I was completely despondent, lying face down on the floor of my apartment. Both of my roommates tried to cheer me up multiple times, but I didn’t want to hear it. I wanted to embrace the misery, soak in all the pain I was feeling, because that was the only thing that felt right. Whenever it was suggested that I move or try to think about something else, I responded with the following, “I just want to stare into the darkness right now.”
A few months earlier, I was upset once more, except this time in a much more reserved manner. Having watched my team lose, I was upset, loudly complaining about how a bad call from the officials swung the game. Still, after about 30 minutes or so, I dropped the issue and went back to talking about other things with my friends. I woke up the next day still mad about the loss, but not so much that it was greatly affecting my mood. The day was Feb. 13, 2023 — the day following the Eagles’ 38-35 loss to the Chiefs in the Super Bowl.
The first story, as you might have guessed, is how I reacted to watching the second half of Game 7 of the Sixers-Celtics series in May of 2023.
That’s just one example of how differently I’ve approached rooting for both teams over the past 20 years. Eagles postseason losses make me a little crankier than usual, while each Sixers’ second round exit has forced me to consider existential and philosophical questions about my life that I’m not comfortable sharing.
It’s not that I don’t care about football. Quite the opposite, actually: It was my entryway into sports as a whole. The 2006 Ohio State vs Michigan game that ended in a 42-39 thriller between the top two ranked teams in the country is a core memory for me. It was the first time I sat in front of a TV for three hours and thought, “Wow, this is awesome.” I watched way more football — both college and NFL — than basketball before I hit high school.
My preference shifted toward hoops for a number of reasons, the main one being that I was heavily invested in my own high school basketball career. For as much as I loved football, I never played it in any organized fashion, while I was getting up at 5:00 a.m. each morning to get extra shots up in the gym before classes started.
I approach football with a blissful ignorance that basketball can’t offer me anymore. Every time I’ve watched the Sixers for the past 6-7 years, I understand what I’m watching with harsh clarity. I yell at the screen bemoaning a defender who forgot to tag the roller. I’m mad at the head coach for drawing up an unimaginative baseline out-of-bounds play. I’ve scouted some of the players since they were freshmen in college, and I’m distraught watching them struggle with the same problems over and over again.
When I’m watching the Eagles — as I plan on doing 17 out of the next 18 weekends — your guess is good as mine as to why each play did or didn’t work. It’s not that I don’t have any understanding of what’s going on out there. I’ve talked ad nauseam to friends about how bad Brian Johnson and Matt Patricia were last season, how Dallas Goedert is perennially underrated, how Jalen Hurts provides exponential value in the run game, and why it’s stupid that people think the tush push should be outlawed. But at the end of the day, I know that every coach and player on the Eagles’ sideline understands football in a way that I never could. I don’t have the confidence in my knowledge of the game to critique them the same way I do my favorite basketball team.
I could spend the day listing reasons that any Eagles’ shortcoming doesn’t make me nearly as mad as a Sixers' loss. I’ve always been far more invested in college football than the NFL on the whole, which is a rare case for anyone from Philly. Having weaker opinions on the other 31 NFL teams makes it hard for me to get as worked up about the Birds. Likewise, the nature of football’s scheduling simply makes it easier to not get bogged down in misery. If the Sixers are having a bad stretch, it’s a relentless struggle, losing three games in four nights and dreading the end of each day when you have to watch them fall again. If the Eagles have a bad Sunday, I’ve got roughly 5-6 days to shake it off and put my mind elsewhere.
But ultimately, every reason is trumped by the following — I saw the Eagles win a Super Bowl. That’s it. That’s the whole thing. With my own two eyes, I watched Nick Foles lift the Lombardi trophy after besting Tom Brady and the Patriots, and I’ve been pretty satisfied as a Birds’ fan ever since.
With full recognition that I’m essentially reenacting the “Bro thinks he’s on the team” meme, it made me realize that the struggle to maintain the hunger after winning it all is real. Every single subsequent failure can be rebutted with, “Well at least I got to see them win one.” That’s what I thought after the football bounced off Alshon Jeffery’s hands in the 2018-19 playoffs for a season-sealing interception, it’s what I thought after the comically bad 4-11-1 campaign in 2020, and it’s even what I comforted myself with after that 38-35 loss to the Chiefs. I entered Eagles’ fandom at a young age being told that they’d never won a Super Bowl, and they probably never would. Losses to the Cardinals in the 2008 NFC Championship and to the Saints in the 2013 Wild Card round hurt younger me in nearly the same way that every Joel Embiid-era Sixers’ loss has because I hadn’t seen the light at the end of the tunnel yet. I kept hoping it would turn out different, and then somehow in 2017, it actually was. It’s hard to believe to this day.
The Super Bowl ring was the cherry on top that made me realize that Eagles’ fans have had it pretty good, or at least in my lifetime. They’ve made the playoffs in 15 of the 23 seasons I’ve been alive for, and are run by one of the better general managers in the league. Imagine what it’s like to be a Lions fan, who finally saw their team make the conference championship for the first time ever after 60 years of failure, and even that turned into a historically bad collapse. Think about what it’s like to root for the Jaguars or the Browns. Those people wake up each Sunday during the fall thinking, “Boy, I hope I don’t get kicked in the face today,” then they get kicked in the face all the same. For as crazy as this fanbase is, Eagles fans have it pretty good. It might just be me, feel free to tell me I’m wrong, but deep down, I think a lot of you know it too.
None of this means I won’t be tweeting like everybody else on Friday night when the Birds kick off their season against the Packers. I’ll say that Howie did it again when either Quinyon Mitchell or Cooper DeJean get a pick off Jordan Love. I’ll go ballistic for Saquon Barkley’s first touchdown in an Eagles’ jersey. Heck, I’m legitimately excited for Kellen Moore as an offensive coordinator, and I’d confidently take this team to win the East over the Cowboys this season. Most likely, I’ll be let down in the end as the back seven of the defense falters and Eagles get smacked around in a playoff loss at San Francisco, or something of that nature.
I’ll be mad when it all ends, but at the end of the day, I’ll still think back to that Super Bowl win and feel some joy. I can recover in a way I can’t from a Sixers’ loss, even doing my best to be a neutral reporter at their games (I think you all can tell I’m still rooting for them almost every step of the way). Nolan Smith being an underwhelming first round pick simply disappoints me, while a reality wherein Jared McCain doesn’t pan out is exponentially devastating to me on a personal and professional level.
The Eagles are a fun experience for me almost every fall (the final six weeks of last year’s regular season notwithstanding), and a team I’m eager to watch. All the while, the Sixers have trapped me in a tormented Wile E. Coyote situation, chasing the Roadrunner that is an Eastern Conference Finals appearance. It’s immensely stressful even though there are few things in this world that give me more joy than watching basketball.
Maybe it’s a necessity. I needed the Eagles to be consistently pretty good and sometimes extremely good in order to focus all my craze and anxiety toward the Sixers. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be writing for The Ricky each week, breaking down every minute detail I caught on the court on my third re-watch. I need the basic relaxation of football fandom, where kicking back on a weekend and complaining about how many bubble screens the Eagles have run somehow becomes therapeutic.
Go Birds.
Daniel Olinger is a writer for the Rights To Ricky Sanchez, and author of “The Danny” column, even though he refuses to be called that in person. He can be followed on X @dan_olinger.
“The Danny” is brought to you by the Official Realtor Of The Process, Adam Ksebe.
Go birds!