Capital punishment

The gang over at Pension Plan Puppets have adopted the Washington Capitals as their temporary team.

Here's PPP's reasoning:

We're officially cheering on another team. Yes, I know I wrote an entire post about playoff hate but the consensus has been that you can't hate teams that have not done you any harm. The Leafs have never met in the playoffs, the two teams have never played any big regular season games, and any problems the Leafs have had recently with the Capitals have been self-inflicted.

Now, I like the Caps. Their fans have waited a long time for something to cheer about. They were kind enough to give us Peter Zezel and Bob Rouse, I always liked Dale Hunter, and Alexander Ovechkin is pretty much the coolest guy in the league.

The MCI Center even provided one of my favorite non-Leaf NHL memories. A few years back we were in Washington to visit the in-laws and had a chance to take in a Habs/Caps game. The arena was half-empty, of course, so we were able to pick up cheap tickets in the lower bowl. Halfway through the first period, a pane of glass pops out almost right in front of us and there's a long delay while they try to install a new one.

As we're sitting in the dead quiet arena, we notice a certain well-coifed official is supervising as the replacement pane goes in. My lovely wife suddenly stands up, leans towards the opening, and shouts "Hey Fraser, you jerk, you blew the Gretzky call and ruined my husband's life!"

He skated away -- I'm not sure if he heard her, or just saw a reflective surface somewhere he could gaze into lovingly. But some friendly Caps fans wanted to know the story behind it. After I told them about that game (which takes me about 45 minutes start-to-finish and involves profanity, hand gestures and an improvised Euler diagram), they agreed it was a travesty and bought us beer.

So I'll always have a soft spot for the Capitals. But I can't do it, PPP. I can't jump on another team's bandwagon, even temporarily. I'll watch. Maybe even cheer. But I won't call the Caps my team. I'm a Leafs fan and a Leafs fan only until the day I die (which will be this summer, by the way, of self-inflicted head wounds when we don't get Brian Burke).

Bottom line: I can't have a second-favorite team any more than I can have a second-favorite wife.

(Which, after double-checking, I'm told I definitely can't do.)