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You've heard the slogan, "The Future Is Now!" The core idea of the slogan is to strengthen near-term expectations. The presumed context is a community that has enjoyed little recent success and has been conditioned to think that success lies in some remote future. The point is to assert that a prepared-for success is about to break upon the community. Now.
Seattle sports franchises have turned this on it's head. "Now Is The Future!" Presumably a verb of being in this construction functions like an equal sign, so that flipping the terms results in no change of meaning. In this case that is not so. We have now been conditioned for perennial rebuilding toward some glorioius future that is always just beyond the immediate horizon.
The implication is that conditions are just not right to have expectations now. There's always some array of preconditions that must be fulfilled and cannot be fulfilled any time soon. So the preconditions are being worked on. As soon as we get there, THEN AND ONLY THEN can we begin to expect success. In fact, if we expect the team to put a successful team on the field now we are accused of being impatient, stupid and counter-productive.
I don't mind this so much as a general theory, it's just that in it's specific application to Seattle sports teams it has become a way of life, a settled feature of the landscape.
What?!  You expect us to actually win something?!
:cough:
:harrumph:
:glares:
Why, dear simpleton, dear fan, that is PRECISELY what we are PREPARING TO DO! Do you realize how DIFFICULT it is to win? Why, things must be DONE. GROUNDWORK must be laid. FINANCES PUT IN ORDER. We must first WORK THROUGH THE MISTAKES THE PAST HAS LEFT US.
The whole thing reminds me of French political and military leadership when the Germans launched their blitkrieg through the Ardennes in May of 1940. If you ever get the chance, read what Churchill wrote when he made emergency visits to his erstwhile allies during that month, finding that defeatism had permeated the highest leadership. In the French view, there were so many insurmountable problems that the task was too hard. The Germans were running through and around them so fast they simply could not stem the tide. Churchill was incredulous that a nation could simply give up so easily and accomodate itself to the will of its mortal enemy. In the end the German army took what used to be a proud, powerful country and pushed it over like a rotted tree.
It has become tremendously difficult to be a Seattle sports fan. Its as if the franchises we hold dear are unworthy of our loyalty. It makes you feel dirty somehow for continuing to give it.
The Seattle Seahawks have gone the route of the Seattle Mariners. Oh sure, in the parity NFL they may actually compete in a weak division and even win. But they have become a joke, and they remain a joke.
Pete Carroll? I admire his energy and effort, but I don't see him as the architect of perenially good team, one that must be reckoned with.
Jack Zduriencik? He inspires more confidence, but until his genius actually generates results in keeping with his reputation I remain unconvinced that the franchise itself will be able to ride him to the heights that it suggests.
My question: When Will "The Future Is Now!" again be our slogan?!