Right Now, the Only Team Worth Cheering Is Stuck Down Under

Addressed to:

Dennis Conner

Aboard Stars & Stripes

Fremantle, Australia

Dear Dennis:

How’s everything down there on the Indian Ocean? Those blokes treating you all right? Find any good Mexican restaurants?

Ah, enough of these stuffy formalities. Time to get to the point.

You and your guys are about all we have left these days. I don’t know if tramp steamers have gotten the news that far, but these are not glorious days for San Diego sports.

The best news of late is that the Padres did not finish in last place. They beat out the Dodgers and Atlanta, but finished from here to there behind Houston. That’s right, Houston is in the National League Championship Series.

Now, about the Chargers.

Do you get “Monday Night Football” out there on the Outback? Hopefully not.

The Chargers lost, 33-7, to Seattle. This was not the bad news. Not really. Bad news with the Chargers is that this was only the most recent embarrassment.

These guys have lost four of their first five games. The last time the Chargers were 1-4, Jimmy Carter was president, “On Golden Pond” was opening on stage in New York, Olivia Newton-John was singing “Hopelessly Devoted to You” and Tommy Prothro had just been fired as coach. It was 1978.

You might have heard that the Chargers scored 50 points in their season-opener against Miami. They have scored a total of 54 in the four games since, and nary a touchdown while being outscored 67-6 in the second halves.

This team’s offense has gone south. Have you seen it, by any chance?

I guess I should mention the good with the bad. San Diego State is 3-2 and in the hunt for the Holiday Bowl. Of course, the Aztecs are frequently “in the hunt” . . . until they play BYU.

The best football team around here is probably the one at Vista High School. If I had to rank county teams, the Vista varsity would be No. 1, the Vista junior varsity No. 2, San Diego State No. 3 and the Chargers just above (or maybe below) UCSD intramurals.

Yes, Dennis, that’s the way things are going.

You can understand, then, why it was so encouraging to discover that Stars & Stripes is 3-0 in the America’s Cup trials.

You guys are unbeaten. That’s a nice word. It’s nice to be able to dust it off.

Folks hereabouts need something to applaud, and you are it. I don’t mean to put too much pressure on you, but that’s the way it is.

Really, I guess I can’t put any more pressure on you than you put on yourself. I know it has been eating at you for three years that those Aussies took the Cup away from a boat you skippered. You feel a sense of responsibility. You feel that you should be the guy to go down there and bring it back. To you, this is more of a crusade than a challenge.

In a sense, this is kind of an Indiana Jones-style caper. You invade a foreign land intent on absconding with a precious artifact. You get there and find the landscape crawling (or swimming) with syndicates, all spending millions of dollars in quest of the same prize. To you, they are all interlopers--party crashers.

I was bemused Tuesday to see that Stars & Stripes had rather soundly trounced Eagle, a 12-meter sailing out of Newport Beach. You guys sure traveled a long way to settle an issue you could have handled off San Onofre.

Regardless, this had to be a nice win. Eagle had to be one of the more serious challengers to your challenge, and you whipped those guys by three minutes and nine seconds. That is a rout.

How many of these challengers are really serious? You’ll probably say, “All of ‘em.” However, I’d guess you are more concerned about America II from New York, New Zealand and French Kiss. Right?

I know it is still pretty early in the game down there, this being a rather lengthy process. Presidential campaigns are shorter and maybe even cheaper than picking an America’s Cup challenger.

Indeed, it’s probably much too early to get excited.

As you said after beating Eagle: “You can’t get too excited about winning or depressed about losing.”

These are like the early weeks of a pennant race, jockeying for position. The competition will get much more heated after this first round-robin. You made the point that the third round-robin, in December, is the most critical.

“You have to be fast in December,” you said, “or you’ll be home by Christmas.”

Naw, no early demise for Dennis Conner. You won’t let a bunch of snobs from New York or sheepherders from New Zealand curtail this crusade.

Will you?

I mean, the Padres were out of it by Memorial Day and here the Chargers are out of it by Columbus Day. I don’t think the old hometown can handle another quick exit.

So take care of yourself. Sail those seas, but don’t drink the water.