Write On Sports LLC - "The True Fan?" by Danny Dolan

The True Fan?

2006-10-26 18:44:04 | By: Danny Dolan

Who is the biggest fan? To truly understand this question you must first understand why someone is cheering for a team. If you understand that, you understand the fan. There are four reasons people cheer for sports teams. These four reasons are relevant regardless of the team, the level of competition, the location and the sport, and they lead to the four basic categories of sports fan: Obsessive, Gregarious, Vicarious and Fiscal.

The Obsessive Fan: Joe Sport-O is rarer then most people realize. This is the guy that knows everything about every sport. The guy who can’t hold down a long-term relationship because there is some type of sporting event on TV 24/7. He can pull off the road and watch a seventh-grade soccer game amongst kids he is not related to and enjoy the hell out of the competition. He does not have a strong affiliation with any team, because he is about the competition not the result.

The Gregarious Fan: This is the fan that loves the town or school, and therefore loves the team. The pure gregarious fan knows nothing about the sport. She cheers loudly with complete ignorance. The likeable gregarious fan is a woman, the laughable gregarious fan is a man. Manufactures love them because they buy everything so that people know they are the biggest fan of the local team. This is your aunt in Boston that calls up and says, “My Patriot’s are going to make so many goals that your Rockies will not be able to make enough baskets to even keep it within a Grand Homer.” Gregarious fans are cute, especially if they are cute.

Vicarious Fan: The Vicarious fan is the lifeline of call radio. These are the guys that live or die based on the results of their team. They are the guys (and almost always guys) that publicly proclaim that they bleed the colors of their team. They miss work with real physical illness the day after a loss. They not only believe that the 12th man makes a difference, they routinely vote him the MVP. They know all the facts and stats and history of their team. They have multiple jerseys of their team. When speaking of the their team they will use the word “WE”, as if they are the team.

Fiscal Fan: This is the guy that has a financial steak in the outcome of the games. The guy that can recite the point spread. When asking his first date if she knows the over/under he is not suggesting a sexual position. He sometimes actually does (or is made to) bleed as a result of the outcome of the game. These guys really try and know all the facts, stats, and weather reports off all the games, but for completely different reasons than the Vicarious Fan. They are the lifeline of 1-800 numbers in the AM, and if truth be known are the lifeline of all televised sports.

So the next time someone says they love a sport, now you can have fun trying to find out why they love the sport.