OT, I know, but remember when this was redundant? Ah, high school.
Livin’ on Tums, Vitamin E and Rogaine
I know this is a little late, but I take serious offense to Satan’s comment regarding Bulls hats. I was a Bulls fan back B.M.J. (i.e. I remember when Jawann Oldham was my favorite Bull–yeesh), and I was able to reap the reward during the M.J. years. Not to mention that, considering the current Bulls team, wearing my Bulls hat is not exactly jumping on the bandwagon of a popular team…
SoxFan–while I share your enthusiasm (why do I always think of DeNiro playing another famous Sox fan when I say that word… :))for the Sox, I think that the company analogy is a bad one for most fans, particularly avid ones. I think that more would regard their favorite team almost as a member of the family. Now, while I might regard my (fictional) Uncle Fred as a supreme idiot, I don’t kick him out of the family after a few bad years…or even 80 or so. (And I might unfortunately point out that the Cubs have seen more postseason play than our favorite team in the last fifteen years…sigh…)
“You must not mind me madam; I say strange things, but I mean no harm.”
–Samuel Johnson
I gotcha, Chief! I can relate - it’s the same thing with music and bands. I was a huge Metallica fan in the early and mid 80’s when only hardcore metal-heads were into them (like Slayer fans).
You used to be shunned for sporting a “Metal Up Your Ass” shirt, but then they won “best HM band” and “best HM album of the year” and suddenly I saw black Metallica T’s adorning 8 year olds, bankers, and even grandma jumped on the bandwagon with a classic “Harvester of Sorrow” black tee.
I wanted to stone her then and there, let me tell you.
Soxfan59, there is a point to owner’s accepting failure as long as they are packing fans in at Wrigley. But there is something more fun about rooting for a team in spite of recent history. It makes the winning seasons seem all the better. Sure, I want them to win every year, but I also want to root for a team that doesn’t buy a title one year, dismantle the next, sit idle for a while, build a new stadium for revenue, threaten to relocate, etc. The Cubs provide year to year continuity (usually sub .500, but it continuity) but they also bring in lifelong fans because a person can identify players, have favorites and know they will stay around for a while, and it is the best dang ballpark in the world. The Red Sox may win a series first, but at least we had the good sense to get rid of Buckner when we did.
I got a lot of energy ready to be wasted on somebody - Mookie Wilson
Sez manhatten quoting me:
"‘a ritualistic stoning in the parking lot on your smoke break.’
OT, I know, but remember when this was redundant? Ah, high school."
Don’tja just hate it when you’re pithy, clever and funny and don’t realize it until someone points it out?
A doff of the cover to manhatten.
Heck, people like a winner. Everyone tends to side with the winners. That little instinct is one of the reasons our species has become so prosperous – if the group we’re “with” becomes a bunch of total losers, we can jump on a new bandwagon. There is NO rational reason to stay on board a sinking ship.
Loyalty to a team through thick and through thin is nothing more than displaced loyalty to one’s family. If you help your family out, you’re helping out people with copies of your genes, which benefits your genome. Shrewd – and devious – leaders know how to play up that family loyalty instinct into one that protects their group, even though their group carries none of your genome.
Oh, and GO DODGERS! 
Quick-N-Dirty Aviation: Trading altitude for airspeed since 1992.
Soxfan59, there is a point to owner’s accepting failure as long as they are packing fans in at Wrigley. But there is something more fun about rooting for a team in spite of recent history.>>>Mullinator
“Recent” history? To support an argument I put forth in another thread regarding how the Cubs and the Red Sox are somehow similar, the facts are these:
Since 1945, the last time the Cubs were in the World Series, the Cubs have finished over .500 in only 14 of 55 baseball seasons. I only did an overview of a few other teams, but its hard to imagine a greater record of futility for a single team over that time period. The laws of averages would indicate that if you don’t try, you should win a little more often. For example, if you compare the Cubs against other teams since 1969, we find that both the Cubs and the Padres have both had 9 winning seasons vs 22 years in which they lost more games than they won. Yet, the Pads have been to the Series twice in that time period.
So when does being a Cubs fan get to be “fun?” (That is, with anything having to do with the game on the field, not the other distractions the Cubs hold forth as being part of “Cubs tradition.”) A professor I had in law school explained that he grew up a Cubs fan, but after a while, if you keep hitting yourself in the head with a hammer, you stop, because it hurts so much. An apt analogy, I think. Wrigley Field, packed with Cubs fans, all with hammers protruding from thier brains.
SoxFan59
“Its fiction, but all the facts are true!”
Why despise them?
They buy that stuff (merchandise), don’t they?
The owner of you’re beloved (fill in the the name of the team that you live vicariously through) is in it for the money, no?
They (the bandwagoneers) may help keep your team in town.
I know you local franchise probably make a ton of money in other ways, but when a new stadium is required, the voters may have a say in it (e.g., Houston: then and now). Don’t think of them as bandwagoneers, think of them as “the lobbied.”
(the above remarks don’t really apply to Green Bay)
Dear Frankie:
Obviousily, you cannot read the English language. I said I have liked the 49ers since the days of John Brodie (I assume a football fan like yourself knows who he is). Believe me, there were a few lean years in there, including the season they blew a 20+ point lead and lost 30-28 to Dallas. Talk about the ignominy.
But thank you for your foul-mouthed and gratuitously rude post. It proves my theroem that only ignoramuses, losers and jerks root for NFC Central teams.
