The San Jose Sharks lost the last 2 games of the Western Conference Finals to the Vancouver Canucks, in a fashion that will have them shaking their heads for years to come. A few weeks back, I said that I was seeing the birth of sport's newest cursed franchise in the San Jose Sharks when they almost choked away a 3-0 lead in a series against the Detroit Red Wings. So I wrote this piece, and then Blogger, our host, crashed and lost it for a week. But as with so many things in life, timing is everything, and after what I've witnessed in Games 4 & 5 of this series between the Sharks and the Canucks, the Teal is officially a cursed franchise. So to make my case, I will delve into the anatomy of a cursed franchise. From my own experiences, I can smell a curse from a thousand miles away, and boy, the Bay Area reeks of it. I thought it was the Giants last year, but they shed their curse, so it must have been the Teal all along. Here we go.1- When you make all the right moves and they still don't work
*Look, sometimes things don't work out when you get a new player or coach, but when sometimes turns into every time, you've been cursed. Example : When the New York Baseball Metropolitans signed Johan Santana. This is the end of a long line of no-brainers that missed for the Mets. Johan Santana came to the Mets with the title Best Pitcher in Baseball. Since arriving, he's been injury-plagued and unable to stay on the field. Prior to arriving in NYC, he had pitched over 200 innings in all but 1 full season of his career; he has only done that once in 3 seasons with the Mets, and has yet to step on the bump this season. Couple that with a long line of "no brainers" (Juan Samuel, Bobby Bonilla, Mel Rojas, Carlos Beltran, Carlos Delgado, Generation K and the worst signing of all time Mo Vaughn) and you have the firm beginnings of a curse.
*A Sharks example would be the acquisition of goaltender Antii Niemi from the Stanley Cup champion Blackhawks. Niemi was the reason the Hawks were able to beat the Sharks in the conference finals last year. So the Sharks decided a better goaltender was the answer, right? They had offensive firepower with Marleu, Thornton, Heatly, and the rest to get it done-- it was the goalie's fault, right? And last year that was the case, but what happened here? First of all, Niemi got off to a dreadful start and was injured a bit this year, but the true sign of a curse came in Game 6, when the Red Wings had pelted Niemi with 33 shots to the Sharks 13, and the Sharks held a 1-0 lead. The Sharks eventually lost 3-1, but Niemi had made 43 saves, and the Sharks mustered only 20 shots. The thing that cost them last season was no longer the issue, it was offense. See the curse in action? Fast forward to this past series and this time, the Sharks out shot the Canucks 91-47 and Niemi made 40 saves. When offense is supposed to be your strong suit and you are out-shooting your opponent that badly, it should net you some goals. Cursed.
2- When you lose a game or a series and can't explain how or why
*This principle applies more to the post-season than the regular season. Weird crap happens in the regular season all the time. Blips on the screen, anomalies if you will. But in the postseason, boy they scream curse when these "blips on the screen" occur every year. I have 2 personal experiences for this one. I don't remember exactly what year it was, maybe '91; it was one of the Penguins' Stanley Cup years. Those great Lemieux teams which were a thorn in my Rangers' side for that whole decade. But the Rangers had an up and coming team that season with it being Messier's first season with the club. Then you had Leetch and the 2-headed goalie monster of Richter and Vanbiesbrouck, and they gave the Pens all they could handle before the curse took over. I believe it was Game 6 in Pittsburgh, the Rangers had a 3-2 lead in the series and had forced OT in dramatic fashion with a last minute goal. OT started, and early in the 1st OT, I believe it was one of the Samuelssons who shot the puck into the Rangers zone from his own blue line, it bounced off of the back boards, Vanbiesbrouck went to go play it off the back boards, and it bounced off of him and into the net, thus ending the game. Game 7 was the Lemieux show, and the rest is history. The curse-- you know it when you see it.
Another favorite example is when the Jets traveled to Pittsburgh in 2005 and they had 2 chances at game winning field goals from a dependable Doug Brien and missed them both. One at the end of regulation, one in OT; both very makeable. In a game where every possible break went the Jets' way, to lose like that reeks of the curse.
*A Sharks example would be to reference Game 5. They had a 3-0 lead in the 3rd period, and to give up 4 unanswered goals in that period is stunning. Considering how stellar Niemi had been in net, and then to have the performance he had in Game 6 and lose, it's beginning to look alot like curseville. After they finally beat the Wings in Game 7, I thought the curse stuff could wait another year, but no, this series with the Canucks, even though not quite as devastating as choking away a 3-0 lead, was still pretty bad. First, in game 4 the Sharks had 5 consecutive power plays and failed to score. They outplayed the Canucks in all but 5 minutes of Game 4, but what a bad 5 minutes it was. After the 5 Power Plays, the Canucks got a 5 on 3 chance, and score in roughly 18 seconds, 1-0. Then, the 5 on 4 chance continued and became another 5 on 3 about 30 seconds later when the bench was called for a too many men on the ice penalty. The Canucks scored on the first shot of that PP, 2-0. The original 5 on 4 finally ended, but then about 3 minutes later, the Sharks were again facing a 5 on 3 and-- guess what happened-- scored on the second shot about 40 seconds in, 3-0. Game set match. Can you smell it?
