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February 03, 2020

Sad trombone times for DFW and Houston pro sports?

ESPN regularly runs a "misery index" about how much suffering fans of different teams have. Dallas and Houston fans in general aren't the Cleveland Browns, but? Cleveland as a city has won a title in one Big Three sport (sit down, hockey) and gone to the big dance in another more recently than anybody from Dallas, and more recently than anybody not banging a trash can in Houston.

Cort McMurray, in his take on the Astros cheating, says that the problem is not just the cheating itself, but from a Houstonian point of view, washing away the goodwill the Astros built up. (Here's my long take.)

So, maybe there's some reverse schadenfreude among Texas pro sports fans? Certainly seemed that way during the NFC and AFC title games, as I noted on Twitter:
Yep, that's about right. Yes, I know some, per Brains, are trying to claim this was just a riff on the roots of the two teams in the 1962 AFL title game. Lemme see, December 1962 was FIFTY-SEVEN years ago. About 2 percent of Twitter users are old enough to have been alive, let alone old enough to remember, the original game. It's butt-hurt jealousy tweeting, no matter how much of the actual history you can present, if you didn't actually experience it.

(And, at least Dallas fans weren't tweeting "Dallas Texans" during the Super Bowl, at least not enough to hit trending on Twitter. But they WERE obnoxiously Tweeting after the game, with stupid tenuous pseudo-connections like the Cowboys going to SB V after the Chiefs won SB 4. I said the Las Vegas Raiders with Tom Brady had a better chance next year.)

But, let's look at the butt-hurtedness level of Texas sports fans.

After all, before that, the Stros only got to the World Series once, despite Albert Pujols' best efforts to block even that:



I never get tired of playing that, not just because I'm a Cards and a Phat Albert fan.

But, the crush-crunch-crouch of Brad LidgeRoger Clemens and Andy Pettitte kind o numbed out in the Astros dugout, at the 20 second mark, and the combo of deadpan and WTF on the face of Nolan Ryan at 25 seconds all make it worthwhile.

Before that, of course, the last time the Stros were close to winning it all, not counting the year before in 2004, or even getting close to the point of being able to win it all, was the 1986 when Ryan was No. 2 on the mound to Mike Scott. (Interestingly, 2005 skipper Phil Garner was Scrap Iron playing on the 86 team, too.)

OK, so the Stros have hurt, and the idea that they would lose their one winning team due to a stripped title is a fear indeed.

Football?

The old Oilers of Dan Pastorini and Earl Campbell were good in the late 70s, but the Terry Bradshaw Steelers twice blocked them in the playoffs.

Basketball?

The Rockets had their schadenfreude of The Beard and CP3 blowing a shot to take down Splash Bros Steph and Clay. Other than that, it's been a LONG time — 25 years now — since Hakeem the Dream, Clyde the Glide, Mad Max, second-year Sam Cassell (not yet with big balls) and coach Rudy T. actually lifted the Larry O'Brien trophy.

Now, to Big D.

The Boys haven't won it all since Barry Switzer coached Jimmy Johnson's accumulation of talent, namely Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith, the Moose, Michael Irwin, Jay NovacekPrime Time/Neon Deion, Charles Haley and more, to a title that proved Jerry Jones kind of right on the coaching side, while the aftermath undercut him on his "socks and jocks" GM side. That's been almost 25 years — just one shy. And, speaking of Sam Cassell's big balls? It was Jimmy Johnson that pulled the trigger to trade Herschel Walker.

Hoops?

While the Mavericks have an untainted more recent title than anybody else, and while Luka and the Unicorn, and supplemental cast, offer hope for the future, Mark Cuban has an abysmal record of landing A-list free agents, and this was true even before Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Kidd, Jason Terry, blast connecting to the past J.J. Barea, and team led them to the 2011 title.

Baseball?

The Nolan Ryan who was nonplussed by Albert Pujols in 2005 with the Astros was even more so in 2011 with David Freese ripping World Series victory from the Rangers' grasp (aided by Nelson Cruz showing why DH is a better spot for him than right field).

And let's watch both the triple and the home run, OK, Nolan and Rangers fans?



Since shortly after that time, of course, the Rangers haven't generally even been close to winning it all, though they have been in postseason as recently as 2016.

The fourth, tag-along sport? It's been 20 years and counting since the Stars won the Stanley Cup. Well, you're ahead of Houston, which hasn't had major league hockey since the WHA days 40-plus years ago and doesn't currently even have a minor league team.

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