The baseball team was eliminated from contention somewhere around Memorial Day, and depending on what you believe, all three of the state’s football teams weren’t far behind.
As for the basketball team, there’s no reason to even offer a season preview. It isn’t that they’re bad, but more because, well, they moved.
In the state of Washington, sports has become a state of panic.
Would anyone have expected this a decade ago? Five years ago?
I’ll take the silence as a ‘no.’
And, fellow Oregonians, it’s not something we should be cheering about. Let our neighbor to the north’s fall from grace be a reminder to us about how thankful we should be for our current myriad choice of winners. It wasn’t long ago that sports in Oregon, between the Beavers, Ducks and Blazers, rarely were successful at the same time, if at all. Athletics in Oregon has been predictably poor for a majority of its history, while success in Washington was like predicting rain: more often than not, it was going to happen. And when it did, it came hard and fast.
In 2000, the Mariners made the first of two straight American League Championship Series appearances, the Cougars were three years removed from a Rose Bowl berth, the Huskies were a year away from their Rose Bowl win over Purdue, and the Sonics made the playoffs. Only the Seahawks, at 6-10, had a down couple of years surrounding the turn of the century – and they made the Super Bowl only three years ago.
Four of the Cougars’ 10 bowl games in history have come since 1998. The Huskies haven’t had a winning season since 2002, but were always a Pac-10 title contender, and for most of the 1990s they dominated the conference. As for the Sonics, they’ve been a fixture of Northwest sports efficiency for much of my life. From the year before I was born (1986) to the year I graduated high school (2005), a span of 19 years, the Sonics made the playoffs 14 times. The Mariners tied the major league record with 116 wins in 2001.
But that was then. Now doesn’t look so hopeful. And the future? That’s anyone’s guess – but it doesn’t look like a fix is coming anytime soon.
Here, we’ve got a race for the Pac-10 football title in Eugene and Corvallis, opening day for both baseball programs only four months away, the Blazers’ revival already underway, and shots of redemption and rebuilding for both basketball programs. Let’s not forget Oregon cross country and volleyball and their expectations.
For us here in Oregon, this turning of the tables is a problem, no matter how much it looks like a time to cheer. Wasn’t it more fun when the I-5 rivalry between the Sonics and Blazers, well, existed? OK, Blazers fans, here’s the chance to choose your next rival, and it’s looking like – Sacramento? Oklahoma City is a bit of a stretch, after all.
As for the “Northwest Championship” that Rick Neuheisel coined in 2003 for the winner of the Oregon, Oregon State, Washington State and Washington series of games every college football season, it’s looking like the more appropriate name in recent years should be the Oregon Championship.
Simply put, when Northwest teams stink, their stench drifts a state or two. Oregon State football beat the Washington schools a combined 100-26 this season, while the Ducks’ combined score was 107-24. And you know what? Neither victory meant a thing, because neither helped either school advance. A loss to either one of those schools, once a regular occurrence, is now laughable. It used to be that a win against either, especially Washington, would change your season. Now, it’s only changed if you lose. That not only hurts the Northwest, but the conference.
And you, Portland baseball lovers? At the rate the Mariners are moving, it’s unlikely people will give Northwest baseball a try again. Picked to win the division (with the Seahawks as well) they frittered away their chance by Memorial Day.
For a state with such history, it’s simply not good enough.
[email protected]