Losing bonds sports fans
sapiens.org
sapiens.org
So the bonding stories are often the ones where we reminisce about bad times and about players who were marginal in the league but memorable to us. Also the judas story works nicely too, that's always some guy who has to make a living and he ends up joining the rivals.
If you're going to find out who really loves the club, because you know tribalism, you can't talk about the time you won the treble. You have to talk about that time you schlepped your friends across the country only to see them get reversed 3-2. Or when someone does yet another shitpost asking for the all time XI, you pull out that obscure defender they got on loan who was terrible and played only 5 games. Or that time you did a pitch invasion thanks to a cult player scoring an equaliser in an otherwise bad game that people were already leaving.
This screams Liverpool.
I can admire someone that is really at the top of their craft in just about any field. It is something to watch and be inspired and amazed by.
I never understand the concept of cheering for a team that sucks because of some loyalty. Loyalty to what exactly? The players come and go over the years, perhaps it's a loyalty to the owners? or as Seinfeld used to call it, "cheering for laundry".
I've enjoyed watching OKC, the Lakers, Raptors, and the Bucks during that time. I chock it up to him enjoying the sport a lot more than I do. I don't want to watch a team lose.
In truth if you've ever had a friend who changed clubs after the age of 10 they've been ridiculed for decades since.
I watch plenty of games by other clubs, I just don't care in the same way. Ronaldo or Messi would never play for my team, but I appreciate them in a sort of intellectual, emotionally distant way. Like how I watch NFL games, it's an interesting sport with strategically appealing elements. Do I really care whether Mahomes or Brady takes it? Nah.
Personnel is transient. That's why it makes sense to have loyalty to the identity of a team. That also elevates it from shilling a corporate entity to a lifestyle. Clubs often have relations and connections to their fanclubs, because they know they have a huge stake in the team and do hold some power. Also its more fun to watch sports if you have some skin in the game, instead of just observing 'neutrally', besides the social aspect. It's a kind of adhoc storytelling.
If you are referring to betting on sports as "skin in the game" when making it more interesting just is an excuse for your need to bet on something. I never bet on sports of any type, and enjoy it just fine. If you feel that sports on only interesting if you have money on the line, then maybe it is time to seek help.
The big difference is that members of the Olympic team are citizens of the country, so the connection to you is clear (one of your "own" is doing well), while that's not the case for local teams. Often, they're not even from the same country (ex. lot of players for Canadian NHL teams are from the US, and vice versa).
So the only local part is the shell itself. Sounds vaguely related to "Ship of Theseus" I suppose.
As the article explains, to your fellow fans.
So cheering for a team that hasn't won big in a long time doesn't necessarily mean watching bad play. They might just perpetually be short that one player or coach. And, as someone whose team is usually bad, when they do win it's so sweet.
Sure, it's cool to watch the championships, but that's being a fan of the sport, not the team.
In the past few years since, the team has continued to develop a reputation for choking. We have lost a number of high-profile games, where the predictive models suggested a 99% probability of winning near the end. Yet we still found a way to lose at the last second.
During this time, I have observed that fanbase has become absolutely toxic. To the point where I don't even enjoy talking with other Falcons fans anymore, and find that many Falcons fans tend to feel the same way. Our fandom is an isolating, silent shame wrapped in a blanket of bitter denial and deflection.
The fanbases of other NFL teams, such as the Cleveland Browns or Buffalo Bills, are known for being charming and loveable for their loyalty in the face of decades of futility. But this has not been the outcome for our fanbase, in the face of sudden and abrupt disaster.
This is just one counter-anecdote. But I wonder if there are "kinds" or "degrees" of losing, whose nuance matters? Or kinds and degrees of fan culture, prior to the bonding loss?
Or maybe the whole thing is just nonsense. I know there are studies linked here, but cultural anthropology is borderline-pseudoscience.
After that game, I noticed the Falcons fans in my town actually seemed more into the team (central GA at the time). Some people put away their apparel, but the ones who kept it up were more invested than ever.
