Part I, January 15-January 21

It is February of 1992. I am ten years old. Dad and I are sitting on the couch in our TV room in Evanston. We are watching the NBA All-Star Game. As the game goes on, I hop off the couch to sit on the floor, gazing at the television as my father speaks.

First came the love, then came the understanding. If you grew up when I grew up, it was impossible not to love the NBA. It was everywhere. And of course, I was particularly fortunate because I was given the Chicago Bulls, a team on the rise. The love was there. It was instantaneous. The understanding, though, came later, and though it was a gradual process, I credit a large jump to watching the 1992 All-Star Game with my dad. This was the game in which a recently-retired Magic Johnson, three months removed from his HIV announcement, was voted onto the All-Star team and then proceeded to drop a game-high 25 points to lead the West to victory while capturing the game’s MVP award. I’d been knowingly watching hoops for six years, and yet my knowledge was low. I remember getting a pack of basketball cards at a birthday party when I was eight, and knowing only four guys in the pack: Michael, Magic, Isiah, and Pax. Two years later I would have known every player in there, along with their colleges, current teams, and maybe even their rookie year. 1992 was the beginning of that process, and the All-Star Game was the beginning of the beginning.

“See that? Ya know, they say that football is a contact game, but look at those guys under the basket. Just watch Malone and Barkley boxing out, fighting for position…man! Look at those guys! Look at the physical play. Jack, do you see it? Do you see what I’m talking about?”

“True. I’m watching the action away from the ball. It’s fun. Basketball is the only sport in which you can do that, because you can see all of the action on television. Whoa! Look at that! Look at those guys battling! Isn’t that something?”

I remember Magic in that game, knocking down threes just as he had the previous June in the Finals, but the player who jumps out of my memory from that afternoon is Clyde Drexler. I actually remember seeing Clyde the Glide knock down a jumper, and then me turning to my dad and asking him “Who’s that guy?”, and him telling me. Four months later, Drexler had his Blazers in the Finals against the Bulls, and I could tell you every significant bare bones fact about him and his team. Amazing, huh? Just think: in February of ’92, I didn’t know Clyde Drexler. In June of ’92, I could tell you about Phi Slamma Jamma and Clyde the Glide’s ppg (25 flat) and that he was part of the reason that the Blazers passed on Michael in ’84. It happened that fast. In later years I would try to pretend that I knew more than I did at a younger age than I knew it. I was the sports genius in middle school and high school, and it seemed embarrassing to think that I didn’t actually know who Clyde the Glide was until I was ten. But it’s true. And that game was the flip.

He laughs. “No, Mom just thought that he was a bad sport after we beat them. And she’s right. But she doesn’t hate him. And he doesn’t hate Chicago. He grew up wanting to play for the Bulls. And you know B.J. Armstrong?”

“Well, kind of. But it’s a job. I’m sure they love playing the game, but it’s a job for them.”

Every diehard has a guy in a restaurant or a store or some other place of business who he talks sports with hard core. Art is one of those guys, as is Scott at Herm’s Palace in Skokie; we all have three or four, and in a way, that’s all that sports talk radio is. Diehards begin collecting “sports guys” at young ages. I was no different, and for me, one sports guy stands out from the rest, and that is Keith, the booming black man with a smile and opinion for all who works the grill and the register at my favorite hot dog joint, Mustard’s Last Stand. I’ve accumulated quite a few “sports guys” over the years with whom I enjoy a good bull session, but Keith is the one who’s been the most constant in my life, as I first ate at Mustard’s when I was but a wee pup.

