An Open Letter to All the Petulant Oregon Fans

This is an editorial that expresses the opinions of the author alone. It does not necessarily express the opinion of Addicted to Quack. For some context and insight into the opinions of the author, his favorite sports movie is Varsity Blues, and likes Kanye West more than the Rolling Stones.

Dear Oregon fans,

No, not you guys over there with the green and yellow beards, ticket stubs from the ‘83 Civil War in your pockets for good luck. Not ya’ll on the left either: season ticket holders since 1988, living and dying by the Ducks every weekend of every fall, and enjoying every single win Oregon can manage. I see you too, UO sophomore who screamed her head off at every home game last year, slapping the phone out of the hand of the bro behind her because IT’S THIRD DOWN YOU JABRONI, STOP TEXTING AND YELL. I’m not talking to any of you. You had my heart the moment I saw you, and you’ll have it every moment from now until we all realize this sport is fundamentally unsafe and we put all our best athletes into soccer. No, I’m talking to a particular group of Oregon fans, a group that has gained members at an alarming rate over the past few seasons. You may have seen this fan at Autzen Stadium, at a sports bar during a game, or even as a member of your own family. These fans exhibit many tell-tale signs, including:

• Providing an alternate play call after any unsuccessful play, one that “definitely would have been six.”
• Finding ways to complain about a touchdown drive, and pitching a fit when a drive ends without points.
• Deeming anything except an undefeated season as unacceptable.
• Revering Chip Kelly as an omnipotent being who did no wrong, and not a dynamic and stubborn head coach who once lost at home to a Lane Kiffin team in the midst of crippling NCAA sanctions.
• Sincerely clamoring for Bryan Bennett in 2012.
• Tweeting about Oregon football, just in general.

This letter is for them. Let’s start over.

Dear Idiots,

We just want to enjoy Oregon football, and you seem to have no interest in doing so. Watching football this way can’t be fun, can it? You’re calling for the head coach’s firing after an 18-point win, rattling off Tweet after Tweet shitting on the team when you’re decked head to toe in their logo. Isn’t the point of rooting for a sports team celebrating when they’re successful, and not gloating in the failure that you, for some reason, relish in predicting? You’re turning a game of football into the World Series of Being a Jackass, and it’s pissing the rest of us off.

Let’s just get this clear: Oregon’s 2016 football team is about nine different shades of “good to very good”. Expecting them to blow teams out 63-3 and play mistake-free football is an exercise in futility. Expecting the linebackers to play like gods when their current best quality is “trying as hard as they can” is setting yourself up for disappointment. I don’t quite know what it is you’re getting out of setting an impossible standard, and being a blowhard about it when that standard isn’t met. You can’t just be doing it because you get a kick out of the experience. You aren’t that much of a sociopath, are you?

And for the love of Marcus, please stop putting Chip Kelly’s teams on a pedestal! His years were great, but time has weeded out all the bad fruit from your memories. It’s like music in the 1970s. All music in the 1970s was great, right? Wrong. Music in the ‘70s was trash. But thanks to the power of time, the thousands of terrible songs have faded away, leaving only the good stuff. You know how the 70s station on the radio plays the same 85 songs every single day? THAT’S BECAUSE THOSE ARE THE ONLY GOOD 85 SONGS FROM THE ENTIRE DECADE. Give it some time, wait until the ‘90s station has been whittled down to nothing but Pearl Jam, Biggie, and Beck. Everyone will think the ‘90s was the greatest musical generation, and not what spawned Ace of Base and Eiffel 65. Do not forget: Chip Kelly football was, with regularity, a maddening experience. Whether it was the opening tilt of his tenure - an unprepared 19-8 loss in Boise, a 15-13 win at Cal that should have been a two-score loss if not for Cal football doing lots and lots of Cal football things, or the numerous losses that resembled a stubborn Oregon game plan bashing its head into the same wall over and over again with little effect - by all means, continue to leave Nick Fairley unblocked Chip, it didn’t work the first twelve times, but that means we’re due! Chip Kelly’s teams were far from the world-crushing mecha-ninjas you remember them being; essentially, what you’ve done is used a mythical creature to create a benchmark that even the very best Oregon teams would have trouble meeting, and are applying it to a perfectly fine and imperfect football team, thereby making a team that will contend for a major conference championship feel like a dumpster fire. It sounds like it’s working out really well for you so far. Just keep it the hell away from me.

Maybe you’ve existed all along, and it’s just the Internet that’s bringing you into my living room and making me question whether I should stop watching sports altogether just to avoid interacting with people like you ever again. Maybe it’s the last decade of Oregon success that’s brought you here from woebegone programs down on their luck. If that’s the case, the Dak Prescott era of the Dallas Cowboys has begun, it’s okay to go back to them now and leave us alone. Maybe you’re here because of all the cool Duck swag. But in case you didn’t notice, our uniforms are trash now, and Michigan really wants your business. What I’m saying is this, and I think I speak for thousands of other Ducks fans around the world when I say it: please get reasonable, or get the fuck out. Please join us Oregon fans who actually enjoy Oregon football, or go away and leave us in peace. Thank you for your time. You suck.

Sincerely,
A Concerned Citizen