Most of the time, if your’e a fan of a professional team sport, the team you follow is going to be the one closest to you. In North America, however, some teams’ markets are divided by international borders. How much do you think that cuts into a team’s fan base? For example, the closest MLB team to people in the Buffalo/Niagara Falls metro area is the Toronto Blue Jays but I haven’t heard anything about baseball fans from Buffalo supporting the Blue Jays. Likewise, the closest NHL franchise to Seattle is the Vancouver Canucks but I don’t think the team has hardly any support in the Seattle area. Of course, there are instances where the opposite is true such (e.g., the Los Angeles Dodgers and Dallas Cowboys have substantial fan bases in northern Mexico). So, this thread is for Dopers who live in areas near the US/Canada and US/Mexico borders who are fans of baseball, basketball, football, and/or hockey but whose closest professional franchise is the opposite side of the border. Does that border affect who you root for?
One of my good friends lives in Windsor, Ontario. He’s a Detroit Tigers fan, not a Toronto Blue Jays fan.
The MLB Fandom map (I can’t link right now but you can Google it ) shows a very small number of border crossings as you describe them. There’s a small but well populated chunk of southWestern Ontario where the Tigers are the prominent team, not the Blue Jays. There are also small sections of Quebec, mostly, where people are more likely to follow the Yankees or the Red Sox than the Blue Jays. According to that map, though, that’s about it.
Back in the 80s I spent some time around Kitchener and London, Ontario, and was struck by the number of Tigers fans I encountered despite the presence of the Blue Jays just up the road, and the Expos also being a Canadian team. It helped that the Tigers were a very good team at the time, and the Blue Jays were not. I do wonder if this is something that is changed over time, as ancestral Tigers fans die off and are replaced by Bluejay followers.
I spent some time in Buffalo this last year as well, and there certainly is some enthusiasm there for the Blue Jays. It helps that the Buffalo bisons farm team is now connected to the Blue Jays, rather than the Indians or the Mets. but most Buffalo people I met were Yankees followers, with perhaps a smattering of Cleveland fans. Someone who knows the area better would be able to tell you more, I’m sure.
Who does he follow in the NHL: the Leafs or the Red Wings?
[QUOTE=Ulf the Unwashed]
The MLB Fandom map (I can’t link right now but you can Google it ) shows a very small number of border crossings as you describe them. There’s a small but well populated chunk of southWestern Ontario where the Tigers are the prominent team, not the Blue Jays. There are also small sections of Quebec, mostly, where people are more likely to follow the Yankees or the Red Sox than the Blue Jays. According to that map, though, that’s about it.
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I recall reading awhile back that the Red Sox had a notable following in the Maritimes. I don’t know if that’s still the case but I do notice the Red Sox no longer have any Canadian radio stations broadcasting their games.
If the Red Sox have any following at all in the Atlantic provinces it doesn’t show up on that map (which admittedly only shows the team MOST followed, without giving an idea of what might be second, or how close that second team is).
That being said, I do know a man who is originally from New Brunswick. (We both live in NY state.) He is a Red Sox fan, but in hockey (which is the sport he follows much more closely than any other) he follows the Maple Leafs. Then again, he’s fairly old–he would have been born in maybe 1955, so there were no Canadian MLB teams at all till he was a teenager, and the Blue Jays didn’t come along till he was in his twenties and had moved to the US permanently.
My guess would be that like the Tigers fans who used to live around London and Kitchener, what Red Sox fans there once were in the Canadian Atlantic are disappearing quickly.
Why just international borders? It happens with state borders in the United States too. There are a lot of Ohioans who are Cleveland Cavalier fans even though they live closer to the Detroit Pistons or Indianapolis Pacers because the Cavs are the “Ohio team.” I imagine there are other cases like that.
Not to speak for the OP, but the effect in MLB anyway is much stronger wrt the Blue Jays and Canada than with most states.
In Ohio, according to the map (which I will link here, now that I can: http://regressing.deadspin.com/heres-facebooks-2015-mlb-fandom-map-1695021778) Toledo and several other counties in the NW part of the state are Tigers territory, and there are even a couple of Pirates counties in the eastern section of the state.
Several chunks of PA don’t go for either the Pirates or Phillies; part of the area around Harrisburg and York roots for the Orioles, the area around Scranton includes mostly Yankees fans.
Most of northern Florida is Braves territory, not the Marlins or the Rays.
There are other examples…the most notable is the southern half of IL, which is totally Cardinals country.
Not to say that state lines don’t matter, because in some cases at least they clearly do; but the international boundary is much more of a barrier. At least, again, where MLB is concerned.
I’ve heard that the Buffalo Sabres count on a number of Canadians crossing to border to come to their games.
I went looking and found this: http://www.brianmmills.com/uploads/2/3/9/3/23936510/10mills__rosentraub_-_cross_border_fandom_in_the_nhl_jse_2014.pdf
The argument is that “conservatively” about 15% of people coming to Sabres games travel from Canada.
However, that doesn’t imply that these are necessarily Sabres fans, just that getting to Buffalo is easier than getting to Toronto for a lot of people on the Niagara peninsula, plus which Sabres tickets tend to be cheaper and easier to get.
