I love me some basketball. Believe you me, March is my favorite month and it has nothing to do with spring beginning, or the fact that it’s the month of my mother’s birthday, but everything to do with March being the only month of the year that college athletes leave the land of men and enter the realm of Gods. There is no greater apprehension than watching a close game, there is no greater bliss than winning, there is no greater sport than college hoops.

Having said that, I must tell you that while college basketball is possibly the one thing I could not live without (oxygen and food I suppose are on that list as well), professional basketball bores me to tears. Over the past year, Major League Soccer has more than filled the void left in my heart by the relocation of the Seattle Supersonics.

And so I have come to the conclusion that the Sonics leaving town was not the worst thing ever to happen in Seattle sports history. There, I said it. Yeah sure we lost greats like Kevin Durant and Nick Collison, but the only cute one (Ray Allen) was already gone. And who really cares all that much about the NBA anyways? There’s no heart, no suspense — it’s just a bunch of overly musculine men showing off their fancy dribbling tricks.

Now let’s compare the Sonics’ fan base to that of the Sounders. There were two, maybe three die hard Sonics fans. They would paint their faces up and go the whole nine yards, but they were quite few in number. The Sounders have an entire section of Qwest Field devoted to the crazy of all the crazies, often clad in full neon green body suits and chanting things like “pass the bong ref,� and �one puff’s enough, ref.” Sounders scarves even became the hottest piece of apparel to hit the Seattle streets, but let’s face it, Sonics scarves would have simply been impractical in the sweltering heat of Key Arena.

Everybody likes to win. So naturally, replacing a losing team with a winning one is an automatic good thing. In their first official season in Major League Soccer, the Sounders managed to win the US Open Cup and make it to the playoffs. And everyone in the greater Seattle area knows that had they actually shown up to their matches against the Houston Dynamo, they would have gone on to the finals. In their first season in the big leagues, they had a chance at the championship.

In their entire 40 season history, the Sonics made it to the finals only three times and won the championship only once. In their last few seasons, attendance was at an all time low and even the Storm outshined the Sonics. It was time for a new era and that’s exactly what we got.

Some may argue that the Sonics and Sounders easily could have coexisted, but I say this is not so, or at least not to the extent that both teams were in their past (or present in the Sounders’ case) glory days.

When one Seattle team is on top of the league with an impressive winning record, while the other struggles at the bottom of the standings, bandwagon fans tend to abandon the terrible team in favor of the good one; it’s simply human nature.

Given the choice between the Sounders and the Sonics, I would gladly take the Sounders. First of all, they have a far greater win percentage and I fully admit to possessing qualities of a bandwagon fan. Secondly, we already have a great basketball program, both men’s and women’s, at the University of Washington and a WNBA team in the Storm. Even if you only count each of those as half a basketball team, they still add up to better than the Sonics. By simply swapping squads, Seattle is suddenly a more eclectic, well-rounded city, in terms of sports teams.

And so in conclusion, although the departure of the Sonics still tugs at the heartstrings of some, out of their ashes rose the age of the Sounder, a prosperous, victorious age. With that I say goodnight, and a happy, happy holiday to all.