I had to work today and it was a bad day at work.

Meanwhile, my gf was at home dealing with some personal crises involving her mom's health.

I wanted to watch the Cal game when I got home and the gf acquiesced even though she likes basketball and soccer better. Plus, she would have rather talked about what happened during her day. However, she let me watch the game, bless her.

She would come into the room from time to time and look at the score. At one point she said: "Wow, is Arizona really bad or something?"

As the game tightened she got more into it and we were watching it together.

Well, in the end she said: "I am done with Cal. This happens all the time."

I had no good response.

How do you explain Cal athletics (having Jason Kidd but losing to Wisconsin-GB or having Aaron Rodgers but losing to Texas Tech in the Holiday Bowl) to friends and family who did not go to Cal? It's not that we completely suck. It's that we always lose in a heartbreaking fashion at JUST the right time. If we ever make a Rose Bowl I am sure we will all pay big money to go watch Cal get creamed. It's our lot in life.

Is it our karma for The Play? I feel like a glutton for punishment.

dimitrig;842363516 said:

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Is it our karma for The Play? I feel like a glutton for punishment.

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Yah I think we should renounce it. We got enough out of it.

dimitrig;842363516 said:

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How do you explain Cal athletics (having Jason Kidd but losing to Wisconsin-GB or having Aaron Rodgers but losing to Texas Tech in the Holiday Bowl) to friends and family who did not go to Cal? It's not that we completely suck. It's that we always lose in a heartbreaking fashion at JUST the right time. If we ever make a Rose Bowl I am sure we will all pay big money to go watch Cal get creamed. It's our lot in life.

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Yeah, it's almost impossible to explain Cal athletics to people who haven't experienced it. It's an addiction that you can't fully pull away from even though it's bad for you and painful. Cal has been Cal for decades. Most of my family and longtime friends are "Cal people" so they have the same experiences and know what Cal athletics is about, and I don't feel like a fish out of water with them.

"Cursed" came up in a couple threads just after tonight's Arizona loss. My catch-phrase for it is that "The Bears will always let you down." Or they always play good enough to lose by a little and break your heart.

And you're right, it's not like we completely suck. We've had our moments and great players. It's not like we're Washington State, a bottom dweller in the PAC, with the disadvantages of being a small school in a small, isolated town and academics and notoriety that are nothing like Cal's -- yet WSU has been to the Rose Bowl twice since 1998.

I think it's the crushing weight of history and the grandeur of the institution that somehow becomes such a burden on Cal players and teams that they somehow implode at the crucial moment. They're like us fans, head cases, who want it so bad but are our own worst enemy.

My years in Berkeley were during UCLA's 18-game winning streak over us in football and the 70-something streak in basketball. It's the same "curse" -- we couldn't catch a break during those streaks and always imploded. The pressure to break the streaks created a negative feedback loop.

On the bright, once we did break those streaks and UCLA was no longer the boogeyman, we regularly and sometimes easily beat the Bruins in those sports.

No explanation needed - my husband also went to Cal. So when we lose, we sit at home and sulk together.

It is very hard for an average program to win a championship in major college sports. We Calfanatics are pretty invested in our team. You cite things that happened years ago and discount how many games played since that time.

With that said, we fans have some bad luck. The Cal D lacks depth. The offensive coaches are not good at eating clock. The team needs to leaen to defend an onside kick. The team needs to defend a hail mary. Regardless, if we had won 51-13, Dykes would not deserve a statue. Losing in this fashion is bad, but we should take it in stride. I'm pissed off too. :/

oski003;842363561 said:

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It is very hard for an average program to win a championship in major college sports. We Calfanatics are pretty invested in our team. You cite things that happened years ago and discount how many games played since that time.

With that said, we fans have some bad luck. The Cal D lacks depth. The offensive coaches are not good at eating clock. The team needs to leaen to defend an onside kick. The team needs to defend a hail mary. Regardless, if we had won 51-13, Dykes would not deserve a statue. Losing in this fashion is bad, but we should take it in stride. I'm pissed off too. :/

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A championship? How about a win over a mediocre Arizona team when up 14-0 after 4 minutes?

Wy wife is not into sports at all, besides the olympics that come around every two years. She asked me why I was so pissed off tonight. "It's just a football game babe".. Yeah, well, BABE, this is a team and school that I love (didn't go to Cal, just a huge fan). I explained to her that this one really hurt. Watching something you love, lose in that fashion, is not explainable to someone who doesn't share the same love, and who isn't even into sports.

