Our Teams, Our Town

2009-06-27T04:57:00.001-07:00

So I finally made it to a Subway Series game last night. I didn't hold a ticket mind you. I just went to talk to people outside the stadium and find out why they rooted for their teams. I was particularly interested in groups, whether husband and wife, parents and children, or just a group of buddies wearing opposite team gear. I asked people when they started rooting for their team, and most of the time they said they were born into it, that their parents were fans of one team or the other. There were a few geographical accidents, which is to say that some who grew up in the Bronx became Yankee fans while some who grew up in Flushing were Met fans. But as always, there were exceptions.

I spoke with a few groups who, though they were uniformly for one team or another, had brothers or sisters who root for the other team. This didn't seem to be great cause of family friction, as the people I talked to generally pointed to specific reasons why their siblings turned out different than they ("My brother really got into the '86 World Series," or "My sister really liked Don Mattingly").

One man was there with his wife and new born son. It turned out he was from England, and he became a Met fan because he too watched the '86 World Series which, curiously, was broadcast in England, I suspect more as a curiosity than anything. He also said he despises the Yankees because he equates them with the British soccer team Manchester United, which has a similar aura about them as the Yankees--they spend the most money on talent, they are seen as the team that always wins, etc. This guy hates Man U., and views the Yankees as the American equivalent.

There was definitely some griping about ticket prices. Many fans of both team said they had reduced the number of games they come to because of the expense. Playing the devil's advocate, I asked if they would rather the teams were unable to sign the likes of Johann Santanna or CC Sabathia if it meant keeping ticket prices lower. Most people were unwilling to make that concession--they'd rather have a competitive team on the field. Still, I didn't get the sense that meant that teams have a blank check to charge anything they want to. A father who said he used to take his son to about 15 games per year said that last night, in late June, they were only at their third game together. He felt it was vital to take his son to games, but that he couldn't and wouldn't pay the elevated ticket and concession prices as often.

All in all you gave me some good insight into fandom. Please keep it coming! I encourage you to post here your thoughts on why you root for the team you do. And I hope to see you outside the Stadium and hear your story!

--Matt

Awe

2009-03-31T18:06:00.000-07:00

Talking (well, e-mailing) with a Yankee fan, I'm struck by how many of them speak of the "awe" they feel for their team. That seems a strange word. I've been awed by the Sonoran Desert and the glaciers on Mount Ranier, and I've been awed by the human capacities for generosity and stupidity, but I can't imagine being awed by a baseball team, no matter how impressive.

Yankee fans, please explain!

--Matt

Narratives

2009-03-26T19:28:00.001-07:00

I'm finding that the more I think about this topic and write about it, the more I find that we root for our teams because we embrace the story behind them. It's about the narrative, just like when we vote for a political candidate. We may or may not agree with every policy position of that candidate--we may not even be aware of all his or her positions. But the campaigns spend a good deal of time weaving a "narrative" behind their horse, and they make no bones about this fact. We won't agree with everything our team does, every personnel move they make or what have you (as the blogs will attest), but we latch on to that narrative, that story that explains our team.

Maybe fandom is nothing more than storytelling in another form.

Thoughts?

Introduction

2009-03-25T09:00:00.001-07:00

Greetings sports fans and observers of the human condition!

I've started this blog because I want to hear about people's reasons for rooting for the teams we do. In New York, some of us root for the perennially-front-running Yankees, while some of us root for the loveable-loser Mets. Why? What is it about the narrative of the front-runner or that of the also-ran that we latch on to? Most Angelenos root for the Lakers, who are good every year. But some root for the Clippers, who are terrible almost every year. What's the appeal either way? What fun is it to root for the team that always wins? What fun is it to root for the team that always loses?

Is it easy to root for a front-runner, even with the pressure of high expectations all the time? Is it tough to root for the also-ran, though the fallible look more like us and are therefore forgiveable? What is it we're buying into?

And then there are Cubs fans....I'd love to better understand the makeup of the Cub fan.

Surely, the accident of geography figures in to this. If you're born and raised in Michigan, you're a Tiger fan. Born and rasied in New England? Red Sox. South side of Chicago? White Sox. In New York, and to some extent Los Angeles, geography doesn't predict one's allegiance as obviously as anywhere else. Fandom becomes much more a choice here, an identity we choose to assume or shun. What goes in to that choice?

As Harray Caray said, "Lemme hear ya!"