If you've looked at my Blogger Profile, you'll see that my Seahawks story involves "...NFL Expansion, a Catholic nun and Don Shula!"While I was looking for an appropriate nun graphic for this piece, this picture reminded me of the classic group shot from the movie Reservoir Dogs.
The pun came very quickly, and then I realized it was perfect.
Websters defines Reservoir as "A large or extra supply; a reserve:", and Dogma as "An authoritative principle, belief, or statement of ideas or opinion."
Since the purpose of this topic is to create a "reservoir" of stories on how the very "authoritative and opinionated" contributors and visitors to this blog site happened to become Seahawks fans, it seemed to tie in the two unrelated streams of consciousness together.
I've started the ball rolling with my story in the first Comment on this topic, so let's keep it going and find out how folks from Alaska, Maryland, South Carolina, and of course, Seattle, came to be such ardent supporters of this team.
Now, when I was in 7th grade in Utica NY my teacher was Sister Virginia, a rolly-polly Franciscan nun who went throgh sisterhood boot camp in Miami. As it turned out, she was a real football fan, and one of the parishoners at her parish was "nun" other than Don Shula, and they became fast friends. She had all kinds of stories and pictures from the Dolphin's heyday of Bob Greise, Larry Czonka and Jim Kick, and even she got to watch some games from the sidelines as Mr. Shula's guest.
ReplyDeleteSister V was really cool, especially for a nun, and I became one of her "favorites". (She's the first and only nun who I've seen drink a beer!)
Up until that point, I liked football and really didn't have "a team", generally followed the Raiders and Steelers, since I loved the way Dave Casper & the Snake played, and of course the Mean Joe Green Pepsi Commercial (or was it Coke?) Anyhow, she really got me more interested in being a football fan, so I started following the sport more closely, and of course followed the Dolphins, cuz let's face it, I'm a shameless kiss up!
Sister V ended up being my 8th grade teacher, and I graduated elementary school in 1975, right around the time the league decided to expand.
Living in New York, you constantly hear stories of die hard Yankee, Giants, Knicks fans, and even Jets and Mets to some degree, who've followed their teams since their great-grandfather was in knee socks, and who hotly contest possession of season tickets in wills and divorces.
When the league expanded, I decided as a young man that this would be my opportunity to get in "on the ground floor" with a franchise, so that when they finally rise to the top and win it all, I can turn to whoever bothers to listen and say "I've been following them since day one!"
When the team locations, names, and logos were announced, I picked the Seahawks mainly because it looked a lot cooler than that gender confused pumpkin colored pirate logo that used to be on the Buc's helmets! Besides, as a former Raider fan, I had done that whole swashbuckler thing to death!
So, thus started my very long, strange, exciting, frustrating, confusing, exaspirating, exhausting, promising, unfulfilling, re-promising, disappointing, exhillerating, and continuing love affair with this club.
And as Paul Harvey says, "and now you know the REST of the story!"
lol i didnt think you were serious on your profile
ReplyDeletesucks cause if you ask me anything about the Mariners and or Sonics, I could give a good story...but with the Seahawks...
eh...nothing fancy...didn't really follow football extremely hard (did watch Barry Sanders every Thanksgiving) until i started a long string of football video games...in which I found myself picking the Seahawks every time I did a franchise...I saw the playoff game against Miami, and felt horrible that the refs screwed them over with a horrific pass interference call (prolly cause it was Marino's last year, and they wanted him to go out with a bang)...felt sorry for them...and before I made the final step (become a diehard follower), I asked a diehard football fan (Broncos though) if Seattle was going to be good one year...he said they should be a playoff threat...and mentioned Shaun Alexander...
I decided to watch them...did, and found myself going through the same heartache you guys did...I was hooked immediately, and loved DJack, Engram, and especially KRob...and SA hooked me. I thought Hass was average until I watched him extensively...but yeh
learned alot very quickly, and yeah...not half as exciting a nun and Don Shula...
