Difficult things take a long time, impossible things a little longer.

Hyperdictionary.com defines fan as an enthusiastic devotee of sports.

Full disclosure, part one: I'm a season ticket holder of the Buffalo Bills. Have been for 7 seasons now. Each year, we receive a renewal notice in the mail, and each year, our payment is made and we get our tickets in the mail. Each year, we sit in the heat, or the snow, and watch the games. So I would state pretty certainly you could consider us fans.

Second part of full disclosure: The Bills have been bad for a long time now. It's been since 1999 that they were in the playoffs. Management of the team has taken it in a direction that can only be considered faltering at best. Drafts have been weak, player development has been lacking, and the product on the field has been a mere shadow. . . with the occasional glimpse at what could be. There have been bright spots; no doubt. Unfortunately, those bright spots are few and far between.

I can say this as a fan. I can say this as someone who invests time, money and effort in being a fan. I am not, nor will I ever be, one of the fans who finds their day lacking if they aren't castigating the team for everything. I am certainly no optimist. But I am also not a fair weather fan. I find it difficult, for lack of a better word, to listen to the doomsayers on the radio who call in because they need let everyone know they hate this, or so and so sucks. I find it just as difficult conversely, to listen to glossed over discussions of what is and isn't right and wrong with the team.

Enthusiastic devotee of sports. I wonder if most of the people I hear criticizing the Bills or the Sabres or whatever team on a daily basis could be considered enthusiastic devotees of sports. Most are certainly enthusiastic, if yelling and screaming like little children can be defined as such. But I find myself questioning truly how devoted most of these people are to these teams.

So am I right, and the fans who scream obscenities at the team at the Ralph on Sundays wrong?

How I would love to say yes. But I can't. I can't be someone who goes to the game only to talk about how much I hate the team, hate the product, hate the experience. But those people are at the game too, so they're putting in the time, money and effort, just as I am, albeit with more color perhaps. So, based on the definition, the person who screams how much Trent sucks, or how the line can't block, or how the secondary can't cover, is just as much of a fan I am, someone who hopes year after year that things WILL in fact turnaround for the best. I know we're bad. I'm not stupid. I consider myself to be rather educated when it comes to sports, perhaps more than some and obviously less than others. The main difference between myself and that fan, is my hope comes in the form of not only continuing to buy the tickets, and the gear, but in a sort of faith that the management isn't stupid either. I know that seems to be an oxymoron based on the way the last 10 seasons have ended. I even know that sounds rather idealistic even. Who am I to NOT criticize something I have a vested interest in? Isn't that what we as fans do?

There is no waiting list for season tickets. In fact, tickets sales were down this season as compared to last for the Bills. Are we Buffalo sports fans so jaded, so cold, that we find we can do nothing more than belabor the same points year after year? Would we rather not have the teams here? Would our heartache be lessened by the absence of the teams we claim to love so much, or would it be greater knowing we're no longer special?

I have said this before, and I will again reiterate this point. We, in Buffalo, are lucky. We have a football team, which only 30 other cities can state. We have a hockey team. We even have a baseball team. We have a lacrosse team. We are a small market who literally adore our sports. People of Buffalo, and Buffalo fans, I do not ask you to not have an opinion. I do not ask you not to be disappointed and tired by the poor performances. I do not ask that you stop singing the Mr. Softie song on the WGR whiner line, even though we have the best goalie in the league. And as much as it honestly pains me to say this, I do not, and will not ask you to stop yelling at Captain Checkdown, or Marshawn Inch.

All I ask is that you continue to believe. Don't give up the fight.