Another Raiders Kool-Aid drinker deals with the hangover

Back during the pre-season, the NYT’s Steve Almond, a longtime Raiders fan, wrote an essay on what it’s like to have your heartstrings tied to perennial losers. He follows today at the NYT’s The 6th Floor blog with another piece, fresh from the Raiders’ ignominious 22-14 loss to San Diego Monday night. An excerpt:

Of course, like every other fan of a moribund franchise, I gobbled up all the preseason hype about how the Raiders’ “new regime” — their seventh in a decade — was going to eliminate all the dumb penalties and mistakes and enforce accountability and blah-blah-blah.
I drank the Kool-Aid because, in the great sports bar of fandom, this is the only drink available to those of us who have tethered our warped hearts to perennial losers.