(note: this opening paragraph is obviously parody)
With a win tonight the Chicago Blackhawks will take another step towards drinking the blessed waters residing within Lord Stanley’s Cup. With just five more wins, the tasting of these pure waters will lift the spirits of Windy City citizens still yearning for a ray of light to get them through the dark devastation brought on by the Great Chicago Fire in October of 1871.
Every Brian Bickell goal is yet another opportunity to make Chicago residents forget about that fateful lantern, kicked over by Mrs. O’Leary’s cow that led to doom and destruction. Every point scored by Blackhawks leader Jonathan “Captain Serious” Toews is another chance to alleviate the serious and somber mood possessed by many who lost everything in the second city’s historical inferno.
Dear media, please please please please please DO NOT DO the “Boston Bruins help city recover from bombings” storyline. #dontdoit
— Paul M. Banks (@PaulMBanks) June 8, 2013
For Chicagoans, a deep Blackhawks playoff run is just what they need to get past these lean and mean times.
Ok, by now you’ve realized I’m being ironic…right? I truly hope you didn’t fall for that disgustingly cheap pablum and mindless, sappy garbage I typed in the first two paragraphs. I was laying it on pretty thick. And believe me, it was extremely difficult for me to write those cheap, air-kissed platitudes. And I even attached a note right at the beginning; just in case subtlety isn’t your thing.
But then again, some people believed CBS when they made their non-stop allusions to Michigan State’s qualifying for the 2009 Final Four, held in Detroit, as the actual savior of the motor city. Remember those ultra-cheap, poorly written, horribly produced stories about wow hard the state of Michigan was hit by the economy in 2008-09?
And how the Spartans run to the title game would get them all through it?
Hey, I know what will get poverty-stricken people through tough times- GOOD-PAYING JOBS!!! Instead of being distracted by college basketball.
I shudder to even bring up ESPN, the New Orleans Saints, and how the Saints’ Super Bowl win somehow got everyone in the Big Easy out of their collective post-Katrina problems. Winning the NFL title DOES NOT REBUILD SCHOOLS, HOSPITALS AND INFRASTRUCTURE! A government that works and cares about it’s citizens- that’s what gets it done.
And Katrina was five years prior to the Super Bowl for that matter. So when do you draw the line?
If Manchester United wins the EPL, does that redeem the city from the destruction brought by the Battle of Hastings in 1066?
Did the French World Cup win of 2002 help that nation’s citizens heal from the wounds of the Saxons routing the Gauls? Natural disasters, terrorist attacks, wars and all other catastrophes that cause mass casualties in a civic space have NOTHING to do with winning ballgames.
Simply put, if you enjoy and believe these cheap, and fallacious story archetypes, you have no brain!
If you produce and/or distribute them, you have no soul!
Sports are a nice diversion, a pleasant distraction from our problems and our issues. We love it when our hometown teams reach the pinnacle of their game. We savor and celebrate, but it still does NOTHING to cure social ills- no matter what the “World Wide Leader,” CBS, NBC, Fox, ABC and company keep telling us.
Ask anyone from New Orleans or Detroit, I’m sure they would agree with me.
And by the way, if anyone pulls this crapola during the Stanley Cup with the Boston Bruins and the Boston Marathon bombings, I WILL LIGHT YOU UP! VICIOUSLY! OVER AND OVER!
Paul M. Banks is the owner of The Sports Bank.net. (“Quasi-endorsed” by Philadelphia Eagles Coach Chip Kelly) He’s also an author who also contributes regularly to MSN, Fox Sports , Chicago Now, Walter Football.com and Yardbarker
Banks has appeared on the History Channel, as well as Clear Channel, ESPN and CBS radio all over the world. President Barack Obama follows him on Twitter (@PaulMBanks), like him on Facebook