It all starts with the Packers.  In January, we all witnessed Green Bay painfully fall one game short of the Super Bowl, and the only chance I would have ever gotten to cover Brett Favre and the Pack on the biggest stage of all.  But that was just the beginning…

Early March, the unthinkable occurred; Brett Favre retired.  Though I didn’t sob and go into the denial that I thought I would when #4 hung it up, it was another tough pill for me to swallow.  Why would Favre call it quits when the green and gold came so close to their ultimate goal and would seemingly have been in the position to make a similar run the next season?  Little did I know the worst was still to come… 

In the days leading up to Packers training camp, Favre got that stupid itch to come back, and what transpired would do the unfathomable; de-sensitize my love for the Packers, Favre, and the NFL as a whole.  The drama and circus, accusations and he-said, she-said between Favre and the Green Bay organization was an absolute nightmare for me.  I constantly wavered in who to blame for everything that went on and just could not believe that it came down to this.

Then I was forced to become a New York Jets fan when the Packers dealt the future Hall of Famer out East.  I hate that it all happened and if they ever do invent a Back to the Future-style time machine, I will hop in that DeLorean and make it all go away.  I promise.

That was the worst of it, but certainly not my only sports tormenting of ‘08.  There’s my alma mater Marquette losing in the second round of the NCAA Tournament to Stanford thanks to a sideways, off-balanced, baseline prayer from Brook Lopez with seconds remaining in overtime.  Then Tom Crean decided to leave the university he had built back to respectability for the head coaching gig at Indiana, because “It’s Indiana.” 

There’s my Chicago Cubs, who dominated the regular season only to once again get my hopes up and swept out of the NLDS for a second straight year.

There’s the fact that I’ve become numb to the 5-10 Packers this season and am over a loss before the final clock even hits 0:00. 

There’s me having to root for Favre on a team that I could care less about.

I guess that is just part of being an avid sports fan who more often than not, wears his heart on his sleeve.  Here’s to a better 2009 year of sports fandom!

Happy Holidays!