“Wait since when do you cheer for them?" The band-wagon analysis

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 I really feel awful for true LA fans...Even their franchise knows that 90% of its fan-base are band wagon specialists.

If you follow sports actively and passionately no doubt you’ve experienced some pretty good highs and awful (and I mean AWFUL) lows as a sports fan.  Here are examples of my high (most shocking thing about that clip was Peja's rebound) and low... very, very low I did not watch the whole thing, just enough to make sure it was the right clip. These occurred within 3 days of each other and I was 10 at the time, but I can tell you every emotion that I went through, and where I watched these happen.  We can all agree that the highs are great, but the lows really do suck.  What makes the lows suck even more is when fans of the other team let you know what just happened, but this is fine, it’s a part of sports.  The thing that has the distinction of pissing me off and making the low even worse are special types of fans: band-wagon fans.  You know who this guy is, he was the first in line to buy a Lebron Miami heat jersey, he thinks Kobe is better than Jordan (I can’t even type that with a straight face)  His favourite NFL teams are the Colts, Saints, Patriots, Packers or who ever won the Super Bowl last.  He is quick to point out that he is a weird combination of a Barcelona and a Manchester United fan, and has been forever (or since 2007).  Lastly he was a Lakers fan in the early 2000’s (go re-watch some of their games; I do not think a more un-likable team ever existed).  In today’s world which is dominated by social media and you can get your opinion out pretty easily, it is very easy to spot the guy I just described.  During the NBA playoffs a guy who I have on Facebook went from cheering for the Celtics, to the Bulls, to the Heat to neutral (“I don’t mind Dallas!”).  Did anyone call him out on it?  Of course not, everyone else was a band-wagon specialist, and in this age, very few people born after 1990 are true sports fans.  When I say ‘true’ I mean you have a favourite team, you know about them and you actively follow them as best you can.  Personally, the teams I like have not had the best of times, Sacramento has not been relevant in the NBA for 7 years, the 49ers are an abomination, the Jays suck, and I do not really follow Hockey (but will, starting this year).  So when these teams are out of the playoff running right away; am I a band-wagon jumper for following another team?  Well, Yeah, but there are some key differences.  In this article I will outline what those differences are, as well as talk about the different types of band-wagon fans.  Now, before I get into it, I am well aware that Bill Simmons has written some pieces about this topic and I am sure many other writers have as well.  If anything here resembles other works on the Internet it is purely by accident (I can’t say I have read everything about this topic, therefore I don’t know what’s out there) and Full credit goes to those writers.  Now that we’ve avoided potential “You Copied sports writer/blog X” let’s get to it.  Starting in order from ‘acceptable’ all the way to ‘outrageous’.  Note: you can be more than one type of band-wagon jumper, it depends on the situation.

The ‘My team sucks this year, but I love the sport too much to not follow it at all’ Guy

I am this guy.  When Sacramento is 20 games below .500 in early January it is really tough to watch.  Not to mention that national television games offer a quality of basketball far greater than the one I am used to watching with the Kings.  So naturally I follow things and if I get swept into liking some players or teams for how they are playing, and get into ‘MVP’ and ‘who is better’ arguments so be it.  At the end of the season I will never acknowledge a title that my team did not win as my own.   For instance, I am very happy Dallas won, there are a lot of guys on that team that deserved a ring, and I had fun cheering for them.  Does their title mean anything to me? No.  If someone had offered me a Miami Heat title win this year but then guaranteed that Sacramento would win a title in the next 5... I take that deal.  At the start of the next NBA season (whenever that may be) you will not see me cheering for Dallas, I will be cheering for the Kings, like I always have.

‘I like a team, but I live in a city that has another team so I follow both’ Guy

This to me is perfectly fine, after all you are exposed to local coverage of a team so much it’s hard not to follow them in some way.  The only exception to this is if the 2 teams are bitter rivals.  A Yankee fan living in Boston would never cheer for the Red Sox.  In my case, unless the Raptors and Kings meet in the NBA finals (we are going to see 5 more helmet catches before that ever happens) I can support both.

The Fair-weather fan

Only there when the team is good, nowhere to be seen when they aren’t.   What can I say?  These guys lead a stress-free life.

‘I only like teams where this player is’

And so we start getting into the band-wagon fans that are annoying.  What makes things worse with these fans, is that the player they like is probably really, really good; meaning whatever team he goes to will become good as well.  These fans are not nearly as bad as some others, but they can get on your nerves pretty quickly when they compare Kobe to Jesus.

‘I have no rooting interest in this game, but I’m going cheer for this team just to piss this guy off’

Quick story:  Last Summer,  several friends and I are in Cuba.  The premier league season had just kicked off and I really wanted to see how Liverpool was going to follow-up on their 1-1 draw with Arsenal.  So I do some research and time-zone conversions and figure out a time and place to watch the game.  I invite Luka (our staff member) to come with me.  Him and I follow soccer actively, and I like watching games with someone who’s opinion I care about, plus we were on vacation together and I did not want to seem like a grumpy loner.  So we go to a room and start watching.  Meanwhile, the rest of our friends decide they have nothing better to do at a 5-star resort so they decide to come watch the game with us.  Again, perfectly fine except for a few things.  Firstly, half of them asked who I was cheering for and quickly started cheering for the other team.  Secondly, their soccer knowledge is ...limited, so their taunts were twice as annoying.  It all may have been OK had Liverpool not lost 3-0, and played so shit (side note: Fuck you Roy Hodgson, you are the worst. Coach. Ever.).  But just the thought that these guys went out of their way to piss me off at a 5-star resort (when they had a million other things to do) was infuriating.  This summer when we go I’m going to tip a maid to beat the shit out of them if they try to follow me to a room where I’ll be watching.  If you are one of these fans, just stop.  To my friends reading this, you’ve been warned.

The Band-wagon ‘Nationalist’

No matter what the circumstance is, if you are from a country, and that country is playing an important game you are allowed to cheer for them.  This includes small teams (like Red Star Belgrade and Partizan) in soccer attempting to qualify for the Champions League.  These types of fans will come out during every world cup; however the ones that are unacceptable band-wagon jumpers also exist.  These are the people who claim to be from a country but really are not.  I bring this up because if you know any Italians, you know how annoying they were when they won the world cup back in 2006.  Full disclosure:  I have no problems with fans being obnoxious, what I do have a problem with, is people who almost break their necks jumping on bandwagons that they do not belong on.  You know who I’m talking about, these people  can’t speak Italian, have never been to Italy, and know the names of 3 players on their team, yet when the world cup or European championship rolls around you will find these guys decked out in Italian colours yelling an Italian phrase they googled the other night.  My favourite? ‘Forza Azzuri”  (If they know what this means it is a small miracle).  This is not limited to Italians only, Portuguese, Serbs, Turks etc. are also guilty.  Italians are just the best example so I used them (sorry).

‘My team wins the championship every year’

This year this fan will be cheering for the following teams: Barcelona, Green Bay, Dallas mavericks, The San Francisco Giants, and the UCONN women’s basketball team.

There are definitely ones I have missed so please add them to the comments if you want to, I may add to this when there are more sports to write about.