The Categories of Fandom - Which one are you?

Twitter is an interesting place to interact with so many fellow fans of your favourite sports teams, and at times fans of rival sports teams.  We have all seen the conflicts that can result from this.  Some of it is mature and friendly, while most of it can get fairly vicious.

What I’ve noticed is that there are so many different types of fans.  And even within each type of fan, there are various levels of sports knowledge that can in itself create conflict. 

My focus as I write this will be on baseball and more specifically the Blue Jays, cause frankly that’s mostly what I care about.  Although much of this I'm sure can apply to other sports and teams.  I am going to attempt to categorise and describe the different types of fans.

The die-hard fan

These fans will root for their team no matter what.  They will watch every game or most games (as their schedule dictates), even if the team ends up in last place.  They always see winning on the horizon, even if that is 5 years down the road.  They believe it can happen.  These fans typically can name every guy on the 25 man roster, and often know many of the prospects coming up. 

This is a team’s core fan base that will stick with them through thick and thin.  They will take the emotional journey of winning and losing.  Their team becomes part of their identity.

 

The bandwagon fan

I’ve seen this description used very loosely in different ways.  The way I see it, the bandwagon fan only shows interest when their team is winning and is successful.  This is the fan that watches playoff games but not regular season.  Or maybe will watch the end of a regular season when it is crunch time and much is at stake.   But it can also be applied to fans who jump on board and follow the team all season when things are going well but will abandon the team in losing years.  These fans will stop following their team if they see no chance of postseason success.

Often on twitter you see this term used as an insult.  The reality is that there is nothing wrong with the bandwagon fan.  Although in most cases, when someone is being called that on twitter it is not true.  However, it is natural for people to want to be part of the success of their local sports team.  These can be exciting times when a city or country can share in something special.  Bandwagon fans buy tickets and watch games.   They also disappear fast.  A franchise that goes years without winning needs a core fan base of die-hard fans to be able to stay in existence. 

I’ve met many people in Toronto that would be able to name a dozen players from the 1992 / 1993 teams, but couldn’t name more than 3 players since.  Some of them hopped back on in 2015 and know about Josh Donaldson and Jose Bautista now.  They are not baseball fans really.  But when the Blue Jays have success and they hear the buzz, they will gladly hop aboard, buy a ticket or go watch the game with you at a local sports bar, and ask the person next to them how many outs there are in an inning.

The fickle fan

These fans are often mistaken as bandwagon fans, but I’m going to put them in their own category.  They are not bandwagon fans because they follow the team and watch most of the games regardless of the team’s success.  They don’t hop off the bandwagon in a physical way, but they do in an emotional way.  When the team starts to lose they quickly disassociate themselves from the team.  They become overly critical in an exaggerated way and position themselves as the one who always knew the team would never win.  They are quick to assign blame.  The GM and/or manager and/or struggling player become their enemy.  The GM/manager/player has taken away their joy of winning and they may see it as deliberate, or the result of incompetence.  Yes, these are the #fireGibby fans.  Any time a bullpen pitcher blows the game, it is the manager’s fault for putting him in the game.  They refuse to be sad at their team losing and instead position themselves in opposition to the team so that they are always on the right side of what is happening.  They vent their anger and frustration with what is going on in a very irrational way.  In a sense, they always have one foot out the door of their fandom but will never leave.

These fans are constantly positioning themselves for an “I told you so”.  They were against Shapiro before he even took a step into his new office at Rogers Centre.  They are against everything Gibby ever does.  They are against every move until they see that the move is working.  That way, if the move doesn’t work, they can say “I told you so”.  They make absolute statements like “playoff teams never lose games like this” or “they always don’t get a hit in these situations”.  They have a catastrophic style of thinking that magnifies a small thing into something much larger.  One bad game can set them off into a tailspin where they sound like they are no longer a fan of the team.  This creates conflicts with other fans, who find themselves having to be defensive and adding reason and rationality to the conversation.  It becomes as if the fickle fan no longer likes their team.

In some cases, these are hockey fans who apply their hockey knowledge to baseball.  If the best hockey team in the league lost a game 8-0 to the worst hockey team in the league, then there is an issue.  That probably should not happen.  Similarly in football, where glorious upsets are fairly rare.   But in baseball, a great pitcher can have a terrible day.  Or a terrible pitcher can have a great day.  It happens.  The best teams lose to the worst teams an awful lot in baseball.   Over 162 games, you get a lot of micro kinds of things happen that don’t make sense at the macro level.

