By Miles Friedman
From storied franchise to storied franchise, New York has forever been one of the most dominant sports cities in the world. But, with all the ground-breaking success in the past decades, this decade was rather bad for New York sports. This decade (2010-2019) New York sports won a whopping 1 championship. New york has ten sports teams combined throughout the state of New York (including Giants and Jets even though they play in New Jersey) which is why their 1 win was such a disappointment.
The brightest moment in New York sports came in 2012 when the New York Giants won the Superbowl. The Giants defeated the New England Patriots to take home the Lombardi trophy. Little did we know that would be the last time any trophy from any of the ten teams in New York state would be taken home. New York teams can’t even get to the championship game. NY teams have been to the finals in total only 3 times. The Giants won, The Mets lost to the Royals and the Rangers lost to the LA Kings. Not to mention this failure is not with a lack of money spent. New York sports teams are often at the top of the pack when it comes to Payrolls.
No team in New York or maybe even the country has been more embarrassing than the Knicks. Their best finish was making it to the conference semifinals. The Knicks have had seven losing seasons, the worst two finishing with a record of 17 wins and 65 losses. However, last years’ 17-65 season came with hope. The Knicks traded Kristaps Porzingis, a once in a generation talent, for cap space to sign two big free agents in the offseason. People also thought they could land in the draft maybe one of the hypest prospects out of college basketball ever: Zion Williamson. But neither of these things proved to be true. The Knicks landed with the 3rd pick instead of the first to get Zion and didn’t sign any big free agents. To make things worse, Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving came to New York but not Manhattan, signing onto the Brooklyn Nets. But the biggest embarrassment for the Knicks isn’t what’s happening on the court, but what’s going on with the front office and the owner. James Dolan has proved to be one of the worst owners in any sport. He has failed to put a good team together and also he has proved to be a terrible with fans. James Dolan has had many problems with fans. One instance was when a fan yelled at him to sell the team, he decided to call security and kick the fan out of the stadium for being disrespectfulThe one bright spot for the Knicks was Jeremy Lin, a player who lasted for a little less than a season. He got people so excited that there was a phrase created called “Linsanity,” referring to the excitement around him.
When it comes to Football, the Jets, Giants, and Bills haven’t been having their best season. The Giants won the Superbowl in 2012 and lost in the wildcard to the Packers in the 2016-17 season, the only two years of somewhat success. The Jets have been plagued with the image of the “infamous butt fumble,” an occurrence where Mark Sanchez ran into his offensive linemen.
When it comes to baseball, the Yankees didn’t meet expectations when they failed to add on to their 27 World series. This was the first decade where the Yankees had not won a world series since the 1910’s. While the Yankees had a somewhat good decade on a normal team basis, the Mets did not. However, they had two very bright spots, one of which was making it to the World Series. In addition, Pete Alonso set the rookie home run record, one of few high points to their season. The Mets only made it to the playoffs twice in ten years. They made it to the World Series and lost in the Wild Card game (the game that determines which team goes to the next series of the playoffs) the year after. The Wilpons family (owners of the Mets) don’t like to go out and spend the money they need to spend to make their team good. The Mets often buy the cheaper veterans in the league.
To cap everything off, The New York Rangers hockey team didn’t have their best season as they were often in the playoffs but only made it to the Stanley Cup once. While the Rangers often make it to the playoffs, The New York Islanders haven’t been able to make it past the second round.
Overall this decade has been a disaster for New York Sports. The decade for New York sports has been riddled with butt fumbles and the inability to make it to the championships or the chance to get to them. But New York fans have something to look forward to. They can look forward to the Mets pitching staff and new owners soon to come. They can look forward to building around their young quarterbacks. They can look forward to the start-studded Yankees lineup and pitching staff. New Yorkers continue to have hope for the upcoming sports seasons
Sources: (https://www.businessinsider.com/how-bernie-madoffs-ponzi-scheme-worked-2014-7)
Photo source: (https://nutsandboltssports.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/pbox.jpg)
