Why Not Us?

A TL;DR Recap of the Cincinnati-in-LA Weekend

I bought a last-minute Super Bowl ticket without asking my wife.  So, on Valentine’s Day, at least she saw red.

The first two events I ever witnessed at Paul Brown Stadium, the home of the Cincinnati Bengals, were not football games. Sometime after 9-11, the venue held a memorial event. And on 27 June 2002, my Mom and I watched evangelist Billy Graham speak.

What’s fascinating about preachers, speakers, and comedians is we’re the only people who can fill a stadium of people based purely on our original thoughts. OK, not me specifically, but isn’t this incredible? It normally takes an entire team, or a boy band, or at least one guy and a guitar. Tens of thousands to listen to some person talk? That’s insane.

My personal Super Bowl story was one of torment. Not only because of the outcome but also because I was torn about going to the game at all. It shouldn’t have been a tough decision: as my now-Phoenix-based bud, Akhil Goel, basically put it: “Isn’t this good marketing for you? Like, you rep Cincinnati, Ohio, so hard — it’s the first line of your bio. How can you not go?”

I had five thousand five hundred reasons not to, that’s how. In the days leading up to the Big Game, most of my friends were shelling out $5K - $6K per ticket. Naturally, as a live performer, I value experiences. But as much as I love music, I’ve been to only about 10 concerts in my life. I find it’s not worth all the hassle when I enjoy listening to the original versions of the songs better. Besides, not to get too personal (I’d never do that), but Covid has been brutal on the bottom line — and if you saw the trailer for season two of my talk show, you’ll know where the money went. Being Desi, we’re good savers, so it’s not like we’re hurting at all. But Harsha and I jointly decided that our six-month-old son, Naveen, is our financial priority. Not exactly an original thought. I ain’t fillin’ any stadiums with that breaking news.

Indeed, upon the Bengals’ loss, my overwhelming feeling was sadness for my son. I’m not sure this is gonna make any sense to anyone, but ever since I draped around him the Cincinnati jersey that his Vikas Chacha had bought, I feared a defeat. Not because I put it on him, but because I didn’t want his very first Super Bowl to be a loss. It’s hard to explain, but since Harsha and I live in a city that neither of us called home for most of our lives, we always muse about the “baggage” we bring from Cincinnati & Ohio and from Austin & Texas. And I never want to saddle Naveen with my burdens. I quickly went down the downward spiral of what other shortcomings I might be handing down to him. I’m not saying the Bengals are losers for losing. Not suggesting that at all. I guess I want what any parent wants for their child: to be a winner. Does this resonate with anyone or am I crazy? A redeeming thought I had was the realization that the one song Naveen enjoys hearing me sing to him is the Beatles’ “I’ll Be Back.”

Did I curse my son? Then again, tigers eat their young.

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Game Day

For all of the events leading up to Super Sunday, you can check my Facebook posts — here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Sunday, February 13, 2022, was shaping up to be a perfect day. The night before, I set my alarm for 7:30 AM, but around 3 o’clock AM, still feeling the effects of Saturday (OK, I was inebriated), I turned it off. However, at 7:25 AM, Harsha brought Naveen to bed for him to play with me. It’s always so cute when she does that; at this point, I was up. I got ready, said goodbye to my parents, and grabbed an Uber to Beverly Hills.

Fellow Cincinnatian Vivek Ramaswamy, who killed his appearance on Bill Maher two days earlier, treated me to an amazing breakfast at Avec Nous.

At breakfast, he offered me a ride to the stadium. His coworker, Kevin, navigated us through the crazier-than-usual LA traffic, where we met up with Vivek’s brother, Shankar (who used to assist my Dad with his radio program in Cincinnati). My producer friend, Abubakar, called to encourage me to buy a ticket, lest I regret it the rest of my life. My writer friend, Adam, chimed in via text to fan the flames of desire. Hmm… that sounded more sexual than intended.

En route, Vivek connected me with Brent, a ticket promoter who kindly gave me his $400 tailgate pass. Only trouble is Brent informed me I’d need a game ticket to enter. It’s now 12:00 PM — 3.5 hours till kickoff.

Before I made the literal game-day decision to hitch a ride to Inglewood, I had three options to watch the game: link up with a group of 35 Cincinnati Desis in Hermosa Beach (thanks, Bhavin Shah & Raj Jhaveri)… catch it at Adam’s pad in Studio City… or stay at home and watch it with my family — all choices I was grateful to have.

