The Life and Trials of a Toronto Sports Fan

It began when my buddy texted me the words: "Toronto fans are ridiculous."

I knew why he felt that way: the Toronto Maple Leafs and Toronto Raptors had lost that November night, and if my memory is correct, both were in dramatic, comeback fashion. I was at work when I received this prophetic message, but I caught the Leafs debauchery on television while wiping down dumbbells. It's amazing how busy you can look wiping down equipment with a wet-nap.

When the game was over -- I mean, when I finished cleaning the weight room -- I thought about what he said. He was right. Toronto sports fans are ridiculous. We support our teams through pretty unbelievable circumstances. It's great having teams in most professional leagues, but none exactly have winning track records. When you think of the Leafs, aside from a horrendous trade history, you think 43 years and counting since they've won the Stanley Cup. And their last hoist came with six teams in the league. When you think Raptors, you shudder from memories of Vince Carter. I have a theory that Raps fans have some form of postpartum depression, but I'll expand on this in a later post. Blue Jays fans rock the throwbacks, clinging to memories of back-to-back World Series Championships in the early '90s because being in a division with the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees dashes any new dreams of the postseason. And the Toronto Argonauts? They're a mythological sinking ship.

And still, at the start of every new season, we have genuine, naive hope.

Toronto teams have a unique relationship with the fans and with each other. We have one of the most infamous, unsuccessful teams in the NHL who are also the largest revenue makers; we have a basketball and baseball team that are the only Canadian representatives in their respective leagues; we own one of the oldest football teams in North America whose success, according to some experts, is married with the livelihood of the CFL. And we also have a brand new soccer team.

Like it or lump it, eyes are always on Toronto.

My buddy told me one day he'd write an essay about all this, about why Toronto fans are ridiculous. Unfortunately, the problems of Toronto pro sports won't fit in an essay. And so this blog was born, hopefully an outlet of frustration for Toronto sports fans who wonder why they put themselves through the pleasure and pain -- the pleasure of having a handful of sports teams to choose from, and the pain of following them.

I am a Toronto sports fan. (To get specific: I'm die-hard Leafs, serious Raps, casual Blue Jays and Argos, and noob Toronto FC.) Ultimately, I want to see them win. I will never bash them out of spite -- if I'm "hating" it'll be for a legitimate reason. I'm grateful for the abundance of sports teams in Toronto, and for the players who (I assume) give their best every night. But when the going gets tough, the tough blog about it. Hopefully I can articulate the dilemmas of Toronto sports fans, and give outsiders a chance to see the inner-workings of Toronto sports organizations and how they affect us.

Maybe someday you'll understand the madness of it all: why we boo players at home, why we curse them out of town, and why, in the end, even if we're supposed to be wiping down fitness machines, we always come back.

Welcome to The Toronto Turnover.