Rock and a Hard Place

The rock being the New Jersey Devils and the hard place being the Nashville Predators. I am a fan of both teams. I have been a Devils fan ever since I found out that they had a team back around 1989-90. I had just moved out of the sticks and to a place that had cable.I was flipping through the channels and when I got to ESPN they were showing a hockey game between the New Jersey Devils and the Pittsburgh Penguins. I was born in New Jersey so it just seemed right to root for them. Back then though, I was living in a small town in Maryland and the only way I could follow them was the few games that ESPN and HTS (Home Team Sports, the sports channel for the Washington/Baltimore area) showed and game recaps in the newspaper. Then came the 94 run to the ECF and therefore more games televised and my eventual distaste for the Rangers. The next year came and I spent a couple of months wondering why the hell I couldn't find any hockey because I was oblivious to the labor dispute. Eventually hockey showed up and the Devils made their way to the Stanley Cup Finals amidst rumors of relocation to Nashville, Tennessee. The Devils went on to win the Cup and stayed in New Jersey. Nine years and two Cups later, it was I who ended up moving the great distance.

I'm sure that it was because of those rumors though that after Nashville was awarded an expansion team that I followed their progress, not to mention that they they also picked up the backup goaltender for the Devils, Mike Dunham in the expansion draft. Year after year they kept getting better and better, building mostly from within and not spending huge bucks on free agents. In that respect, they were reminding me a lot of my beloved Devils. And then they did something that I had never heard of before, they were going to raise ticket prices but refund the difference if the Preds didn't make the playoffs.

I wasn't planning on becoming a Predators fan but I already had the connection and when I moved, Nashville was the closest hockey city. I had planned on going down there to catch a hockey game just for the fun of it, but for whatever reasons (money, fear of the unknown) waited until January 19, 2006 when the Devils came to town to finally go. That's right, my first experience in Nashville was as a rival fan, all alone, something I wouldn't do in Philadelphia. There was some good natured booing and taunting but the locals were friendly, even pointing me in the right direction to go out for a smoke during intermission. They welcomed me to Nashville and asked me how I liked the town and how long I was down for. When I told them that I had just moved to the area they suggested that I should come down more often. When the postseason came around, I obliged them. The atmosphere was so awesome that I not only went to one playoff game, I went to two.

So here I find myself, a fan of two teams. My first love is one that is killing hockey. My second is one that doesn't deserve to have a hockey team.
Hey at least Greg Wyshynski is fighting the good fight. But oh, wait:

I suppose that speaks volumes about where those franchises have gone in the last decade, and where the Predators haven't.

They should trade his ass to a complete no-man's land for hockey. Some city that barely can hold on to its franchise. A city like ... uh, scratch that.

Hey at least I can turn to Mike Chen. But oh, wait:

That being said, if I was forced to move two teams, it’d be Florida and New Jersey.

Well I guess somebody has to be a fan of the red headed (and mustard) step children of the league, and I guess that person is me.