Outside SoFi Stadium, there were a lot of corner tailgate parties and I figured I could link up with some folks who said they were gonna watch the game from the outside. However, this quickly dissipated, as every single one of my friends suddenly texted to say they were going inside.

Madhukar Srivatsava with Jaime Foxx.

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You Are Now About to Witness the Strength of Peer Pressure

1:00 PM — 2.5 hours till kickoff: I’m now standing out in the unseasonable heat, by myself, contemplating what to do. I’d already thrown my Hail Mary of seeing if I could gain access with my tailgate ticket, but as predictably as running at Defensive Tackle Aaron Donald, that failed. I lingered outside the gate for a good (or bad) 25 minutes, watching people go in, and the one lyric I had was from “Touch the Sky” when fellow Super Bowl LVI attendee Kanye West rapped:

Dog, I was havin' nervous breakdowns

Like "Man, these ni**as that much better than me?"

I mean, it can’t be that 70,000 people are all doing better than I am in life, right? Still, I walk a couple of blocks and stumble upon Casa Rios Restaurante, a fantastic, family-style spot with good Mexican food. (What else?) I mingle with some Bengals fans who are all either wrapping up to walk over or madly trying to find tickets on apps like Ticketmaster, TickPick, SeatGeek, TicketIQ, and Gametime. I hear two things: ticket prices drop a lot after kickoff, but… and this is the kicker… sometimes the tickets can take a long time to show up in your app after purchase.

What the heck do I do? What if I don’t get a ticket at all? Is there any way these fall to a more manageable range of sub-$3,000?

2:45 PM — 45 minutes till kickoff. I order some food and post up in a not-so-bad position if this were any other sporting event than Super Bowl LVI. I’ve got a big table, access to an electrical outlet, a huge plate of sumptuous rice-and-bean-accompanied enchiladas, a super accommodating wait staff, and a full view of a big screen TV.

A View of Me.

3:30 PM — Kickoff: I’ve now missed the National Anthem and am about to start missing the actual game when I realize what I’ve done to myself. At this point, it’s far too late to take an Uber to any of the other spots. Is this really how I’m going to watch the Cincinnati Bengals in the Super Bowl in LA? All alone in a Mexican restaurant surrounded by mostly LA Rams fans? Feeling utterly lonely like pre-record-deal Kanye, I make my decision: I’m pulling the trigger. I don’t call my wife. I’m too scared. She’s 5’3” and 100 pounds and I’m terrified. Like Compton and Long Beach, now I know I’m in trouble. Hey, I’ll just tell her the LA Rams were my inspiration: they mortgaged their future by giving away a bunch of draft picks. “Honey, I just gave up my birthday and Christmas gifts for the next six years… cool?” Don’t think it works that way.

3:45 PM — 15 Minutes Post Kickoff: I pay my bill, leaving a sizable tip for all of their hospitality, and head back over to the stadium. I find a relatively reasonably priced ticket… let’s just say a couple thousand less than the price I quoted above… and go for it. #GotMyMindOnMyMoneyAndMyMoneyOnMyMind

Here’s a learning for all of us: ticket prices do come down but not so much, which stands to reason, right? If they did, then this would create a secondary market of sorts. Or tertiary, since these apps are technically the secondary market. Something that occurred to me only today is that I really should’ve just bought the ticket and then checked in to see what happened with the pricing. It was potentially a very costly experiment. Why?

Because now for the really scary part: out of nowhere, all of the tickets disappear. Realizing I just missed my opportunity to hit “Buy,” my heart sinks into my shoes. Or since I have two shoes, then maybe my atria goes into my left and my ventricles goes into my right. Or maybe the right ventricle and the right atria go together — never mind. Anyway, I’m freaking out. And then… just as suddenly, they reappear! I feel like Marty McFly after George kisses Lorraine, back on my feet, strumming the guitar.

But then… my transaction isn’t going through. I’m getting fraud alerts on my AmEx card and my SeatGeek seat is showing “Confirmation Pending.” I call TickPick and SeatGeek. To their credit, they do put their reps on fast, but there’s nothing they can do since it’s a marketplace and they have to wait for the seller to confirm the sale. Ten minutes go by… 20 minutes go by… 30 minutes go by… they suggest I go to Ticket Resolution, which I learn is clear on the other side of the stadium. One of the young security guards is far less than helpful and I give myself credit for not calling him a lot worse than I did. I’m jogging around the enormous facility, when I’m struck by the memory of the dream I had last night: that somehow, I was in the middle of nowhere, unable to watch the game. Realizing it’s not a deja vu, I shudder. It’s hard to shudder while jogging but I manage to do it.