I was six years old when the Seahawks started as a franchise. To be honest, I liked alot of different teams back then, including the Steelers (who didn't) and the Giants and the Browns (especially). I started collecting football cards in 76 and I, like alba just liked the idea of following a team that was new, and no one else seemed to like. Plus I was infactuated with the Sonics already. But what really made me a Seahawks fan was two things. 10 I HATED the Vikings, I hated the fans of the Vikings(who were all my friends) and 2) I watched the Seahawks play the Vikings on T.V., and while all my friends and relatives were cheering for the Vikings, who were at that time still a very good franchise, I just felt myself drawn to rooting for what I percieved to be the underdog...then it happened...the magical moment I will never ever forget...Steve Largent, at the front of the end zone, in between three defenders, made a beautiful catch, the kind every boy dreams of making, the kind that shows perfect balance and concentration. He took a wicked hit but held onto the ball to score a T.D., (one of the few the Hawks scored in what turned out to be a somewhat embarrassing loss, and that cinched it for me, at the age of six I was a Hawks fan for life. I collected football cards for years (I still have nearly every year Steve Largent card printed) and my love affair only grew stronger as the Hawks actually became more competitive. Kenny Easley became my second favorite Seahawk ever after the Bronco game where he got knocked out cold on a punt return, then when he finally got back into the game, he knocked the guy who had hit him so hard, I think that guys grandchildren will feel it.
ReplyDeleteI have a family picture, when I was about 9 or 10 with my family standing outside my grandmothers front steps, I am wearing my first ever Steve Largent jersey (which I begged for two years to get, and which I only took off when my mother forced me to) with an eyepatch on my eye, (because I had gotten superglue into my eye, seriously after trying to glue the turret back onto my toy tank that had broken off and somehow the glue shot out of the bottle so that drops landed in my eye, glueing it shut). That jersey was SOOO cool, and I thought I was cooler than all the Vikings fans because I wasn't just some homer, who just cheered mindlessly for the home team, I had picked my favorite team based on the kinds of characterisitics I felt were most important in sports, like heart.
Sister Blue, Sister Green, Sister White, Sister Brown and Sister Pink.
ReplyDeleteSister Pink???!!
Why do I have to be Sister Pink?
First of all I have to introduce myself, I have been a daily visitor since the end of last season, and am a 21 year old college student in Tacoma...
ReplyDeleteI came to be a Seahawks fan because I never really had one team that I especially liked…in fact my family roots are in Minnesota, but that would never have worked, can't root for a team that wears purple and yellow.
Now my dad is a huge baseball fan and for that reason we would make the 4 hour drive to Seattle every month or so and through that I became a Seattle sports fan, and I wasn’t the biggest baseball fan…so that led me to start following the Seahawks.
When I started to play football in high school I met and became great friends with some diehard hawk fans…and when I say diehard I mean they would watch game tapes from before they were born that their parents had recorded. This led to more interest in the hawks, although I didn’t bleed true Seahawks blue at that point…I became a diehard fan after the 2000 draft, which included such greats as Shaun Alexander, Darrell Jackson, and Isiah Kacyvenski…at this point I realized we would be great for years and have been a true believer ever since…
I have since persevered through the beginning of Hasselbeck’s now pro bowl career, the Koren Robinson debacle, the green bay playoff heartbreaker, and the 2004 St. Louis tragedies…but I’m still drinking that oh so powerful Kool-Aid
Posted by easternhawk
Welcome to the club, EasternHawk!
ReplyDeleteIt's great to hear from those who visit but don't comment.
Posted by alba
Come one, come all. It's liberating. All of those out there just looking, go ahead and make your presence known. OH! sweet release!
ReplyDeleteWelcome eastern Hawk. Now you said you're a college student in tacoma, but you cant root for a team that wears purple and yellow.... You must be a Titan!
Posted by check
must ignore...Kaz comment...must not...mention...his superior...
ReplyDeletefdksjfadjkTRACYWHITEsdjfkldjfsklfh;r
ok seriously...welcome Eastern Hawk...good to see someone who stuck with us since day 1, posts or not...just think, the Rocky Horror Picture Show with the Cardinals all the way to the constant Ram bashin, to the exciting Seahawks signed Sharper!?! moments...thats just the beginning...this site will be huge one day cause everyone around here sticks with it...and we usually have breaking news before nearly any other site
hey alba, never thought of it, but this is a good way to get people to introduce themselves...nice...and it involves a nun!
Posted by adp
Don't thank me, thank JoSCh...it was his idea...he just asked me to start the ball rolling with the nun story.
ReplyDeletePosted by alba
thank you Josch...
ReplyDeletenow the attention feedback whore is turning into a modest, honest whore :P
Posted by adp
LOL, well done ADP.
