I know that the title "Sports Editor" means that my column should be about sports. But let's face it, this isn't exactly the best time of the year for a sports writer. Especially a sports writer in Buffalo.
While I watch nearly every game that is on TV, baseball really doesn't mean too much yet, even with the Yankees and Red Sox playing this weekend. Besides, I've written too many baseball columns already.
The NHL playoffs are going on right now, but apparently I'm the only person in Buffalo who still cares about hockey now that the Sabres are done for. So, I'll spare all you poor Sabres fans out there from a hockey column.
Then we've got the basketball playoffs, which start tomorrow too, but since no Eastern Conference team has a chance of winning, I don't really care about it. That's Senor Byrne's territory anyway.
The NFL draft is quickly approaching, but the Bills are probably going to just throw away their pick on some gimp who is going to sit the year out when there are good players - cough Anquan Boldin and Nick Barnett - Sorry, I'm a smoker. Don't worry; my beloved Jets took Dewayne Robertson, an equally terrible pick in my book.
Then there's the Masters, which I'm sure a sizable number of you enjoy, but golf, NASCAR, bowling and curling are about as interesting as the intricacies of an ant colony.
I guess I lied, this isn't a bad time of year for sports. But there is something of much greater importance to write about now. Surely, you've all read or heard about how Buffalo came to be in the sorry state that it is currently in.
There are plenty of theories that hypothesize how Buffalo became the seventh circle of hell. Sure, the brainiacs in charge could put some money towards revitalizing the waterfront, the way Baltimore did. Or they could have run a subway to north campus, connecting the thousands of UB students to downtown. Or heck, they could have even built north campus on the Buffalo waterfront.
Any of those things may have kept Buffalo from sinking as far as it has, but none of those answers are as good as mine. I know exactly why Buffalo is really in such trouble. There are no good pizza places. Don't put the paper down, this idea is only semi-ridiculous. Read on.
From what I hear, Buffalo was a pretty happening place to be in the first half of the 20th century. There was art, architecture, and even a rocking train terminal. Most importantly there was the mafia, and I may be generalizing here, but with the mob comes good pizza, which is what makes a good city.
As evidence that there had to be good pizza places here at some point in time, I submit to you unshakeable evidence from the Mafia's Bible: The Godfather. In the Godfather, Fabrizzio, the henchman who kills Michael's wife Appolonia, is found running a pizza place here in lovely Buffalo. He was from Sicily, and no self respecting Sicilian would eat the slop that is called pizza in these parts, so he must have been making some good stuff.
But in the late 70's and early 80's, when Buffalo's mafia went downhill, so did the city's ability to make good pizza. What is left of the once thriving Buffalo is a shell of a city with places like La Nova and Pizza Hut trying to pawn their greasy "pizza" off on us.
Now that you're all convinced, there is a reason I'm writing this column now. There is finally a good pizza place in the city of Buffalo, which means that this city's resurgence is just around the corner.
Zetti's, the new place in Tops' Plaza, right next to South Campus, is a sign that the Queen City is on the verge of a comeback. It's no Rosa's (the place in Penn Station) and they have plenty of room for improvement, but they don't have square slices and they serve chicken rolls and garlic knots. That's a step in the right direction.
Good pizza is just the first step. Next up is the election of a competent city government and a complete relocation of the city to the Gulf Coast of Florida.
Maybe next time I should stick to sports.