After 40 minutes, the ticket comes through. I run inside midway through the second quarter. The one upside is that much of the risk is now gone: this game is clearly not shaping up to be a blowout. I feel like Verbal Kint in The Usual Suspects:

I froze up. I thought about Fenster and how he looked when we buried him, then I thought about Keaton. It looked like he might pull it off.

I’d say it was a bummer to miss that much of the game, but I don’t yet know the meaning of the word till the fourth.

I Have Arrived. Of course, the one person wearing a mask is Asian.

Akhil and our mutual friend, Sachin Mehta, also based in Phoenix, had stayed in excellent touch the whole time, checking in on my status. (Upper Middle Class, or so I thought.) Akhil let me know there were a couple of open seats near him and his friend… but I gotta tell ya… this is another learning: the Battle of the Pigskin really does fill up. There are hardly any open seats at all, so this was a stroke of luck. I make my way up to Section 518, link up with them, and then step out to grab drinks. And I make the voyage over to meet up with some Fairfield High School buds.

Eric Seitz. Chris Cook. Marty Hileman. Rajiv Satyal. Y’know, all the studs from FHS94.

Was it all worth it? Yes, and besides the Tom Petty line of “We Did It for the Stories We Could Tell,” the magical period of the interception at the end of Q2, the epic halftime show, and the opening 75-yard pass and additional interception of Q3 was a run I’ll never forget. Forget about how I got there. I got there. And that’s all matters.

Oh, and now Gen-Z will understand one of my favorite Dad jokes:

Q: What’s brown and rhymes with Snoop?

A: Dr. Dre.

Post-Game: At the LAX Marriott Bar (Akhil, Rajiv, Smita, Sachin).

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My 7 Takes on the Game

1. At some point in the 3rd quarter, the Bengals seemed to stop playing to win and instead starting playing not to lose. Think about the very first opening series: Coach Zac Taylor elected to go for it on 4th and 1. I actually loved that call. It set the tone early. We’re not messing around. We’re aggressive and we came to play. After we settled for a field goal to make it 20-13, we somehow lost the thread.

2. Yes, we handled Aaron Donald and wide receiver Cooper Kupp quite well throughout the first half. And though quarterback Joe Burrow sustained an injury, Rams wide receiver Odell Beckham had to leave the game. But the reality is that the Rams were the better team and the better team normally makes adjustments and figures it out eventually. The law of averages kicks in, and the next thing you know, Kupp has two touchdowns and the Bengals’ offensive line becomes porous and gives up seven sacks. #LongAgoSomebodyLeftWithTheKupp

3. It’s true that neither offense had a great game. The two teams put up a combined 43 points. That’s a lot of stops. But given the history of Rams quarterback Matt Stafford, we had to assume he had one great drive left in him. It could not come as a surprise that the Rams were going to score at least one more time in the fourth quarter.

4. The officials changed their tune and began calling penalties it didn’t seem they were calling before. The most notable one seemed to be the Logan Wilson Holding call on 3rd and Goal. Did this change the outcome of the game? It’s impossible to know. That said, it was on 3rd and Goal. If it were on 4th and Goal, then yes, this was the ballgame. In that case, we could make the case that the game was stolen. However, even though this gave the Rams a fresh set of downs, take a step back and look at the progress they were making. That had all the trappings of a Super Bowl-winning drive. Besides, Tee Higgins did commit a facemask penalty that would’ve brought back that epic 75-yard TD. With far worse field position, we can more than easily say that these two TDs canceled each other out. Yes, the Rams’ was at a critical point, but let’s not forget the momentum that opening salvo gave us.

5. More on the Logal Wilson holding: it’s a bad call. Many NFL players tweeted that they thought it was simply great defense. Moreover, I’m reminded of American History X, that cheerful little romp about a white supremacist named Derek, played by Ed Norton. Towards the beginning, the White guys are playing the Black guys for control of the Venice Beach basketball courts. One of the Black players hits Derek hard. His brother begins the dialogue:

- You gotta call offense on that shit, Der.
- Not on game point, Danny. 

