"A town divided"

Done.

http://chicagosports.chicagotribune.com/sports/football/bears/cs-0701250176jan25,1,1890145.story?coll=cs-football-print

By the way, everybody, Rex Grossman did not go to Bloomington South High School. He graduated from Bloomington High School South. Just like future Texas Tech coach Pat Knight is a graduate of Bloomington High School North.

Yeah, I think the Bloomington schools did that just to frustrate everybody.

 

I thought that the Trib's story was pretty good.
I haven't read all the others, but being from that part of the world, I just remember the split between the baseball fans. Some loyal to St. Louis, while others rooted for the Chicago teams.
On a side note: My cousins, the Gores of Chrisman, are available for interviews.

 

I've said it before, I'll say it again. Super Bowl hype is not a favorable time for sports journalism. The stories we do are borderline embarassing.

 

haha, Piotr, count me as one of those... I lived in Michigan City, Ind. for about 10 years until I graduated high school. When I went to college at Bowling Green, I would tell people "Chicagoland."

 

And God bless you for it, good sir. The Chicago metro area extends quite a bit into Indiana. Except Gary. We're not claiming that cesspool. Y'all Hoosiers can have it.

 

Fuck that shit. Chicago can have Gary, and the fucking Jackson family.

 

Sorry, sweetie. Gary is in Indiana. And it's almost as bad as the Haute.

 

It used to crack me up when I went to college, and everyone from Indiana north of I-70 was trying to glom onto Chicago so they wouldn't be identified as hayseeds by the many Indiana students from the East Coast.

"So, where you from?" "I'm from this suburb of Chicago. Plymouth. Ever heard of it?" Of course, the same people would try to insinuate that Indianapolis was a little insignificant cowtown in the middle of the state to further the point.

Of course, I'd quickly point out that their town was in the middle of a cornfield 100+ miles from Chicago and closer to Fort Wayne than any other decent-sized city, kind of blowing a hole in the whole "suburb of Chicago" thing.

Really, the gist of all of these stories is that the issue between Colts/Bears fans lies isn't necessarily in the current generation, but from those that are 40+. Indy was a Bears (and, for some weird reason, Dolphins/Cowboys) town before 1984. And, at late as the mid-1990s, there were still as many Bears/Dolphins/Cowboys fans as there were Colts fans in the city. If you're 40+, it's likely you grew up following someone besides the Colts. And, if you live outside of Indy metro, it's likely you still follow that team.

 

I was up that way -- in Merrilville, Ind., the day of the divisional playoffs. Was surprised how many Colts fans there were given the proximity to Chicago. I'd guess Merrilville is divided, too.
In case anybody's looking for ideas ...

 

I "get" two of those -- Remington and Rensselaer -- but Battle Ground? It's fucking right by Lafayette, that's Colts territory these days, someone just thought the name was cool.

And I don't know any self-respecting Illinois resident that is a Colts fan, especially in Danville, which really has no connection to Indy at all, other than sharing I-74 and matching its urban blight despite being about an 1/8 of Indy's size.

And yes our paper, which straddles Colts-Bears territory, has one of our own going in our special section.

 

Mars to Indianapolis: 31,252,650 miles.

Mars to Chicago: 31,252,601 miles.

Fucking Martian sports editors are Chicago homers.