like losing. In Stage 7, you want changes because you don’t like them. The team is bad, sure, but so is the vibe. You’re just kind of done with this team, at least this particular iteration of it.

Sometimes, you’ll reach this stage because of something specific. Maybe you’ve finally realized the other fans are right and these guys are a bunch of dirty cheap shot artists. Maybe you’ve heard a few too many of the same excuses trotted out in the postgame. There could be some controversy involving fans, or a bigger social issue, or the media. It could be something approaching all of the above.

Somewhat weirdly, it’s possible to reach this stage even when a team’s record says they’re playing well. (Ask any current Leaf fan what will happen if they lose in the first round again.) You might arrive at this stage when a team has been stubbornly staying the course for years, and you hit a tipping point where you just want them all gone. It can be a progression through the other stages, or in the case of some sort of major scandal like this year’s Blackhawks’ story, a rapid ascent.

The key is that Stage 6 isn’t personal. Stage 7 very much is. You’re sick of this team, you want everyone out, and you’re not going to root for them until it happens.

Stage 8: Apathy, part two

This is what comes next when you hit Stage 7 but nothing changes. There really isn’t anywhere else to go. You used to hate these guys, but hatred at least meant you still cared. Now you can’t even muster that. You raged against the machine, nothing happened, and now you’re done.

Make no mistake: Despite the similar names, there’s virtually nothing connecting this stage to Stage 1. Back then you stopped paying attention, but it was always going to be temporary. You’re well beyond that at Stage 8; it’s a far darker place to be. You’re pretty close to being done.

If you reach this stage, your fandom is at a critical moment. If something doesn’t change very soon, this might be it.

Stage 9: You quit

The natural progression from Stage 8.

You’re done. There’s not much more to say. Hopefully, you gave your team plenty of chances. Stage 9 should never be a rash decision. But at some point, enough is enough. Life is too short to make yourself miserable, or to let a pro sports team do it for you.

In theory, reaching this stage means you’re no longer rooting against your team, because you don’t care anymore. But in reality, anyone who gets this far doesn’t want their team to win without them. Imagine being a Red Sox fan who bailed after the Aaron Boone homer in 2003. Nobody wants to be the fan who’s pounding on the doors of a bandwagon they just abandoned, desperately begging to be let back on.

A truly noble fan would leave quietly, wishing those that are staying behind the best. It should go without saying that none of us are noble. If we’re leaving, we want to toss a match over our shoulder as we go. And taken to an extreme, that can lead us to our final stage …

Stage 10: Actively wanting to see just how bad it can get (aka Sicko Mode)

Not to be confused with these guys, the fan who’s managed to get all the way to Stage 10 is truly disturbed. They’re not even really a fan anymore, at least in the way we think of the term. They’ve transcended that experience. Their team has spent years, maybe decades, force-feeding them angst and misery, so much so that now it’s all they know how to consume. It’s what they feed off of now. And they want more.

Oh, the team has a new franchise player? Let’s see him tear his ACL. They’ve made the playoffs? Let’s blow a 3-0 series lead. A can’t-miss prospect who’s absolutely guaranteed to become the greatest hockey player ever? Lifetime deal in the KHL, baby. The owner is a hopeless moron? Have him name himself coach and GM. No matter how bad it gets, it needs to get worse. So much worse.

These people are depraved.

They’re also extremely rare. Oh sure, many fans might spend brief amounts of time as a Sicko Mode tourist, but very few ever stick around permanently. You might think you’re there now, but you’re probably not. And that’s a good thing, because it means you can still be redeemed. There’s still good in you. There’s hope, somewhere, even if it’s hard to find.

There’s always hope for an NHL fan. Until you reach Stage 10. And if you do, may the hockey gods have mercy on what used to be your soul.

I'm too much of a purist when it comes to certain aspects of competitive sports.

Yes I definitely can get apathetic at times but there is never a situation that I can think of that I would want my team to lose even it makes total sense. It's just not in my DNA. Too competitive probably. 

[SpeedFlex27]

On 2022-04-19 at 12:13 PM, Goalie said:

They literally have lost millions the past 2 years... millions. They want to win hence why cap team in the no fans Era and this year. 

Turns out the leaders in the room gave up. Is that on Chipman? Chevy? They ain't in the room

 Connor Stastny Dubois Ehlers A Lowry and even Morrissey have hinted at this.

Chipman and Chevy aren't on the ice. Eventually you gotta look there cuz that's where the real problem is. 

I've been in dressing rooms playing sports where certain people get favored by coaches and others can do no good by them. This has been festering for a while now.

Thge rot doesn't start at the bottom when it comes to the Jets. It starts at the top. Ownership on down. We saw that with Chevy & the scandal with the Blackhawks last fall. Instead of Chipman firing Chevy, he doubled down on how great an individual he is. That's where things start when a dowfall of an team starts. Players will take direction but when they see politics taking place along with favouritism as well as a lack of accountability within the Jets organization, it's no surprise this season turned out the way it did.