Two time zones and 1,894 miles separate New Orleans and Los Angeles.
Culturally, aesthetically and ideologically, the two cities might as well be on different planets.
It would be difficult for the NFL to pit two more distinctly different American cities against each other in its NFC Championship Game on Sunday (Jan. 20). In so many ways, L.A. and NOLA are diametric opposites.
Former Times-Picayune colleague Chris Rose once famously said, “You can live in any city in America, but New Orleans is the only city that lives in you.”
No one ever said that about L.A.
Norman Mailer once described Los Angeles as “a constellation of plastic.”
There, they fake tans, their financial status and various parts of the human anatomy.
Here, the only thing we fake are punts – and the occasional “sick day” after a Saints win.
For better or worse, what you see is what you get. Unless, of course, you’re out past midnight on Bourbon Street.
Everything about New Orleans is real, right down to the dysfunction, corruption and blight.
And yet, for all of our flaws, frustrations and incongruities, New Orleans remains America’s most intriguing city. We’re eccentric and shamelessly provincial.
Who Dat Nation gathers for NFC Championship Game pep rally
L.A. is everything New Orleans is not: rich, progressive and proudly inauthentic.
A former New Orleans friend who now lives in L.A. described the differences between the two cities this way: “In New Orleans, being different is cool. In Los Angeles, being cool is cool.”
It’s telling that Britney Spears moved from here to there and Nicolas Cage moved from there to here.
That said, even the most prideful New Orleanians have to admit that L.A. has some things on us. For instance:
L.A. has Beverly Hills, Newport Beach and Manhattan Beach. NOLA has Monkey Hill, Coconut Beach and Pontchartrain Beach.
L.A. has a water shortage. NOLA has too much water … and too often has to boil it.
L.A. has Disneyland and Hollywood. NOLA has Storyland and Hollywood South.
L.A. has the best Major League Baseball team in the National League. NOLA has the farm team of the worst team in the National League – and even then, not for long.
L.A. has gridlock. NOLA has potholes.
L.A. has LeBron and the Lakers. NOLA has the Pelicans and a future Laker.
New Orleans celebrates Black & Gold Day
But when it comes to football, frankly, Los Angeles can’t compete.
L.A. had Flipper Anderson. NOLA had Morten Andersen.
L.A. has Troy Hill. NOLA has Taysom Hill, aka “The Mormon Missile.”
The Rams have Sean Mc-Bae. The Saints have #SundaySean.
L.A. is, was and always will be a Laker and Dodger town. The Rams rank no better than third in the hierarchy of L.A. sports teams. And if Southern Cal football ever gets its act together again, they’ll drop to No. 4.
That could change when the Rams’ new stadium opens in 2020, but until then, L.A. has two NFL teams, no stadium and a half-interested fan base.
For a club that’s existed for 82 years and was one of the NFL’s original franchises, the Rams have a relatively unremarkable history.
When the fifth best moment in your history is the debut of the horns helmets, you’ll never be mistaken for one of the league’s storied franchises.
The Rams think so little of their past they banned one of their all-time greats, Eric Dickerson, from their sidelines a few years ago.
New Orleans, meanwhile, is all Saints, all the time. The franchise was born on All Saints Day in 1966, and despite four initial decades of futility, has been woven into the city’s cultural fabric ever since.
New Orleanians name their pets and first-born sons after Saints. They tattoo fleur-de-lis logos all over their bodies and write paeans and rap songs in the team’s honor. On the Sunday of Super Bowl XLIV, Rev. Monsignor Crosby Kern wore a Drew Brees jersey under his vestments at morning Mass.
As football towns go, there’s no comparison. NOLA owns L.A.
The only thing the L.A. Rams have on the Saints football-wise is Jim Everett. The Rams got the better version. Otherwise, NOLA wins in a landslide.
Choppa Style beats Animal Style every day of the week.
Source: “Los Angeles” – Google News