The first step is admiting you have a problem.

I have a problem.

I love the Hershey Bears.


If you haven't already figured out that I absolutely love the defending Stanley Cup Champions you obviously haven't read much of my blog. The Pittsburgh Penguins are affiliated with the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins of the American Hockey League. It's only right, that as a fan of the Pens, I am a fan of their AHL team as well.

I live in South-Central Pennsylvania... about an hour south of Hershey. Hershey is not only home to a somewhat world famous chocolate factory, but also to the Hershey Bears of the American Hockey League. The Hershey Bears are one of the most storied franchises in the AHL, they've been around, well, forever. Even famed Canadian hockey broadcaster, Don Cherry once suited up in the chocolate and white.

Hershey is a whole lot closer to me than WBS... so that's where I go and watch the AHL. When WBS comes in to town I get decked out in my Pens gear and cheer for them, when the Bears were playing someone else, I cheered for the opponent... the Albany River Rats, etc. etc. I never cheered for the Bears, I hated them... for one main reason...

They're affiliated with the Washington Capitals. As my friend Erika says, I drink the "haterade" when it comes to the Caps. I despise them. I don't like their red jerseys, their building, their players, their coaches. I don't like anything about them, thus I most certainly couldn't cheer for the Bears.

But then... I decided to try and do something nice. A friend of mine is a big fan of Karl Alzner from when he captained Canada's World Junior team to the gold medal in 2008. She happened to mention the week before I was going to Hershey to see the Baby Pens that Alzner played for the Bears. I figured I could venture on down to their exit and get him to sign a puck for her.

That's when it started.

I'm not going to reiterate the entire story of that game or getting autographs, but if you want to read it you can look here.

My friends and I had pretty much the entire Bears' team sign our free shirts that we had got that night. We talked to them and put faces with the names we had only ever seen on the backs of jerseys. Imagine that... the hockey players were real people too.

It's all kind of snowballed from there... I returned home from school in Kentucky just in time to go and see the Baby Pens vs. Hershey in Game 7 of the AHL playoff semi-finals. We cheered for the Pens, but they ended up losing 3-0... I have to admit, I wasn't extremely heart broken, I didn't hate the Bears anymore.

The Bears continued what would ultimately become a run to the Calder Cup Championship and my my friends and I continued to go and see them play. It was the playoffs... in the home building, I couldn't bring myself to cheer against them. I told myself I was just there to see "good hockey," I didn't care who won... but I did. Different friends who accompanied us had never been down for autographs so we'd go down and end up having little conversations with the players. I hated them less and less after every game.

Then... there was prospect camp. My friend B. and I decided to take the 1 1/2 drive south to Arlington, VA to see the Capitals prospect camp. The Pens prospect camp didn't fit our schedules (and is 3 hrs. away) and we were dying to see some live hockey. I loved every single minute of it (maybe not the elevator ride, but that's not a story for the blog). That day only made my love for the Bears even worse... I didn't look at them as the future of the "enemy" anymore. They were just going to be Bears someday. Someday soon. And what did I tell myself? "Oh. They'll be Bears. The Bears are okay."


I always had looked disgustingly at the fan apparel shops at the Giant Center in Hershey. I even went as far as to buy an Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins puck in their store (they carry a puck for every AHL team). I never wanted a Bears shirt... why would I... that's practically like wearing a Caps shirt. Now... I want one. I've justified it, telling myself I'll only wear it if they're not playing the Baby Pens, but I should still have one so that I can support them. Why would I want to support them??? Less than a year ago... I despised them.

This has gotten out of hand. It needs to stop. If it doesn't stop soon I'm going to have an awfully hard time learning how to hate the "former Bears" once they're wearing that bright red Washington Capitals jersey. (My friend and I already had a little bit of a problem with that regarding Mr. Simeon Varlamov.) And I absolutely cannot start being okay with a rival of my team. A team that is lead by the biggest rival of Sidney Crosby, a guy that has taken awards away from Evgeni Malkin.

This is not acceptable...

I have a problem.

I love the Pittsburgh Penguins... and frankly, I think I love the Hershey Bears.

I probably won't see them play again until I'm home for Christmas break. I have until then to solve this problem and renew my feelings of despair toward the chocolate and white. Is it possible?

The real question is... Is that what I really want?