Anatomy of a tough loss

First appeared on January 11th, 2011
in The Lebanon Reporter

With the exception of players betting against their own teams, nobody likes to lose. Losing is deflating. Like the peeling of an orange, losing strips us down revealing our true selves; something we often find unappealing. Nothing crushes the soul more than loss.


By definition we must lose something to experience loss. Be it loss of time spent with family or the loss of Super Bowl aspirations; some losses cut to the core. Some fester until a part of our soul becomes so gangrenous it’s lost forever. Such was the Colt loss last year to the Jets that shattered all hope of perfection. That surreal defeat struck many fans like a nail to the skull from an air hammer. A nail buried so deep the only hope of extraction was found in assembling a team of the best surgeons from four different continents.

But as hard as Curtis Painter’s coming out party was to watch, we haven’t seen a loss like this past Saturdays in some time. Obviously losing the Super Bowl wasn’t enjoyable but fans did move forward knowing the Colts made it to a stage 30 others had aspired for.

Saturday’s loss to the Jets was more along the lines of the 1996 AFC Championship game in Pittsburgh. A 29 yard game winning pass from Jim Harbaugh that bounced off Aaron Bailey’s chest in the end zone. That was a loss that sent Colt fans scrambling for snowy bridges over icy creeks only for Clarence to show up in the form of Peyton Manning’s draft choice. Losses of this caliber are torturous for fans and leave them bleary eyed from “what might have been” hangovers.

Extenuating circumstances often compound losses. Last year saw the prospect of perfection lost, in ‘96 it was the fact Indianapolis appeared destined for a Super Bowl after an unexpected playoff explosion.

The salt in Saturday’s wound was undoubtedly found on the Jets sideline. All the way from his high-water Dockers and white socks past a generous midsection so weakly camouflaged by your grandfather’s sleeveless sweater up to that notoriously loud mouth clogged by horse teeth, Jets Coach Rex Ryan personifies everything not Midwestern.

Despite the fact over 100 different men would play a role, the always blustery Hurricane Rex blew into Indianapolis Saturday night basically proclaiming the first round match-up between his Jets and the Colts a colossal game of one on one between himself and Peyton Manning.

Ryan declared the game “personal” and you really can’t blame him for being a frustrated man. Coming in Manning had owned Ryan’s defenses posting a 5-1 record shredding them for 1500 yards and 12 touchdowns.

That being said, Ryan is everything Midwesterners are not and that is what made Saturday’s loss so unbearable. The game became more than Jets vs. Colts. It morphed into a clash of styles. Ryan’s brash, in-your-face approach versus Jim Caldwell’s quiet wisdom.

Indy fans rallied behind Caldwell for not injecting himself into the game as Ryan had (as for the time out he called with 30 seconds left, that’s probably best left for another column). The point here is who needs Ryan anyway? Considering it was 19 outside, I’m sure there was plenty of hot air in Lucas Oil already.

This being said, it’s the shadow of Humpty Dumpty wearing a Motorola headset that will make this loss most difficult to move past. And while all the sand may not be out of Peyton Manning’s hourglass just yet, Moby Rex did his best to force as much through the neck as possible. And that’s the loss that stings the most.