Mr. Kerry's wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, made a similar goof a few weeks back, when she tried to get points in Cleveland for being from Pittsburgh, perhaps forgetting the Browns-Steelers and Indians-Pirates rivalries.
The Indians and Pirates play in different leagues. They'd never met in a real game until interleague play started, and even so I don't think Pirates fans have any particular animus against the Indians (the Braves and Mets would be my two most hated NL teams, with the Astros my least favorite division rival).
The Steelers-Browns rivalry is of course quite heated, but she got the order wrong. (And the Pittsburgh-Cleveland rivalry goes beyond sports.) So Wilgoren is completely right on the substance. As if that were an excuse.
Also in the same article--how do you pronounce "Nevada"? Wilgoren says "(it's Ne-VAH-da, not Ne-VAD-uh)," but Dave Beisecker busted me for pronouncing it Ne-VAH-da. Is there just more than one pronunciation?
Posted by Matt Weiner at August 16, 2004 11:57 AM