Red Sox Still Selling Disappointment

Certain sports teams seem to cloak themselves in the warm blanket of lovable losers. The Chicago Cubs own that brand, but the Boston Red Sox, despite winning two rings in the past decade, seem unable to let go of their comfortable woobie.

After reeling off 95 wins this season, their playoffs ended with a thud with a sweep at the hand of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. Jonathan Papelbon, the Sons of Sam Horn's clown prince, raindanced away a 2-run lead in the deciding final game, giving up three runs in the ninth inning, and allowing the Angels to advance to the AL Championship Series.

While winning can fill a bandwagon, in some cases, like Red Sox Nation, losing can become a brand all its own. Despite having gone 101 years with no World Series win, and having the chance at one ruined in epic fashion, the Cubs still pack 'em in, with the sixth highest attendance in baseball last year. The Sox don't trail far behind, at eighth. Why do people keep coming back to have their hearts broken?

The Mets, who check in between the Cubs and Sox, with the seventh best attendance in baseball, are another one of those teams who always seem to be on the verge of turning the corner. In two straight years prior to this season, the Mets were rolling towards the playoffs before epic collapses, after coming within one game of going to the series in 2006. After a 2009 season with virtually no reedemable qualities, the Mets will have a tougher time selling that same idea that they're on the cusp of greatness.

While the Mets and Red Sox can try to claim some false sense of lovable loserdom, they're not being honest with themselves. Sure, the Mets have had their hearts broken in ways few fans can possibly imagine in recent years, but they've been to a World Series in the past decade, and they've won two in their history. There are Cubs fans who have gone entire lifetimes without seeing their beloved team reach the summit of baseball nirvana.

Being swept out of the playoffs seems to have jolted some Sox fans back to the post-traumatic sensation of prior years, before their embarrassment of riches. And like a emotional wound long since healed, they realize how much they missed how it hurts.