Apparently it goes back to at least the 1800s in sporting use.
I think the experience of being a fan of true sad-sack franchises doesn't have the same effect. (Probably Bills fans were like that after their fourth Super Bowl loss.) A successful season for the Browns or the Lions is 8-8, so they never reach the point where they think "This is our year." You got to think this was your year to the latest possible moment.
I was in New Orleans for a professional conference and watched the game in the hotel bar. After that heart rending loss, I just wandered around Bourbon Street (still wearing my jersey) until the wee hours of the morning. I was greeted, chatted up, hugged, by fans of any number of teams, not even my own.
The "Fuck Tom Brady" factor may have played into this, which ties into the 'kinds' or 'degrees' of loss that you're leading in to. And yes, I certainly think there are degrees of losing.
If it's any consolation, I don't believe the Falcons were ever truly at 99%+ win probability, in the Super Bowl or in those blown leads this regular season. Most WP models, in my opinion, highly over/understate the true WP as they approach the extremes. Obviously ATL had a very high P(winning), but perhaps it was 96-97% rather than 99+. Seems like a minor difference, but from the NE side, if the Patriots truly had a 3.5% chance instead of a reported 0.5%, that's a 7x improvement. I've done some analysis on these models and written about it here: https://cfnine.com/blog/nfl-win-probability-part-1
t. Atlanta sports fan
Something like that, eh?
Losing might strip away the fairweather/bandwagoner fans, leaving only the people with a natural predilection to commitment. Winning might attract more bandwagon/fairweather fans.
You could probably test this by finding multiple teams that had around a 50% win percentage and finding fans that adopt them in early adulthood, like someone who goes to college in Indiana starting to root for the Indiana Pacers (basketball), etc.
If you build a sample of around 1000 people that adopted different middle-of-the-road teams, then followed them longitudinally, you could see whether they increase in commitment, drop out, or stay about the same with rising and falling fortunes of the team.
A lot of work, though. No doubt certain experiences shape perception of fandom, but I imagine it's different populations — not just the same type of starting population being effected by different events.
- Why Losing _Bonds_ Sports Fans: why when your team loses you strengthen your affiliations to your team. - Why Losing Bonds _Sports_ Fans: why throwing away good money on bonds is popular (I have no background to decide why bond investing in bonds might be a good or bad idea).
“Losing brings sports fans together” ok that makes sense.
Anecdotally, it seems like it should be more complicated too. As a New York Yankees fan who was in Massachusetts when the Boston Red Sox won their first World Series (Major League Baseball) in 80+ years, it seems winning was a pretty big bonding moment for Red Sox fans.
I think affinity must also be different depending on the region. If you go to Boston, there are signs everywhere for the Red Sox and Patriots. In Seattle, everything is all about the Seahawks. In the New York area, we have multiple teams in the major pro sports, so sport-team-affinity and location-affinity are necessarily more loosely coupled here.
Most of the records the team holds involved losing, like being the only NFL team to go 0-16. It's an extremely rare occurrence when the team makes the playoffs, the team has only won a single playoff game in its history and they promptly fired the coach.
The team hires General Managers who have zero management experience and they're going to keep doing it until they win. The Detroit Lions just traded the best quarterback the franchise has had since 1957 in his prime to begin yet another rebuild, such pure joy.
To me the class structure as it relates to English football clubs is far more important and deeper than than just the simple "identity fusion" and "dysphoric events" the article puts forth as the key bonding elements of football fans and their clubs
I'm a devout believer that sports fandom is all about wagering emotion. The more of your heart and happiness you "bet", the larger the payout when your team finally succeeds.
Consistent top 4 and a Champion's League place with a shoestring budget while City and Chelsea were spending like crazy is nothing to laugh at. You're ignoring the context and diminishing his achievement. Just look what happened to Arsenal after he left. He definitely is a legend, albeit not Fergie. But then who can come close Fergie.