If their team wins the World Series, these fans will tell you that they believed in them all along.  Hopefully they delete a thousand tweets that prove otherwise.

The championship fan

Ever meet someone who lives out west but is a Yankees fan?   They have zero ties to New York but they have chosen the team to be their favourite.  These fans would never choose the San Diego Padres, or Tampa Bay Rays.  They chose a winner.  Likely they made this choice in a year where the Yankees were dominating.  They buy the winning brand and associate themselves with it.  There is no geographic attachment whatsoever.  They root for the team that they believe will win the most and have the most success.  I’m not talking about New York folks who root for their Yankees.  Or even people who grew up before the Blue Jays existed and became Yankees fans because of the geographic proximity (and that Buffalo stations would play the Yankee games).

When the Red Sox built good teams over the last years, we saw “Red Sox Nation” grow.  These are “championship fans”.  They want the glory of their team winning, but the choice of who their team is, was based on probability of success. 

If their team ultimately loses, the first thing they will do is count World Series rings for their team vs. yours.

The anti-fan

These are the fans who don’t have a specific team to root for.   Instead, they have a team they root against.    Think Marty York.  We have all seen these types.  They will crap all over their targeted team and glorify the rivals of that team.  And guess what….. on average there is a 29 out of 30 chance that they will be winners at the end of the season.  Chances are that their targeted team will not win the World Series.  And assuming that is the case, they will claim victory for the season.  Their joy is for the fans of that team to feel the pain of loss.

Ask yourself which category you are in

Within each category there are variations to be sure.  I also think it is possible that some fans can change over time.  For example, a busy schedule in your work and personal life can leave little time to watch sports and maybe you find yourself a little bit in the bandwagon category because of time constraints.  In some cases a fan can hop aboard a bandwagon and never get off…thereby becoming a die-hard fan.  Also, a baseball season is very long, but in a given moment we forget how long it is and many people can find themselves frustrated and act a little fickle.  The purpose of this is to categorise the primary tendencies.  So which one are you?

All-Star Break - Blue Jays

Back by popular demand, I am writing a blog post.   Well, I am exaggerating by saying "popular demand" but one guy at least actually has missed my posts.

It has been an interesting first half of the season for the Blue Jays.   They had a very slow start offensively with many of the guys slumping all at once.   It was really hard to believe they could be that bad, but sure enough the offense has come around to what we had expected. 

Tulo got off to a real rough start and many Jays fans really had no clue what this guy was capable of.   Now he is back to being the Tulo that the Rockies fans grew to love.  His overall season stats may not be impressive but if you look at his stats since about mid May, he is hitting very well. 

Donaldson is being a boss and on his way to the all star game.  Thank you Billy Beane.  I don't know what voodoo magic Alex pulled off on you, but thank you, thank you, thank you.  

The 2 biggest pleasant surprises offensively have been Michael Saunders and Darwin Barney.  I wasn't sure what to expect out of Saunders after last season's knee injury, but I certainly didn't expect him to have a career year and being an all star.  As for Barney, I expected him to be a back up infielder with good defence.   I didn't expect this kind of offensive contribution.   There's a guy who really has increased his stock as a player.  

EE has been hot in June and July and has 80 RBIs already.   Not coincidentally, JD has scored 80 runs.  

Bautista has been on the DL.  Seems like they never quite get their full offensive power all healthy at once.   I will be happy when Joey Bats comes back.   

The starting pitching has been quite good.   Estrada and Sanchez are all-stars. Happ has mostly been the guy that shocked everyone with Pittsburgh after the trade deadline last year, other than a mini slump that he went through  Dickey is having his usual season where he sucks in April and then becomes way better than most will give him credit for or even realize.   Stroman has been the most inconsistent.  He was quite bad for a while there but the last couple of starts have been very good.   The big test fro Stro will be when he faces AL East opponents again.  That's who have given him the most trouble.  I wouldn't ever bet against the Stro Show.   His drive and determination will get him through whatever struggles he may face. 

There are concerns however.   Estrada's back has put him on the DL.  Let's hope he gets through it well.   Sanchez may or may not be working on an innings limit.  If he is, they will put him in the bullpen.   He has been so good as a starter that putting him in the pen will hurt.   Unless Jays add a starter before the trade deadline, that will likely put Hutch in the rotation.  