Like all hot dog joints, Mustard’s has a specific order procedure. At Herm’s, you order your meal, sit down and eat, and then pay when you leave. At The Weiner Circle in Chicago, you get into a shouting match with the employees, and then proceed to take a fair amount of verbal abuse as you eat your food. At Little Island (aka Hot Dog Island) in Evanston, you order, pay, and then wait, watching one of the small TVs that is, somehow, always set to day-time television, even after the sun is down. Mustard’s is no exception to the rule of specific ordering, though their policy is dictated not by demeanor but by the building’s design. The restaurant is long and narrow, with the register, grill, and food counter to the left and customer seating along the wall to the right. Because of this setup, customers walk in and go all the way to the back, place their order there, and then walk forward to pay and get food. It is during the order process when conversation begins, with old customers striking up sports talk with Keith and whoever else is working, and new customers being slowly drawn into the conversation either through listening to one going on or by starting one on their own. This happens more often than not, both due to Keith’s gregarious nature and the restaurant’s overwhelming sports atmosphere. The walls are covered with pictures, both local and otherwise, but mostly local: Michael, Dawson, Gracie, Black Jack, Bobby Hull, Minnie Minoso, Scottie, Luis Aparicio, Johnny Lujack, the 1991-92 Blackhawks team photo, Steve Cauthen, Pat Fitzgerald, Bobby Christian, Darnell Autry, the Wheaties Box dedicated to the 1995 Northwestern football team, a plethora of various Wildcat sports pictures both male and female, and various other stuff. The small windows in the walls where customers eat look out at Dyche Stadium; on game days for NU football and on the Fourth of July, they move hot dog and pop sales outside to accommodate the extra customers, and on summer days the place is packed with little leaguers gathering for their post-game meals.

I am meeting my good buddy Ben there for lunch today, albeit a late lunch. Ben and I have known each other since the first grade when we met in Sunday school, and though we were friends with all of the same guys growing up, he and I did not become good friends outside the confines of the group until college. Ben is a huge Cubs fan, and he loves the Bears, but our bond grew strong when we each realized that the other one was the biggest Bulls fan we knew. It was always difficult to find a person to talk to about the post-Jordan Bulls, and our friendship grew over the joy we got from talking sports, the Bulls in particular. As the Bulls had just knocked off the Knicks in classic fashion earlier in the day, I figured it was a good time to get some food with Ben.

“Unbelievable. Ya know, I knew Gordon was gonna hit the shot as soon as he got the ball. I was sure.”

We get inside, and it’s not too busy, which is to be expected during this time of the afternoon. There are a couple of young teenagers eating on our right, and a mom is paying for food with her two young sons standing by her, waiting anxiously to get their hands on their French fries. We walk to the back; Keith and Steve, another long timer, are both working, and when Keith sees us we get a hello and a handshake.

Steve nods hello, slightly aloof as always. He is a white guy, Greek, with short black hair that sits gelled on top of his head, sort of spiky. He looks like someone who is “way too cool,” but he’s just the contrary, always with a friendly and sincere word to you. He has always been a very nice guy, not as talkative as Keith, not as emotional, but just as laid-back and friendly in his own way. Black, white, loud, quiet, large, thin, tight fade, gelled and combed…they’re a great duo.

“So,” Keith starts, while slapping my burgers and Ben’s chicken on the grill, “where do you want Sammy to be on Opening Day?”

“I don’t know,” I say, while Ben starts leafing through the Sun-Times that’s sitting on the counter. “I think he’ll end up staying, and I think people will forgive him and everybody will move on.”

“You know what the big problem is,” Keith says, while flipping our burgers. “They need to get rid of Dusty. He’s killing them. I’m telling you, Dusty’s got to go.”

“He’s too buddy-buddy. How you gonna let guys get so hung up on what the announcers are saying? You’re in the middle of a pennant race, man. But Dusty wants to be friends, so he backs ‘em up no matter what they do. Cubs need somebody who’s gonna discipline them, and Dusty just ain’t doing it. You think Joe Torre or Bobby Cox puts up with that crap? Hell no. Hey, uh, what do you want on here?” he asks Ben.

“Yup.” And then, right back into it: “Don’t you think you’re being a little hard on the guy? I don’t know how you can say that he should be gone after what he’s done. Would you rather have Baylor or Riggleman back? Dusty’s been consistently one of the four or five best managers in the game over the last ten years.”

The guy behind us who just walked in the place joins in. “Yeah, but he can’t get his teams over the hump. The Bartman thing wasn’t his only big collapse. Look at the World Series, when San Francisco was up in the seventh or something in Game 6. They lost that lead too.”

“Yeah, but I still don’t see that as reasoning for firing the guy. He’s got a four-year deal, right? You gotta give him at least three of those years, considering what he’s done with the club in his first two seasons. I mean, do you think Baylor would’ve had the balls to make Grudz the opening day second baseman instead of Bobby Hill? Or to platoon Karros instead of just giving Hee Seop Choi the job? Dusty has the credibility and confidence to make those kinds of decisions.”