The authors do say that Canadian attendance at Sabres games increases when other Canadian teams are the visitors, and especially (and this would not be a surprise) when the Leafs are in town.
Interesting stuff.
And in Canada, too. Many older hockey fans in Alberta are more fans of the Toronto Maple Leafs or the Montreal Canadiens, than they are fans of the Calgary Flames or Edmonton Oilers. Why? The reason is simple: when they were younger, there were no Alberta NHL teams; and the only hockey games on TV came from Toronto or Montreal. So they grew up with the Leafs and the Canadiens, and fandom took hold.
More to the OP, ask Canadian NFL fans who “their” teams are, and be prepared for a surprise. Canadian NFL favourites have no apparent rhyme or reason–you’d expect Toronto fans to like the Buffalo Bills (they’re the closest NFL team, after all), but that’s not going to be the case. One of my Toronto friends followed the Miami Dolphins, another liked the Cowboys, and I myself liked the 49ers. Here in Alberta, I know Steelers fans, Packers fans, Bills fans, and Broncos fans, among others; and I still follow the 49ers. Canadian NFL fandom may seem to make no sense to our American friends, but since there are no Canadian NFL teams, and the sport is broadcast and heavily followed here, it may be the only possible response.
That’s similar to what often happens in Seattle when the Blue Jays come to town to play the Mariners. A large influx of people from Victoria and Vancouver come down to root for the Jays. In fact, during times when the M 's are struggling and the Jays are in contention, it can seem the Jay fans outnumber the M’s fans by 2 to 1.
I was going to mention this earlier but it seems in situations like the one I described in my OP, you’re more likely to find Canadian (or Mexican) fans rooting for the American team just across the border than American fans rooting for a nearby Canadian team. Of course, I could be jumping to conclusions.
Supposedly when the Sabres were added as an expansion team, it was intended to be a semi-Canadian team, since it was right on the border.
So the idea was to also attract hockey fans in the Hamilton, Ontario area rather than give the city its own NHL franchise? How well did it work?
Most Buffalonians I know are Mets or Yankees Fans, despite not only the greater proximity of the Blue Jays, but also the Pirates, Indians, Tigers, Phillies and even DC (Queens is further from Buffalo, but the Bronx is closer.) State borders, much less national ones, can have a huge say in fanbase support.
Check out a fanbase map. While there’s a fair amount of slosh-over between states, especially in those states that don’t have an in-state team, state lines do account for a lot of fan support.
I’ve met a few Jays fans in Buffalo. The fact that Toronto now has its AAA team there is beginning to grow the fanbase.
However, Buffalo fans are still largely Yankees or Mets fans. Much of this isn’t due to the border; it’s the television rights. The Toronto Blue Jays own the local broadcast rights to every square inch of Canada, but once you have crossed the Peace Bridge into Buffalo, your games will be Yankees and Mets games. People will naturally want to be fans of the team they can see on the tube.
If you think about it, this goes a long way to explain Spoons’s observation that there is no rhyme or reason to Canadian support for NFL teams; you can see any number of NFL teams on TV here, so it makes little different what team you support. If you want to cheer for the Niners they’re on TV every Sunday just like every other team.
[QUOTE=NDP]
So the idea was to also attract hockey fans in the Hamilton, Ontario area rather than give the city its own NHL franchise? How well did it work?
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It works pretty well. Depending on opponent and the state of the Canadian dollar, attendees at Sabres games are 10-30% Canadian, which is a pretty significant chunk. So many fans are Canadians that the Sabres play the Canadian anthem even if there isn’t a Canadian team involved.
One of the arguments against a team in Hamilton is that it would seriously hurt the Sabres. That is, frankly, quite plausible.
Speaking as a person with many family members in the Windsor area I can attest to the fact that Detroit teams are much beloved there.
A few years ago I stopped in a rest area on the New York State Thruway that was about 60 miles east of Buffalo. These areas have several fast food places and a kind of drug store to pick up various things. In the area with the sports teams memorabilia (bumper stickers, shirts, glasses,etc) it was all Yankees. No one else. 90 years of winning tends to make fans of a team 350 miles away.
I suppose geography can play something. My mother was from western Pennsylvania and commented once the favorite teams of her friends were the Pirates and Indians. Phillies were too far away and besides they had a 30 year period of losing records in 29 of them.
Consequently in the NYC area, you can find lots of boomers who are Cowboy, Dolphins or Redskins fans because those teams were good and the Giants and jets stunk when they were growing up.
Anecdote =/= data, of course, but Mrs. SMV’s family is from York, and they all rooted for the O’s. Except for my mother-in-law, who for some perverse reason, was a Brooklyn Dodgers fan.
Detroit Tigers fan here. There’s plenty here in my city, too!
It’s not unusual to find quite a few folks from British Columbia, Alaska and Oregon at Seattle Mariners games. Sat next to a couple from The Yukon at a game a few years ago. There are also strong Seattle area support for the Canucks, the line crossing back into the US at Blaine after a Canucks game can take a while. I also know some folks that make regular trips to Portland to watch the Trailblazers since Seattle had the Sonics stolen. Being in the Northwest (and Western Canada) provides a much larger area to draw from, we don’t have other teams nearby. The owner of the Canucks has made it known he does not support moving an NHL franchise to Seattle, it would likely cut into his teams fan base.