Prospective Point: From Superstitious to Super Bowl

All made possible by a jersey, a dream, and a fan

By: David Abada

There is a difference between being superstitious and being sports superstitious. I do not believe in any of those wacky superstitions that you can while reading Huckleberry Finn. But I do believe that, in sports, I directly influence the success of my team.

For most crazed sports fans like myself, it’s hard not to be superstitious at all times. However, I save the superstitions for important games. We're not talking about a Red-Sox Yankees game in the middle of July or a Giants-Cowboys game in mid-November, but games that directly correspond to whether or not my team makes the playoffs or stays in the playoffs. If the Giants have three games left in the season, and they need to win all three, that’s when I begin my journey.

I have an insanely large list of factors that I believe influence the flow of the game. To be (somewhat) exact, I have at least 30 I can think of such as: what I wear, where and how I sit, whether I should move at all during the game, what I eat, how my hair is, what songs I have listened to that day, what friends I have texted or emailed, and the list goes on and on.

My superstitions start in small doses, and as the tasks get greater, more factors, in my opinion, have a larger affect on the game. During the NFL's Divisional Round, I will move around in my bed during the game. But when it comes to the NFC Championship, I won’t move an inch. The Giants need my attentiveness at all times.

You may think I’m crazy, but hey, I love sports. Now I know I’ve been talking a lot about what my superstitions are, but I actually have some life applications where, I think, my superstitions, or dedication, have paid off.

Back in 2007, when my Giants made their first run, I wore my Plaxico (Burress) jersey and black Adidas pants with white stripes (and red Haynes boxers, but I won't go into detail about that). With that jersey on, sitting on the couch next to my dad, the Giants won their game against the Buccaneers and their game against the Cowboys. I was feeling great. I had my spot, I had my outfit, and I had two wins to go before I was a Super Bowl champ (I like to refer to myself as a member of the team, so what?). But then I heard the news: I had a bar mitzvah on the night of the NFC Championship game, and I could not get out of it. Now if the circumstances require it, I do make amends to my superstitions. So I wore my suit and tie, but I also had that jersey and pants in my pants pockets bundled up. The Giants won, and the Super Bowl was coming up. I decided to wear just my Plaxico outfit for the Super Bowl, and when that didn’t work out well I put my suit on over the outfit during halftime. The Giants made a key stop in the 3rd quarter while I sat in a reclining position rubbing my stomach, so I proceeded to remain in place for the duration of the game, and sure enough, WE WON.

I thought that was the end of my superstition troubles, but I learned the following year that these superstitions change yearly, and that they only apply to one team.

Towards the end of the season, when the Giants needed wins to make the playoffs, that superstitious feeling ran through the air of my household.

The scene:

It’s late in the season, and sure enough, my Giants are playing poorly. I’m sitting with my dad and my little brother, and my mom is doing whatever she does in her room. The game is so painful to watch, so I decide we need a little change in the house. I go upstairs and watch in my room, and to my surprise, the G-men prevailed. That’s when I knew where everyone would be stationed the rest of the run. I even began to accumulate more and more of my customs and by the first week of playoffs, I knew the outfit I would wear for the run: an Old Navy Giants long sleeve tee shirt and gray Nike sweatpants. My dad even busts out his retro number 56 LT jersey (the one and only LT) back from when he was a kid for the NFC Championship. He said the Giants never lost big games when he wore the jersey, so he had to use it at certain times.

The Giants win and we are off to the Super Bowl to face Tom Brady again. A bittersweet, but in retrospect, totally shocking thing happened the Thursday of Super Bowl weekend. My dad told me that I was going to the Super Bowl in Indy with my cousins and two siblings. You might think I am a crazy, and that’s all fair game because who would not want to go to a Super Bowl right?

Wrong.

I was so nervous that I would taint the Giants fortune by going to the Super Bowl that I nearly backed out had it not been for the Bar Mitzvah reminder: certain circumstances require amendments. My family forced me to wear a Giants jersey to the game, and it was the Super Bowl so I agreed (of course I wore my Old Navy/Nike combo underneath). Nonetheless, it was hard for me to cope with the fact that I would not be in the safety of my home in my room watching by myself. (The Giants always won under these circumstances, by the way.) The jersey was a big dilemma, too. Would it ruin the luck of my other outfit even if I switched back to it? Should I not wear the jersey and look like an embarrassment of a Giants fan who refuses to wear a jersey to THE SUPER BOWL?

You all know how the story ends, but I think I played my part in helping the Giants get there. I wore my jersey, and going into the second half, I thought it was going to be easy. But Brady’s quick score to start the second half changed things pretty quickly. I began to wonder if I should take the jersey off. Late in the third quarter, I DID take it off because the Giants had gotten nowhere, and almost unbelievably, they knocked home a field goal. In terms of my outfit, the rest is history. I wore my original playoff run outfit and they won big, hooray!

The seating arrangement was a different story. I did not get up once during the game, not even during the half time show. I sat with my legs crossed and my arms folded, not moving an inch until the clock struck zero and the confetti was flying (I have some confetti in my room now).

A tough decision for sure, but the Giants won, and I really feel accomplished. This may sound cliche, but I truly believe I put the team on my back. A luxury box, a Super Bowl ticket, all of that means nothing to me if my team does not win. Call my crazy, call me superstitious, call me whatever you want, I love my Giants, and I love all of my sports teams, so I am willing to put behind selfish desires to see them win. You can say I’m crazy, but I contend that I am a dedicated, true, die-hard fan.

Would you go the distance for your team?

I sure as heck know that I would.

David Abada is a prospective Class of 2016 Cornellian. His sister, Dani Abada, is an Assistant Sports Editor for the Cornell Daily Sun.

Prospective Point will run periodically through the semester. Any prospective Cornellian who is interested in writing, please email Geoff at gjr52@cornell.edu