“OK.” The two teenagers have remained silent throughout, but I can see that they are listening intently and trying to find a place where they can jump in. The grill sizzles with more food, as two older men have come in and ordered. Keith sets our cups down under the pop fountains, hits the “large” buttons, and continues.

“Dusty just can’t manage the games, man. He can’t. He’s one of the worst in-game managers in baseball. Strategy and common sense. Remember in the World Series when his kid was out on the field and almost got run over on that play at the plate? It’s the World Series. You got a runner who’s coming home. How could he let his kid run from the dugout to home? It’s right in his field of vision, ya know what I’m saying? Everybody in the park is focused on the runner trying to score. Where is this guy looking at this crucial point in the game that he doesn’t see his kid running towards home plate, ya know? And what’s his kid doing in the dugout anyways?”

The restaurant nods in contemplation. Steve totals us up, still silent, still considering.

We pay and leave, taking the food over to Ben’s house to eat, while Keith and Steve make more burgers and dogs and conversation.

After getting set up at Ben’s and tearing into our food, we take our first “break” and start to talk.

He is referring to the road trip that Meghan and I are taking. When most people decide to travel after graduating college, they head out for Europe or some other part of The World. Me? I’m hitting the states. We live in an enormous country, and I know almost none of it. Europe can wait. The U.S. begs to be seen.

The joy of watching good playoff football usually comes with the pain of knowing that your team isn’t good enough to get there. And when you watch the Chicago Bears, the pain of knowing that your team isn’t good enough to get there is augmented by the pain of knowing that maybe your team would be good enough to get there if only management knew what they were doing. Most of the Bears teams of the past fifteen years have been teams that suffered from the same problems: an inability to win close games (coaching and quarterbacks), and an inability to run a team and evaluate talent. What really impresses me about this current edition of the New England Patriots is the way that they have instilled the team concept into every part of their organization, with Bob Kraft, Bill Belichick, and Tom Brady embodying that concept with everything they do. If the Bears were only as eager to mimic the Patriots’ success as they were to mimic the 2000 Ravens’ success, when they went out and signed two massive d-tackles to clog the middle…

Unfortunately, this is not the case. The Bears may have had a promising 2004 in some respects, but we’re a long way away from being the kind of team that can make the postseason a yearly event. And so each year as the NFL playoffs come around, Bears fans reminisce on the seasons gone by and think about our time in the sun. This is one of the reasons that the ’85 Bears have remained so popular, but while I remember that team in broad sketches, I was only four years old at the time, so my memories come from more recent Bear playoff teams, the last two being in 1994 and 2001. 1994 was a more successful playoff run—we upset the Vikings in Minnesota with a dominant 35-18 victory—and even though it ended without a ring, there’s no shame in a 9-7 Wild Card team losing to the eventual Super Bowl champions, especially when that team is as powerful as the 1994 49ers. But 2001 was the year with more great memories, and that made the playoff loss to Philly even harder to accept.

At the end of the year, the Bears found themselves division champs, and after the Eagles trashed the Bucs, the Bears were set to host Philadelphia for a playoff game at Soldier Field. A few days before the game, my buddy Jake Bressler called me from the University of Illinois with the news that he had an extra ticket. He wanted me to come with him because he couldn’t think of anyone who would appreciate a Bears playoff game more than me.[1] The catch was that I was going to have to drive from Bloomington to Champaign, pick up Jake and a buddy of his, and then drive the three of us to Chicago. Within three minutes of hanging up the phone, I was packed.

When we got to Soldier Field two days later, I was overwhelmed. Dressed in my Robinson jersey over a Bears hoodie and a winter Bears cap, I was as excited for this game as any other in my career. While we waited in line outside the gate, I sung “Bear Down Chicago Bears” with fans I’d never met, and when we stepped inside, I was ready. I knew we were going to win, and I knew that my spirit was going to help contribute to that win.