Even Nazis have enough honor to know you gotta play it out.

6. But that’s not why we lost. Stripe Hype posted a tweet that summed it up:

7. Sorry. As crushing a defeat as it was, the Bengals lost that game fair and square. In baseball, managers always say what they want is the chance to bring the winning run to the plate in the bottom of the ninth inning. That’s what we had. Two timeouts, decent starting field position (touchback at the 25-yard line), and 1:25 to play. We gained 17 yards and then 9 yards. We had a 2nd and 1, then a 3rd and 1, and then a 4th and 1. In three plays, we couldn’t move the ball one yard? I don’t think the incomplete pass on 2nd down was a bad call by Taylor. Like virtually everyone else, I think handing the ball to Samaje Perine instead of Joe Mixon on 3rd down and then having him run right at Aaron Donald was probably the call that cost us the game. It’s one out of many, but it’s at the most crucial juncture in more than three decades of Bengal Ball. And dropping back into the pocket for a pass on 4th is also a mistake. Hand it to runningback Joe Mixon twice, and if he gets stuffed, then that’s that. But if you’re a championship team, you simply have to answer the Rams’ drive with one of our own. This is as winnable a Super Bowl game as you’re gonna get.

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Putting the Loss in Perspective

This is a tough beat. In my sports viewing experience, the only one that clearly ranks worse to me is Andre Agassi’s loss to Pete Sampras in the 1995 U.S. Open. Agassi was on top of the world, winning every tournament that summer. He goes in, thinking he’ll finally best his nemesis, and when he falls at Flushing Meadows, his ranking drops to #141 in the world. When you lose like that, nobody else is going through what you are. There are no teammates with whom you share the humiliation. Because tennis is an individual sport that I also played in high school, this devastation shook me extremely hard. I’d go so far as to say that watching Agassi mount his comeback inspired me for my own after the troubles I faced in the 1990s. I can’t imagine ever caring that much again… until the inevitable losses my son will witness if he becomes a sports fan. But then we’ll have each other.

This leads me to “34 Seconds Short,” when the Bengals were thwarted by Joe Montana’s San Francisco 49ers. In some ways, this was worse because, for months, we expected to win it. The only reason this doesn’t rank higher is I was too young (not to be confused with Steve Young) to appreciate it. In fact, when the Cincinnati Reds won the World Series in 1990, I thought this was normal. “Yeah, your football team goes to the Super Bowl and your baseball team goes to the World Series every couple of years, right?” What a glorious time in the Queen City.

There are things that make this Waterloo a bit easier:

1. I’d purport you never care more about sports than when you are a kid or when you have a kid with whom you can watch.

2. It’s easy to say this now, but because I didn’t wanna piss in anyone’s soup, I internally predicted it’d end the way it did. We’d have a shot at it and not deliver. Because if you go back to a month ago, could you really have believed “The Bengals are gonna win the Super Bowl this year”? No. So, as terrible as this is, it only seemed like a reality for a matter of weeks.

3. Imagine how bad the Kansas City Chiefs feel. Unlike them, we didn’t blow a huge lead to an arguably inferior squad.

4. I’m so damn proud of this team in particular. The Bengals massively overachieved. We set the Super Bowl record for a team with the fewest wins in the previous two seasons. What a turnaround. Yes, short-term, we’re disappointed, but over the coming days and weeks, we’ll become even more grateful for what they’ve done for us. In fact, we already are, given the hero’s welcome they received upon arriving back at PBS.

5. I’m so damn proud of this franchise in general — at least in the Game of Games. We’ve lost three Super Bowls by a combined 12 points. Five, then four, then three… gosh, I hope we break that pattern because I’m not sure I can take a loss by two or one. But man, do we provide some real entertainment for football fans (and it’s still the best sport). You can count on an instant classic when we’re there. Obviously, I’ll take a win over an appearance, but I’m glad we could be a part of it.

6. At the tailgate party on Saturday here in LA, somebody told me 54% of the crowd was for the Bengals. I wrote that off as myopia, in terms of seeing only the things that are around you, but it turned out that was true. That said, the Rams, though they were under more pressure, had to feel more comfortable playing on their home field. This was a tough break for any visiting AFC team, even if we were technically the home team.

7. Hey, that’s what we get for giving the world Donald Trump. HA.

LA says, “End Racism.” Cincinnati figures out a way to almost say, “All Lives Matter.”

