Boston Fans.. A question from a Laker Fan.. Who do you hate More???

[mobanners]

dont flatter yourself lakers fans--the boston sports fan is born and bred to hate the yankees above all others. its not even close. when the lakers beat the celtics in 20 championship series over a three decade span we'll talk.

with that said, i can step out of my born and bred nature enough to say that i dont hate the yankees--or the lakers for that matter--equally year after year. for example, i couldnt hate the 1998 jeter-williams-cone-oneill-yankees as easily as i could the 2004 arod-giambi-mussina-cairo yankees. in the same way, i guess i dont hate the current lakers lineup as much as i did the 1987--or for that matter--the 2002 squads. aside from kobe (who's brilliance is always overshadowed by being such an egomaniacal prick) and vujacic (who is a whiner) i generally like the current lakers.

[kw10]

I hate the lakers by far. Given I'm not a baseball fan, but the fact that I hate Kobe Bryant, and the fact that most of my friends who are casual basketball fans go for the lakers and it's such a pain in the backside to listen to them go on about the lakers and Kobe, most of what they say are pretty thoughtless too. So even if I was a big Red Sox fan, I'd still hate lakers more.

[GoldenThroat]

Being that Im a Laker AND Yankee fan, I must Satan Incarnate to you guys. 

[Raygus]

for me, hating the lakers is like breathing. I was born in the early 80's, and my dad and grandfather did such a good job of implanting anti-LA sentiment, that its almost become part of my core. Now, I dont remember the rivalry when it was good, i dont remember the 87 finals. but i hate the Lakers because its just a part of me.

i hate the yankees too, but its different. its more of a reaction than anything else. its not as much a part of me. for me, hating the yankees is like being a wing man at a bar and having to deal with the ugly girl. i hate doing it. she's ugly, uninteresting, and not fun. she's there and i have to look at her. i hate the idea of having to hang around her, i hate having to look at her. but i'm still reacting to her.

with LA, I have no memories of the Lakers, it makes no sense that I would loathe them as much as I do. its more of a preternatural necessity for my personality. hating the Lakers is a constant backdrop in my life, a frame through which to view the world. hating the Yankees is a response to something outside of me, its kind of like there's always that chance that someday i wont hate the yankees - like maybe one day my buddy's date wont have busted friends. its possible, but unlikely.

sorry, it was one of those nights.

and i'd take the game 7 tix to the NBA finals over the ALCS tix anyday.

[cuckroller]

Well, as a Laker fan, I guess I should not respond to this thread, but...

It has always been rather curious to me that we always define fanbase rivalries in terms of "hate"!  Perhaps, because I am a fan (sans -atical)and still believe in the tenets of honest sportmanship, I would rather think that this unreasoning "hate" is the illegitimate son to the more proper father "respect".  It is rather obvious that there is a direct correlation between the regions in where we are brought up, the basketball tradition in which we are schooled, etc., that determine which basketball franchise we eventually wind up being the fans of. 

Both great franchise fanbases are now poised on the lip of the precipice.  The fact that there is such a heated contention between the fans of these two historic teams is only due to our having had to measure our teams, and in a lesser sense, ourselves so many times against one another. 

May the best Team win, and with no rancor thereafter.  These are obviously the two most storied franchises in the entire League.  Let us enjoy the show, and give due respect to both franchises, to the victors, and to the vanquished, whoever they may be.  I doubt that this year will mark the last time that we will meet on the "big stage", the NBA Finals!

Good Luck to all.

For the importance of this rivalry, a good well-balanced overview:  http://www.latimes.com/sports/basketball/nba/lakers/la-sp-heisler1-2008jun01,0,7302259,full.column

[libermaniac]

It's pretty even, but I live in LA, so I dislike the Lakers/C's matchup more.  The main reason is that many Lakers fans come out of the woodwork.  You'll overhear women who know jack about the Lakers talking smack about them in the playoffs, etc..  Also, I am sooooo tempted to go on a Laker flag breaking rampage one of these days ... those freaking things in the window of every other car (only during the finals) clearly illustrates the bandwagon jumping in LA.

I'd take the Sox tickets.  NBA playoff games are just too stressful! LOL.  My heart is much better suited for baseball, where there aren't 130 some-odd shots per game where my heart skips a beat.