GO COLTS!!!
GO NINERS!!!
GO INDIANA UNIVERSITY!!!
And if y’all don’t like it, you know what part of my anatomy you can kiss.
Per Peyote Coyote’s last post, and back to my original post.
How can you root for two favorite NFL teams? If they played each other who’d you root for? That would be your team – no one else.
I understand all the benefits bandwagoneers provide for teams. I just want to reassert that those that follow and root for their teams through lean years are better fans. Those who jump on and fork over the bucks can be appreciated for the cash boost they give their teams and the league as a whole, but they still deserve a swift kick in the nuts. And I hate 'em.
(And I might unfortunately point out that the Cubs have seen more postseason play than our favorite team in the last fifteen years…sigh…)>>>> dramatoig
But our favorite team has just as many post season victories as the Cubs, despite one less playoff appearance. And, year in and year out, the White Sox, on average, have an exponentially more competitive team then the Cubs and, prior to the last strike, regularly outdrew them at the gate as well.
SoxFan59
“Its fiction, but all the facts are true!”
I’ve been a Cowboy fan since the days when Tom Landry used to tell Roger Staubach to line up in shotgun formation on third and six.
Win or lose, they will always be my team.
Of course when they finally won the big enchilada, I started to see a lot of Cowboy sweaters and hats.
If you’re hot, that’s good.
If you’re cool, that’s good.
I don’t get it.
So Wally?
Thru thick and thin is through a 1 and 15 season and a couple of 500 seasons??
Last time I checked they’ve been to the super bowl 5(?) times?? Yah I feel so bad for your fucking trevails! Get real you bandwagon shit. You jumped on the bandwagon and haven’t had reason to jump off yet!
Fuck you all!
Frankie-Who loves the Lions from 1-15 all the way through 500!
I think Frankie has some misplaced issues with Scott Mitchell, Andre Ware, and Rodney Peete that he is trying to dump off on Wally.
I got a lot of energy ready to be wasted on somebody - Mookie Wilson
I’ve been backing Dallas for more than a quarter century, and I’m on the bandwagon?
May your beloved Lions find ever more interesting ways to lose, if they have not already exhausted all the possibilities.
Fuck me?
Well, fuck you!
Communist.
If you’re hot, that’s good.
If you’re cool, that’s good.
I don’t get it.
I’ve been a Rams fan ever since they moved to St Louis. Granted, it hasn’t been that long, but hey, I’ve certainly satisfied the “lean years” requirement. So, I feel perfectly justified in staying on their bandwagon now.
And, Peyote Coyote… IU SUCKS!!! Bobby Knight is an overblown, loudmouthed, outdated, arrogant idiot! Kentucky kicks your ass in basketball every year and we have been in football lately, too. GO BIG BLUE!
Plunging like stones from a slingshot on Mars.
Mullinator-
You forgot Eric Hipple and Billy Sims, and Eric Andolsek, and Mike Utley, and Reggie Brown, etc…
and yah my issues may be a bit misplaced.
and Wally and Cowboy…I think you have won enough championships to soothe your souls against my little rants!
And Wally… there is nothing new with the Lions losses. They shoot themselves in the foot and lack in talent every game!
Frankie- Lions-If I don’t love em, Who will?
Dear ChiefScott:
Where is it written that one must restrict one’s affections to only one team per sport? I like both the Colts and the Niners, although I must confess the Colts are my favorite, and believe me, people, that has meant backing them in some pretty lean years.
I would point out they play in different conferences, so they rarely meet each other in the regular season. When they have met in the regular season, I generally support the team that needs the win the most, although I like to see the other make good plays.
If they were to meet in the Super Bowl, I would be in seventh heaven and yelling my fool head off on every play, although I suspect I would want the Colts to win on a last-second field goal. After all, SF has won more Super Bowls.
I remain in agreement with your opinion of bandwagon fans
Frankd6: Of course, Kentucky beats Indiana regularly. Big Blue is a pro team while IU is a college team. (Sometime, Frank, ol’ boy, compare how often the two schools have been hammered for gross violations of NCAA rules).
I am not going to defend the Sweatered One because he has turned out to be an embarassment to my alma mater, which incidentally enjoys a better national reputation for academics than Lexington High.
Finally, to the point of this thread, if rooting for Indiana’s football team does not prove I am a true-blue fan, nothing in the universe will. Talk about backing a team through lean years.
Frankie: You wouldn’t like it; I would just lie there and laugh.
Well, you gotta have a grudging admiration for Frankie. It’s been a long and bumpy ride with the Lions and he’s still there.
Frankie, I’m sorry I called you a communist.
Yankee capitalist oppressor!
Chief Scott et al,
I certainly understand your ire when confronted by these bandwagon Bozo’s; however, if you are a fan of any Chicago sports team, you have to root for someone else in the post season. In order for me to enjoy sitting through a game I wouldn’t otherwise care about, I fabricate a reason to like one team over the other. This year I picked Boston to root for. I am hoping that if Boston finally wins a series, they’ll forget about Bill Buckner (who I really liked when he played for the Cubs). Of course Boston aquired Beck. You would think they would have learned better. Do you think there is a connection between the Cubs’ curse and Boston’s?
“If you stick your finger in a pie, whatever is in the pie will be on your finger, and whatever is on your finger will be in the pie…unless you wear a rubber glove”----some demented old lady