1. The Rams are an easy team to like. Yes, there were some assholes taunting us as we filed out, but for the most part, they were gracious. The man next to me turned, shook my hand, and congratulated us on a great game. Donald absolutely deserves a ring. So do Stafford and Kupp. Being an engineer, I’m a systems guy: like Moneyball, the Rams might’ve come up with a new winning formula of mortgaging your future for the present, trading all of those low picks for marquee players.

2. We didn’t get to see our team win the Super Bowl. But we got to see our team winning in the Super Bowl. Some years, fans don’t get to see that. They’re blown out from the jump. I’ll take it… which might be why I myself am not more successful in life. Oh, well.

3. As a city, Cincinnati is well past the point of needing this kind of victory. My hometown has a lot of things going for it: if you walk around downtown or in any of the surrounding neighborhoods, it’s in the middle of a renaissance… and boasts an exciting (and Indian!) Mayor, whom I apparently missed at the tailgate party as he went to the LA Rams’ owner’s for dinner. Fortunately, my Mom and I got to meet him a few years ago when we volunteered and performed, respectively, at the Namaste India event in Washington Park, the site of the Bengals celebration today.

4. To Live and Die in LA… man, it was a true LA day. Despite all of its flaws, it is a great place to live. And if I weren’t a Bengals fan, I’d have to say that it felt right, given the location and the best half-time show in history (putting up stars raised in the surrounding neighborhoods) for LA to win. Objectively speaking, this would’ve been an embarrassment for the Rams to lose. (In fact, so many people said this was a win/win for me. No. I’d say it’s a lose/lose. These are my two favorite teams, but I don’t want them to meet any more than my wife and my girlfriend. Not that I have a girlfriend, but the joke works better in the first person.) But what came out in stark relief as I looked around at the tailgate party was how entirely different Midwesterners are from West Coastal people. Ever since I moved here, I’ve felt there could not be two more different cities than LA and Cincinnati. The people don’t really even look similar at all. Not necessarily better or worse but certainly not the same. I got such a clear idea of how, over the course of thousands of years, people in different Indian states can become their own ethnicities, like Punjabis vs. Bengalis. Imagine how different Ohioans and Californians will look in a thousand years — if we get that far.

5. My Grampa always used to say, “Whatever happens is God’s Will.” And knowing how religious many of my Cincinnati brethren are, this’ll likely resonate. And if you don’t believe in God, trust me there were enough people trying to convert you outside SoFi Stadium.

Hope that helps ease the sting a bit. That all said…

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There are things that make this Waterloo even worse:

1. I don’t know if we’ll return to the Super Bowl anytime soon. It’s very difficult to do. To defeat the Tennessee Titans and the Chiefs, both at home? Everything had to fall our way. Trust me: as a performer, I know how difficult it is for lightning to strike twice, which is pretty much what has to happen for you to become a star. As it’s been said, “If you make one viral video, the video goes viral. If you make two, you go viral.” I have 13 videos with 100K views each, but only one with 50 million views. That’s something few people in history have ever achieved, but I’m still sitting here writing mile-long posts as opposed to a syndicated column. I have talent, diligence, and connections all working in my favor. But so many things have to line up to make you a celebrity. To make another Moneyball reference, take a look at Billy Beane.

There's not an organization in baseball who would not have taken a chance on this young guy.  He didn't pan out.  That happens every year.  Some do, some don't.  Few scouts can go into the mind of a young man and determine whether he's really confident about what he can do.  So you can sign him based on his ability, but then he's gotta be successful to be confident.  And once he becomes confident, that's when you've got something.  You make a decision on what you see.  And if things don't pan out, you move on.  That's baseball.  Many are called, few are chosen.

It’s a heartbreaking assessment. “You move on.” Easy for an analyst to say but what about the human being inside the player? Look, I have a new project the world doesn’t yet know about. I’ve assembled a team with credentials; every member of the team is so confident in the idea that they’re working for free. But even with all of that, it might go nowhere. What people often forget is that things rarely fail or succeed for one reason. Success and failure are generally constructed from a vast combination of factors.

2. Zooming in a bit further, we lost eight games total. A 10-7 record isn’t all that hot and five of those victories were very close. We easily could’ve missed the playoffs. Game theory would lead me to believe other teams will make strategic moves, too. But with a stronger O-line, we should at least be looking to win at least one playoff game for the next couple of years, provided we keep our core players of Burrow, Ja’Marr Chase, and Tee Higgins. As I joked with some friends who’d traveled in for this, “What if we make the next five Super Bowls?” Hey, you never know.

