When The Wings Needed Me, I Was AWOL

Shame on me, in the end.

I didn't watch much of the third period of last night's Game 6 of the NHL's Western Conference Finals. In fact, I watched about two seconds -- long enough for me to flip on the TV and see that the Red Wings were trailing, 4-2, with 4:45 left. Then I turned it off again.

I had watched just about all of the first period, and most of the second. After Anaheim took the 2-0 lead, our daughter bounded into the room and asked me, "Are you watching this?"

I thought for a moment and said, "No, honey, you can watch whatever you want." (She actually wanted the TV to play a video game).

And that was it for me, until I tuned in with that 4-2 score on the screen.

Why, I wonder.

Well, I don't take these playoff runs quite so seriously and personally as I used to. Back in the 1990s, especially pre-Stanley Cups, I was inconsolable if the Red Wings were losing a playoff game. If they had lost a game like Sunday's Game 5 I would have been chewing through wood. If they lost a SERIES? Pleeeease. Especially when, back then, the Wings were usually the better team getting upset. Remember Toronto in 1993? San-freaking Jose in 1994?

But now? It's more of a shrug. Maybe it's because this year, the Wings met my hopes -- the conference finals. Maybe three Cups since 1997 have satiated me. Maybe I'm just getting less passionate as I move steadily deeper into my 40s. Don't get me wrong -- I wanted the Wings to win. Badly. And I predicted that they would. But you know what? It's OK. I don't know why, but I'm OK with this. Now, maybe after tuning in to the Cup Finals, I might feel a little differently. But for the moment, I'm cool. Maybe even a tad relieved. Not sure.

The reason I say shame on me is because I purported to believing in these guys, yet I turned my back on them when they fell behind. It wasn't malicious or done out of spite, but I turned the game off. Actually, I think I was trying that old sports fan technique of turning off a game that's not going your team's way, in the hopes that when you flip it back on, things have gotten better. You all have done this -- admit it.

It was a two-goal deficit when I turned it off, and a two-goal deficit when I checked back in late in the third period. So needless to say, I missed the final, frantic minutes, when the Wings got within one goal and threw everything at the Ducks. I'm not sure if I should feel guilty about missing that, regretful, or fine. I know I definitely didn't want to see the Anaheim celebration or the post-series handshake. I only watch that if the Red Wings win. But in doing so, I missed out on the team's last-gasp effort. Still not sure how I feel about that, since I supposedly believed in them -- thinking that their destiny was NOT to lose this series.

Guess I'll have all summer to muse about it.