ReplyDeleteMy story isn't really that unique probably, as I grew up in Puyallup and the Seahawks were the local team. However, remembering the AFC West rivlary, the "RaiderBusters" and "Mr Ed" t-shirts, Boz getting drafted and ultra-hyped, John L, Mudbone, Blades, Galloway, Curt Warner, Tez-Rex, The Flash, all those great players. Even when the Hawks weren't any good there were always great players, and great games in the division.
Plus, I'll admit there is a degree of satisfaction on being a dedicated homer of a team that has really defined mediocrity. It makes me feel superior to "bandwagon" fans and those that love a winner, even if it is justified by location.
Also, the fans, as beat down as we generally are, have to be some of the best. We started the wave for Chrissakes, and homefield advantage is always real for us (maybe not in Husky Stadium, but that is over!) We got a number retired for us, first pro team to do that too.
As usual, I am super optimistic this year, but I have a feeling this year we really make some noise. Is a superbowl win out of the question, heck no, not with a start like this. I will admit week 4 last year (and the year before) I would have said the same thing, but this year is different, really, it is. Kool Aid for everyone, Vinnie is buying.
Posted by JoSCh
I was born in 1975 in Seattle and the Seahawks were born the following year. However it wasn't until about 5 or 6 years later that I started to take notice of football. Initially it was more to get out of going to church and spend time with my old man. He was a big time Cowboys fan, but also liked the Seahawks. He took me to a few games and I was hooked. It was crazy in the Kingdome back in those days. I remember they used to hand out blue cards at the game and when the fans would do the wave it really looked like a wave.
ReplyDeleteThe Seahawks in those days seemed like part of your family. They were always underdogs. With the exception of maybe Steve Largent and Curt Warner we never really had a "all star" player. But we had some great "teams" with Chuck Knox. I remember listening to Pete Gross on the radio and his trademark "Touchdown Seahawks" call. I remember when the Kingdome was so loud that it caused the NFL to create a penalty for excessive crowd noise.
I still think the excitement of that win against the Dolphins in the 83 playoffs is what gets me to don my Seahawk gear every Sunday. We did have a few more good years after that, but during the Behring years it sure was rough. The only nice thing about that time was that I knew some people that worked at the Kingdome and they would give us free tickets when the games were not sold out, which was pretty much every week.
Then the team moved to Los Angeles for a few weeks until Paul Allen rescued the team and made the season tickets $10 dollars. From that point forward until midway through 2002 I was a season ticket holder.
For various reasons I relocated to the Los Angeles area myself in 2002, but have continued to follow my team down here. Usually being the only person in the sports bar watching the hawks game unless they are playing the Raiders, 49ers or Rams (those games were tough to watch last year).
I did come up for the Monday Night Football game and went to see them in Arizona last year (also tough to watch).
Sometimes I wish that I could be a fair-weather fan and just follow the Patriots or whoever happens to be hot at the time, but somehow I don't think it would be as sweet.
I would love to see the Seahawks in the super bowl one day, hopefully against the Raiders so they can trounce them.
The Only Seahawks Fan In Long Beach,
Dustin
the first team i liked was the steelers, and mostly because they beat the cowboys in the 1976 superbowl. (even when i was 7, i already knew that the cowboys were evil.) and so i followed them. i liked their colors, their logo and lynn swann.
ReplyDeletebut after winning their 4 superbowls it was a little boring. these guys were not the underdogs anymore, and i decided that i was the kind of guy that rooted for the underdog.
since moving to alaska in 1977, (my dad was in the military), the tv had seahawk games on. and i got to see some of the early years of the seahawks. they weren't very good. but they were gutsy, scrappy and creative. i loved all the trick plays and watching jim zorn scramble all over the place. once i was done rooting for the steelers, the choice was obvious. i had my loveable underdogs.
and i guess they've never given me a reason to stop rooting for them, because they've always been the underdogs. i guess if they win 4 superbowls, i might have to think about it. (actually, i don't think i even could change teams now even if i wanted to.) but my support has never wavered. not when we drafted the boz. not when we were 2-14. not when the berings owned the place.
so there's my story. i'm ready for my team to rise up and vindicate all of us who have believed for seasons and for decades. amen.
nothing would be sweeter then for the Seahawks to knock out the Rams in the NFC Championship on the road and head to the Super Bowl to beat the Raiders...
ReplyDeletewelcome to the site guys...this is the freest site out there...say what you want..
Posted by adp
Was sister VA, your first conquest? :)
ReplyDeleteDolphins, were my favorite team until 1976.
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