3. As much as we can applaud LA, it’s hard not to root for the Bengals who’ve never won a Super Bowl. That’s what might make this one even worse than the Super Bowl XXIII loss — another 33 years have passed since our 1968 inception. Only two teams (Minnesota Vikings and Atlanta Falcons) have existed longer without the trophy. And now I’m hearing that the Rams actually have a better chance to return to LVII than my Bengals do. Man, don’t gimme that now.

4. My parents have been here with us since December, helping us take care of their grandson. But it’s been super difficult for them to engage in one of their favorite pastimes: watching the local news wherever they are. It’s been all LA Rams, all day. Would it have been better to be in Cincinnati? I wonder what the mood there is like … because I can tell you it was awful post-game. I sent out texts to everyone to meet up. I felt it was the right time for us to mourn together. Nobody responded. They were simply too depressed. (Major shout-out to Neil, who came over on Monday to help ease the pain.) To think of the party that might’ve been… THAT many of my Cincinnati friends here in my LA backyard? We’ll likely never get that chance again.

4. The Bengals will probably win a Super Bowl before I see Halley’s Comet one more time (when I’m 85… if the Earth is still intact). But what makes me choke up is whether they’ll win one so my Dad can see it. He and I discussed this last night; he watched every game this season. He’s a lifelong fan. Thank God he got to see the Reds win three World Series. In fact, I’ve long wondered if leagues should rig it so that each team wins every 30 or so years. That way, you get to the Super Bowl every 16… you make the Conference Championship game every 8… and so on. It’s a terrible idea, but it’s the kind of desperation you feel as your parents age and you realize they might not see it at all.

Dad’s Got the Right Hat.

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I’ll Be Back

Well, them’s my thoughts. Jesus, if you printed this, it’d fill a stadium. Not sure why I began that sentence with “Jesus,” but perhaps because I saw Billy Graham? In the end, I’m glad I just said, “YOLO,” and did it. Then again, I’m Hindu. We live multiple times.

When I wrote the Bengals off in 2016, following the awful wild card loss that we gave away to the Pittsburgh Steelers in the waning seconds, I declared I’d return when they won a playoff game. Well, they did. And I’m a man of my word. This hurts a lot more than I thought it would. I’m still feeling really down over it, but my heart goes out to all of my friends, especially the season ticket holders, who have been Ride or Die for the Bengals their entire lives. My sincere condolences. I truly hope, with each passing day, the pill is getting easier to swallow.

As I woke up Monday morning, I once again saw my son’s smiling face, which cheered me up immensely. That night, my wife and I had the talk I’d been dreading ever since I made the solo decision to go to the game. We both teared up as she said what upset her the most was not that I’d bought the ticket but that I didn’t call her. She said that we’re always in it together and then asked, “Do you really think, when I heard it in your voice about how badly you wanted to go, that I would’ve said no? You know I always support you and would’ve given you my blessing. And you’d have had a better time, too… do-do-head.” Of course this was the right answer. Sheesh, it’s so obvious in retrospect. How could I not have thought of that? And right then and there, I forgave Zac Taylor for his bad calls during that last drive. What seems so right in the moment can later be revealed to be the wrong play.

Finally, I confessed my sadness of dressing him in the losing jersey to my wife, who eased my pain by reminding me that she had him don a University of Texas outfit… and they’ve sucked since she was an undergrad. (She saw the Ricky Williams year. Interestingly, he was the guest who sat down with Bill Maher right before Vivek on Friday.) Harsha and I discussed how it’s not about winning or losing. It’s about celebrating and commiserating with your community. It really is about how you play the game. When Novak Djokovic cried on the court and lost out on his chance to close out the Grand Slam at the U.S. Open, he gathered more fans than he would’ve had he won. (And after Flushing Meadows, he flushed all of that goodwill down the toilet by acting like a total douche at the Australian Open, but let’s set that aside for the moment.)

Above all, it’s about sharing our identity with our son. For all the foibles of Cincinnati/Ohio and Austin/Texas, they’re home. They’re who we are. And as long as we share that with Naveen and encourage him to embrace who he really is, he can never lose.

Rajiv Satyal is a comedian. He resides in Los Angeles. But he lives in Cincinnati.