[BadNewsBarnes]

It's a real tough call for me but probably hate the Yankees more because as noted upthread we see them 19 times a year.  They are in your face more because we do have an infestation of Yankee fans in New England whereas there aren't a lot of Laker fans around here.

Once Chamberlain became a Laker we've always had a guy to hate.  From Wilt to Magic and now to Kobe.  Although I do have to admit that after Magic came to Larry's retirement night at the Garden I softened on him quite a bit.

[ACF]

Can I say that I hate the
Pistons the most? 

TP, ACF! While I can't say I hate the Pistons the most, I can say without question that I hate them as much as the Lakers overall, (and more than any other team), and individually, (aside from Kobe), absolutely! (You've gained an ally with this post ... though I usually agree with you anyway, this put it over the top!  )

Thanks for the support and the TP 

[Onslaught]

I hate them both but I hate the Lakers more. I don't like baseball at all and I'm not from Boston so I'm not into the Red Sox. But I have friends from NY and know all about the Yankees and have grown to hate everything about them. So I pull for the Sox because to me the enemy of my enemy should be a friend. As for the Lakers, I HATE the current LA team. I have never pulled for the Lakers but I respected their teams from the past. It's kind of hard to hate someone like Magic or Worthy other than they stand in the way of my team winning it all. But I absolutely hated the teams with Shaq and Kobe on it. And I still loath Kobe to this day. He's the best overall player in the league right now in skills. But as a person he's worthless.

[BigAlTheFuture]

I hate the Yankees more. I'm only 19 so I was too young to witness the Celtics-Lakers rivalry.

[Chief]

I live in TN and there were no pro sports teams in this area to follow when I was a kid. So at about 11 years old (1985) I picked teams to follow:

Chicago Bears
Boston Celtics


And then later (1989) started following college sports and picked the team from the place I was born:

Michigan Wolverines

I've been a fan of all the teams ever since. So my most hated rivals are in this order:

Ohio State
Lakers/Knicks
Green Bay Packers

[jaketwice]

I have come to hate Red Sox fans - even though I am one myself.  Truthfully, I no longer see much difference between the Sox fans and the Yankees fans...

"No question now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which." - George Orwell "Animal Farm"

So I guess I hate the Lakers more.  That Kobe is so smug.  And I'm not sure there wasn't something to that rape charge... ...that girl was sodomized.

I also hate the idea of LA as a city, so phony, and driving your car everywhere. It's like the fake glitter-covered anti-Boston.

[Eja117]

The Yankees for a ton of reasons. For one thing they act all arrogant even though they bought a ton of championships. For another thing they were fairly prominent in the whole steroids thing. For another their owner has a God-complex. For another they think they ARE baseball.

The Lakers only have Kobe, and the Yanks have A-Rod. Soon the term "Ewing-Theory" will be called the "Ewing-A-Rod Theory"

Plus it was clear the respect that Magic and Larry respected each other and with all the Kurt Rambis clotheslining and whatnot they were a tough team that worked and played hard. They were two houses alike in dignity.

The Yanks were just a bunch or rich steroided up jerks that the whole rest of the world wanted to beat, and eventually teams with smaller payrolls did. Now they are just jokes so I don't have to think about them much anymore

[ma11l]

i think the answer to this question is reflective of one's age.  for younger celts fans who have yet to experience a finals/championship, they have supported mediocre to poor teams their entire life, so the laker/celtic rivalry was non-existent, while the sox/yankee rivalry has been consistent thru their lives.

personally, i hate the lakers the most!  when i think of the lakers, i vomit in my mouth. 

I agree with this.  People under 20 lived through the Sox/Yanks in 99,03, and 04.  They were a part of the rivalry in what could be considered its peak.  People who were around in the 80's for those NBA Finals have been around for the peak of both rivalries.  This question can only be fairly posed to them.  Although I am only 21 I still have to say the Lakers.  The love the Celts a lot more than the Red Sox and I know the history.  My family has been Celtics fans forever so I've heard many stories.  It is a special, unique rivalry.  I can't wait to be a part of it.

[SShoreFan 2.0]

Despite the Beat LA chants and the memories of the intensity of the 80's -- the Sox / Yankees rivalry stands heads and shoulders above any (ANY) pro sports rivalry in North America. 

Frequency and proximity rules over arrogance & the rapist.

Yankees in a landslide