I'm having a Vodka/Tonic with a splash of lime right now at 1:29 am.. Anyone else with me?

Raiders .... tuck rule

Cal football and basketball ... nuff said

Oakland A's .... cheap ass owners though their history in Oakland and lose in the playoffs year after year

Golden State Warriors .... lousy for years, barely make the playoffs, never win it all (except 1975)

Sharks (by default) .... playoffs and always some bitter failure

I guess you just get used to it ....

I'm curious, would you gentlemen prefer to have your s/o (usually wife or gf (sorry, don't mean to be sexist) to be into sports - like passionately into it? I'm female and can get really emotional when my team wins/losses (but dont get me wrong, I know my x's and o's and I follow recruiting closely). But when we lose, I'm a mess. Sometimes, my husband says "you need to relax and not take it so seriously". He's also a huge Dodgers fan and I'm a big Giants fan since I'm from SSF - so when we play each other, it's war in our household. Do guys really want this? I tell my husband he's lucky but when I'm getting overly emotional over a game, he's not so sure.

Thoughts?

That's a great question. I would just love her to understand why I feel the way I feel after a loss like this. Perhaps I care too much. Maybe she's right. I dunno, but I do know that even with the stuff us Cal fans have gone through, I will forever love the blue and gold and root on Cal until the day I die.

Go Bears!

It's Cal football.
Nuff said!

dimitrig;842363516 said:

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Well, in the end she said: "I am done with Cal. This happens all the time."

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My wife said almost the same exact thing! She said she doesn't care for it but I reel her in getting excited and then we lose. She hates watching us lose and doesn't see the point for caring and feeling upset after a loss. I even bought two tix to the Mutts game at halftime thinking with maybe being 4-0, Stubhub tix would increase. At the end she told me to find a friend to go with because she didn't want to watch Cal Football. She's done with it.

OSKIesq;842363575 said:

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I'm curious, would you gentlemen prefer to have your s/o (usually wife or gf (sorry, don't mean to be sexist) to be into sports - like passionately into it? I'm female and can get really emotional when my team wins/losses (but dont get me wrong, I know my x's and o's and I follow recruiting closely). But when we lose, I'm a mess. Sometimes, my husband says "you need to relax and not take it so seriously". He's also a huge Dodgers fan and I'm a big Giants fan since I'm from SSF - so when we play each other, it's war in our household. Do guys really want this? I tell my husband he's lucky but when I'm getting overly emotional over a game, he's not so sure.

Thoughts?

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That does sound intense. I get too into my teams (like everyone here), so I could see the war scenario happening. In a way, I'd want my wife not to be too into sports...or at least not into my teams' rivals.

To glb78, I feel you on the drinking. Gonna have to resume it this afternoon.

Heroin is a gateway drug for Cal football

I just explain that being a Cal fan is more like a disease. That always gets the laugh and the point across.

The ex-wife understood. Her father was a Cal graduate. The girlfriend loves watching sports, but she struggles with Cal's consistent losing. I summarized it as the following:
- We are very loyal people. If you were not stubborn and loyal, you would have left the Cal bandwagon a long time ago.
- Cal has THE worst major sports athletic department in the country.

Among the power-5 FBS school Cal may be alone with :
a - one CO-championship in Pac-10 football and no trips to the Rose Bowl in 55 years
b - just one basketball Pac-12 conference championship in the past 50+ years, and no trips to the elite 8.

Most schools that are bad in one sport (Illinois/Kansas) have a decent history in another. Most schools have brief periods of success with at least one BCS bowl or one deep NCAA tournament run (Baylor, Northwestern, Rutgers). Maybe Vanderbilt or Texas Tech .... (sigh)

Time to go get some exercise.

It's a hereditary disease for me. I feel bad because I passed it to the next generation. Mandatory sterilization?

OSKIesq;842363575 said:

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I'm curious, would you gentlemen prefer to have your s/o (usually wife or gf (sorry, don't mean to be sexist) to be into sports - like passionately into it? I'm female and can get really emotional when my team wins/losses (but dont get me wrong, I know my x's and o's and I follow recruiting closely). But when we lose, I'm a mess. Sometimes, my husband says "you need to relax and not take it so seriously". He's also a huge Dodgers fan and I'm a big Giants fan since I'm from SSF - so when we play each other, it's war in our household. Do guys really want this? I tell my husband he's lucky but when I'm getting overly emotional over a game, he's not so sure.

Thoughts?

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My wife takes Cal losses far worse than I do. She's still pissed about the 2006 Arizona game.