The bullpen has the been the worst component of the team for they year so far.  Had the pen been even average, this team would be in first place now easily.   However, there's been signs of big improvements.   Grilli has been excellent for the most part since they acquired him (despite giving up the homerun to V-Mart the other day).   Cecil is now healthy and looks better than he did in the early part of the season.  Chavez has been good, although scares me coming in with inherited runners.   I like Bo Schultz.   I don't trust Storen or Loup.   I expect some improvements at the trade deadline in this area.   Of course, if Sanchez moves to the pen, then adding a starter becomes the bigger priority.   I'd still like to add a lefty specialist in addition to Cecil but other than Loup.  

There were times in the early part of the season, when this team was frustrating to watch.   Even when you know "it's early", you also can't expect that the team will win at the pace they did in August and September last year.   But they won enough games when they weren't playing well to avoid digging too much of a hole to crawl out of.   After playing well in June/July, the Jays sit just 2 games back of the first place O's and tied with Boston (also tied for WC spot).   I still expect the O's to fade and the Sox are the team to worry about, but strange things happen in baseball. 

It will be an exciting 2nd half of the season!   Go Jays Go!

Blue Jays Twit

My thoughts after watching "The Colorful Montreal Expos"

Last night, MLB Network aired a wonderful documentary on the Montreal Expos called "The Colorful Montreal Expos".  It was an incredible documentary that brought back many memories and emotions for me, so I thought I'd share.....

I was born in Montreal and lived there until I was 7 years old, but even after I moved I still had that connection given that my parents would always consider themselves to be Montrealers.  I had grandparents and other family that lived in Montreal, plus I visited from time to time.  As I grew up in Toronto, there was always a piece of my heart that was still a Montrealer.  I really became a bigger Blue Jays fan than an Expos fan, but I considered myself a fan of both teams.  There was never any real conflict in that.  The Pearson Cup was just a fun exhibition game.  Interleague play came along and they would play each other in real games, but I don't believe any of those series were very consequential to either team.

The first baseball game I ever attended was at Jarry Park in Montreal in 1976.  It was Expos picture day, so I was able to go onto the field while my father took pictures of me and my brother.  My memory of this is quite fuzzy, but I'd imagine that the lineup to have your picture with star players was quite long, so I don't have a picture with the "Kid" or anything like that.  In fact, it seems like over time some of those pictures were lost.   Here is one that I have remaining with my brother and coach Ron Piche of the Expos.  You could see the Olympic logo on his jersey sleeve.

I'm the little guy on the right (6 years old).

Watching the documentary last night brought back memories of the passion that my grandmother had for that team.  She was a huge Expos fan.  In those days, many games were not televised, so she would always listen to the game on the radio.  The voice of Dave Van Horne, who appeared in the documentary, was part of my childhood.  I would sit at my grandmother's kitchen table listening to the game, playing cards with her and trying not to inhale too much secondhand smoke from the constant cigarette she had burning.  She was an emotional fan, although not a sophisticated fan.  She would complain about certain players and yell things like "ahhhh, he strikes out all the time!", or "I don't trust that Reardon!".  She would also get very pleased when the team was doing well and would always tell me how many games they were above .500.  When she would come to Toronto to visit us, she would always want me to find the Expos game on the radio, which was sometimes an impossible task.  She didn't seem to appreciate that Toronto had different radio stations than Montreal.

Overall she was a disappointed fan.  The pain of "Blue Monday" sat with her.  Those great teams in the 1980s that never quite got over the hump left fans feeling empty.  She didn't care much for the Blue Jays.  Montrealers often look at rooting for a Toronto team as a betrayal.  But in 1992 she was happy that the Blue Jays won the World Series because she knew how happy I was.  She was rooting for them for me.  She was too sick in 1993 and died that year.

During 1994, the Expos had the best team in baseball.  My initial thought was "oh figures, now that she's gone they are going to win it all".  But of course, the strike happened that year and the season ended without playoffs.  My thoughts changed.  I thought of how angry she would have been to see that happen to her beloved team, and maybe it was good that she didn't get to experience what was the ultimate disappointment for Expos fans.

I hope to see the Expos return to Montreal one day.  It just seems wrong for that team to no longer exist.