3- When strange things happen for no reason
*You know the moment when you see it. Like the forces of nature are against you, and there is nothing you can do about it. Two examples come to mind. The first was Game 5 of the 1997 NLCS when Eric Gregg gave Livan Hernandez a king-sized strike zone. The Braves were befuddled as Hernandez struck out 15. The 2nd one was the weirdest thing I've ever seen. In 1993 when the Rangers were favored to win the cup, they got a taste of the curse before they ended it in 1994. The Rangers were playing in Toronto, and Brian Leetch, widely regarded as the leagues best defensemen at the time, went into his own zone to collect the puck when he fell into the boards feet first, breaking his ankle and ending his season. This is hockey; injuries occur, I'm aware of that. But the weird part of this scenario is that there wasn't a player within 10 feet of Leetch when he fell. Nobody. If you watch the play, it looks like he was trying to avoid something. What, I don't know. Maybe it was the curse coming for him, like those black, screechy things in the movie Ghost. It was bizarre.
*I didn't have a Sharks example at the time I originally wrote this, but I do now. Game 5 in Vancouver, the Sharks played about as good a game as you could imagine while being down 3-1 in hostile territory, but the curse grabbed on, and is not letting go of San Jose. The Sharks were up 2-1 with 30 seconds left in the game. The Canucks dumped it deep into the Sharks zone. Sharks' D recovered behind the net and cleared out off the glass, the puck rolled all the way down for an apparent icing. The Sharks bench went nuts, claiming the puck bounced off of a Sedin's shoulder and then rolled down, thus negating the icing. Refs weren't buying it; non reviewable so the call stood. In the ensuing face-off in the Sharks zone, Ryan Kessler put home a tying goal thus sending this one into OT. Upon further review, the puck did indeed hit a Sedin's shoulder. The refs blew the call. Cursed. On a side note, Ryan Kessler, who scored the game tying goal, pulled a Willis Reed on the Sharks by limping off the ice in the 2nd period, and then coming back to score the game-tying goal very late in the 3rd. Worse off, did you see the game winner in OT? I'll let the video tell this story.
If you don't think you're cursed after losing a series like that, I don't know what to tell you.
4- When the loses get more painful and heart wrenching every year.
*Boy, this is the best part of the sports curse, THE PAIN. Here's where you know for sure, 1000%, it's a curse and not just stepping stones to a championship. You start to look around and see the fear in everyone's eyes when the big game is approaching. That's what I saw last week at my kid's school and the grocery store when I saw people on their way to work talking about game 7. The inevitably of the heart wrenching defeat. Then the victory happened, and it all went away...for a moment or two. But when it sneaks up on you like the odd carem off the boards in OT last night did, it stings for even longer. I want to be clear here-- any loss would be heart breaking and devastating, but the curse loss is excruciating and will stick with you for years. My best example is the most recent one, the 2011 AFC championship game. Jets and Steelers. For the first time ever, I believed in the Jets. I thought they could win this one. After a 21-3 halftime deficit burst my bubble, I was actually OK. I accepted it. It was over. I watched the second half just because that's what fans do, but the pain was already dealt with; it was just football at that point. But then the comeback began and before I knew it, the Jets had gotten within 5 points with 3 minutes to go. All they needed was a stop, and there I was on my floor praying for the stop. It never came. Big Ben completed an all time 3rd down conversion, thus sealing the game and further crushing Jets fans' spirits for another year. It does get worse with every year. Last year, it was the Jets who just couldn't get over the hump against Peyton and the Colts, but this year, we believed, gave up, and then believed again. THEY KILLED ME TWICE! Now that's a curse for you.
*The Sharks had a bunch of subtle signs before this post-season, but this postseason to me, coupled with the other more subtle examples, have a curse on their hands. It's a brand new curse, and it can be broken, but don't wait. Get it out now. A few more seasons like this, and it will set in and be increasingly more difficult to shake. Before you know it, chants of 40 years will ring from the Kings or the Ducks rafters. Take it from a Rangers, Mets and Jets fan, I know what shaking the curse is like.
So Sharks fans, pray and pray hard that you can shake this curse soon because it's at your doorstep and ringing the doorbell like a Jehovah's Witness on a Sunday afternoon. You've opened the door, and now it will never stop coming back. Before you know it, you'll have a stack of "Watchtower" pamphlets on your shelf and a lifetime of pain and misery in the form of black and teal jerseys.
So it's been 20 good years, and this franchise has had some moderate success, but heed this warning, a curse does not make you a bad franchise. The Kansas City Royals are not cursed, they just suck. Bad management, no money, and a bad system set up by the MLB has plagued the Royals, not a curse. The New York Mets are cursed. The Jets are cursed. Teams that have the means, appear to make the right moves, and then inevitably crash and burn. OH! and I must not forget the pain. The key element to the cursed franchise is the pain. That's what makes it a curse. Some teams just don't win. Like the Clippers. WTF? They have the means but they never make the right move. They just lose, and fans of the Clippers expect that, all the time. There is no hope for a Clippers fan. But the Sharks for several years now have been considered a top tier franchise and they have nothing to show for it. And every year it seems to get worse. More painful. So, great people of the Bay Area, pray and pray hard that the Sharks can shake this curse and shake it early, because if they don't, "Feel the Teal" will now be "Feel the Pain" because that's what's coming. Sharks fans, you are at a crossroad. It's either a team that's on the rise and needs to a piece or two to win it all or it's the fear every time the big moment arrives. You know it when you feel, you get the feeling of impending doom, and inevitably the teal will go down in the most heartbreaking of ways. On the up side, a curse may create some buzz. With the Giants winning the World Series last year, the Sharks would be the only curse in town, so that's something right?
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