By Rachel Mathews:
I really had decent expectations going into Superbowl XLVI as a Bills fan willing to cheer for the Giants as my adopted, second favorite, home-away-from home team. Sure it was the lesser of two evils to cheer for the Giants, especially after last week’s Brady hotel comment debacle, but I also have a strong base of NYC friends who are born and raised Giants fans. I wanted to see what a city post-superbowl victory would be like, and I wanted to see my NYC friends in, what I had hoped would be, rare form. In what may potentially be a more isolated situation (although I can’t help but think that it was not so unique), I have to say that as a Bills fan, I was truly underwhelmed.
The game was close enough to be exciting, and one would expect a game such as this to amount to insanity. You can imagine my disappointment when, ten minutes after the end, we poured into the streets of downtown Manhattan expecting to find chaos and crowds but instead found ourselves greeted with a few cheers and a couple nods of comraderie. My friend group, mostly all die-hard Bills loyalists, rallied behind the Giants with an enthusiasm unmeasured by actual Giants fans, just eager to see a team that they were relatively connected to make it to victory. Even if Buffalo never secures a win in the Super Bowl, I’d put money on the fact that we’d have a more passionate and emotionally invested response in the outcome than what I observed last night.
On the subway, one would barely have an idea that the Super Bowl even occured. I heard a few fans with Giants memorabilia exchange congratulations, but where were the chants and cheers that I expected to witness? At home, I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to move a few blocks without hearing some rendition of the Shout song. In New York, all I heard were modest acknowledgements of success, something that must lose its luster in a city that experiences so much of it. As a Buffalo sports fan, I really wouldn’t know.
On my trip home, I overheard one Giants fan say to another, “I have friends in DC, Maryland, Florida, all calling me saying congratulations, as if I won the game, as if I was Manning!” His incredulous tone struck me; in Buffalo, you would never hear something along those lines. In Buffalo, it truly is a team effort. If Buffalo were to make it to the Super Bowl (again), every one of us would feel like we played a part in the journey to get us there. No matter how distant the friend or relative may be, a call of congratulations would be met with high-pitched, jubiliant screeching, not skepticism. To be honest, in Buffalo, one could probably expect rioting before the game even began. We don’t take these things lightly. We appreciate how hard it is to get to glory.
Aside from an excessive amount of food, nothing made this Sunday different from any other Sunday this season. Of course there was the occasional trash talking on Friday at the end of the work day, but come Sunday, the enthusiasm I witnessed among my NYC cohorts was on par with any other gameday.
Winston Churchill once said that “success is going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm”. Lord knows that it is something inexplicable that drives Bills fans to rise every crisp Sunday in early fall with a fervent (and relatively unwarranted) hope that this season is OUR season. I don’t want to say that the Giants didn’t deserve this success, because by all means, they did. To see the Patriots defeated in the Super Bowl this year is in itself a small victory for Bills fans. But to be in a city that continually exceeds expectation and is known for its outlandishness, and to witness how unphased it could be by such a momentous occasion, was disappointing… but simultaneously, reaffirming. It reminded me how unique, committed, and unwavering Buffalo Bills fans are. It reaffirmed my sense that our overzealousness is something that, although at times may seem ridiculous, is a passion that binds us together in a way that only a city overcome by failures can experience.
I’m sure every Giants fan is proud of their team and excited by the fact that they are Super Bowl champs, but last night, all I could see was the way this celebration could never even come close to a post-Super Bowl championship celebration in Buffalo.
Until next year, Go Bills.
Photo: mmamania.com