But somehow, we didn’t win. The Bears made a nice push in the second half with a TD pick return by JerryAzumah and an end-around TD run by Ahmed Merritt, but the game slipped away, and Philly walked out of Soldier Field with a 33-19 victory. Suddenly, the frozen air swirling around the park felt a lot colder. I could feel it on my cheeks, like a slap, like it had been accumulating around me the entire game without my knowledge, and now that the game was over I could finally feel it all. I was surrounded by Eagles fans—all of them yelling and cheering, getting ready for the next game—and all I could do was sit there, cold in my seat. The last game at Soldier Field went by with little fan fare, the season over, our stadium as we knew it gone, and the only thing left was the cold in my cheeks. But then—and I’ll never forget this—something came over me. A calm. For some reason, everything felt like it was OK, like losing the game was not the end of the world. I felt this, through and through, and it shocked me, and it felt good. I could feel the smile growing on my face as my fellow Bears fans walked towards the exits engulfed in what felt like a sea of green, and in this moment of calm, I decided to say goodbye to Soldier Field by using the bathroom one final time.

The bathroom is one of the great equalizers of man. Public bathrooms in particular. Actually, any place with multiple urinals attached to a wall. Hell, they don’t even have to be attached. Just so long as they’re lined up. It doesn’t matter where you are or who’s at the John, around the world it’s all the same. Give me a king, a president, the guy working the overnight at Steak-n-Shake, and a hobo, line them all up at the urinals, and all you’ve got is four guys taking a leak.

Dave Barry once wrote about the instinctive male urinal code that says that men would rather hold it in for a 48-hour period then use a urinal between two other men. For the most part, I agree. Go into a restroom in a bar or restaurant and that code will be silently upheld by every guy there, as we stare deep into the wall in front of us out of fear of accidentally making eye contact with another man in the room.

But go check out the bathrooms at a sporting arena during a game, and there you'll find guys side-by-side doing their business without a care in the world. Of course, the ultimate in arena bathrooms were the giant troughs at Soldier Field that they had until about six years ago. Is there any better way to signify the kind of basic animal instincts that take men over when we are watching sports than making us piss into a 30-foot half pipe that most horses would refuse to dine at?

The thing about a bathroom in a sporting arena is that inside, the collective mood of every fan grows into an aura of emotions, one you can feel the moment you step in. Let’s say you’re at a Bears-Packers game, and you’re in the bathroom after a Rex interception or an A-Train fumble—you’ll likely see bathroom patrons angrily pissing and cursing, banging on the flush handle and aggressively harassing small children who happen to be wearing Packer gear. On the other hand, if you’re in there after a Marty Booker[2] touchdown or an Urlacher sack, you might see guys singing “Bear Down Chicago Bears,” high-fiving each other and cheering, and gleefully harassing the same small children. This is, as far as I know, the way it’s been for an eternity. I’ll bet in ancient Rome you could find six guys lined up at trees during a Gladiator fight saying things like “Stupid Demetrius. What was he thinking getting killed like that?”

My most memorable time ever spent in a men’s room was also my saddest. It was that trip to the bathroom, after the playoff game against Philly was over. I went to the bathroom, and as soon as I stepped in the door, I was in line. It was packed. I remember the feel of it, the overwhelming mood. Not only had we lost, but Soldier Field had seen its last game: they began the renovation as soon as everyone left. No one said a word for the first two minutes I was in there, until someone in the back of the line yelled, “Ah who cares. Let’s piss on the floor. Not like they’re gonna clean it.” Another guy answered with “The sink looks good to me.” And then, after about ten more seconds of silence, one guy said “It’s been a great year.” It went from there. Everyone reminiscing about the great season, and the game, and cursing Hugh Douglas. This is what sports is about: the moments, both the moments of the season and the moments with the fans. Moments in bars and restaurants, time spent in the bleachers with fellow fans, moments after a huge game when you leave the park and you can feel the city vibrating with excitement and joy, when you hear cars honking and you know why. The bathroom moment after that Bears-Eagles game was one of those moments, one of my moments as a fan. It ended appropriately enough when a kid in front of me—no more than 10 years old—said pretty loudly “Well, it’ll be OK if Brett Favre gets killed tomorrow by the Rams.” The bathroom erupted in celebration. Truth from a child.

[1] I’m not trying to brag here; this is exactly what he told me, and it makes me feel really good to know that I’ve got friends who fully understand how intense my fandom is.

[2] Man I miss him. Raise your hand if you would be opposed to sending David Terrell and a 2^nd round pick to Miami to have Booker back. Your hand’s not up, eh? Neither is mine.

GO TO PREVIOUS SECTION: January 8-January 14

PART I, continued

January 15-January 21