Reconciling My Sports Fandom

This year I’m starting to experience difficulties in my fandoms of certain teams versus the larger picture of whom I am and what I represent in a new age. Many of you who have read AD&AD over the years know that I was a sports junkie – and unknowingly to you, I really don’t pay attention to the contests anymore beyond what my alma mater and the Miami Heat basketball team do because life is so much more than a game. In case you missed it, we finally cut the cord to save money:  Despite thousands of cable channels, we only watched at maximum twelve shows on a weekly basis and the files saved to our DVR were so extensive that binge-watching each show would’ve been time-prohibitive.

But more of that some other time – just not today.

I’m already enough of a contradiction as are most of us (if you really look in the mirror and admit it to yourselves). For example, I’m the guy who lives in a mostly white neighborhood and wears a Black Lives Matter t-shirt on my days off to smoke ribs in the backyard and practically lives in a white Tommy Hilfiger baseball cap. Then there is also my fandom of two specific Boston-area teams:  the Red Sox and Patriots; I cannot surrender years of loving the Miami Heat for the damned Boston Celtics, and my Starter jacket was the San Jose Sharks NOT the Bruins.  Allow me to explain those before any more castigating happens like this.

Boston Red Sox

Years ago when I packed up a little red crossover and moved cross-country for a job (big mistake, but I met some pretty great guys and gals – their relationships come in a different blog), I was a typical Arkansan whose own team passions were the club with the tightest ties to the home state (Dallas Cowboys, St. Louis Cardinals/Atlanta Braves) and who once lived for Razorbacks football game days at War Memorial Stadium in Little Rock and have the memories from the old Ray Winder Field which has been converted into another concrete jungle, but this time for state employees. In New England, the Saturday afternoon college football games weren’t the religious blowouts (pit masters and fry daddies cooking those second to none pregame meals along with Arkansans of all stripes unifying for the flagship school to take down Alabama, Ole Miss, Texas, Auburn, Mississippi State, South Carolina, Tennessee, and of course, LSU) that I was accustomed to back home in the South so I drove nine miles into town to catch whatever ESPN was showing that particular afternoon. That also meant calling the Hogs (Woo! Pig! Sooie) was initially met with some crazy looks until Arkansas began playing and as the cameras showed the state’s third largest city* in Razorback red and white raising arms, people understood what I was doing and why I wore my Arkansas t-shirt every Saturday that fall.

*Reynolds Stadium in Fayetteville holds eighty-something-thousand souls to capacity. This is the reason why I consider it Arkansas’s third largest city on game days only after Little Rock and Fort Smith.

Whoops, I digressed. Here’s the real story of how I became a Red Sox fan:

Rewind back to October 2006 with me. Remember two years earlier when the Boston Red Sox ended their 86-year curse between World Series titles? We beat the St. Louis Cardinals to get over the hump and I remembered (at the time) how respectful Cards fans were during the sweep. Perhaps the moment was too big for Albert Pujols and Co., but beating the Yankees alone would’ve been enough much less the way we did it coming back from 3-0 with New York pulling out the brooms in anticipation of a sweep in the ninth inning of Game 4 to winning Game 7! Anyway, I was working for a certain environmental nonprofit organization which implicitly encouraged drinking at its development days (alcohol was discouraged before 4 pm, but no one really observed that rule especially with a few working kegs nearby) and listening to the MLB playoffs during a go-kart race. My car simply happened to be the first one parked past the finish line and as participants finished the race, we all congregated around the tailgate and proceeded to destroy a 30 pack of PBR. It did not matter that the Cards were beating the New York Mets for the NL pennant as much as a country boy switching his team allegiance to Red Sox Nation and having a blast drinking with longtime citizens and Massholes* many of whom are still friends to this day.

*Massholes comes from how Massachusetts residents drive. For further proof, check out I-95 through Boston or the Turnpike, or note any car with the MA license plate.

New England Patriots

You’d never think of it, but in my family, being a fan of any club aside from the Dallas Cowboys was a bit of sacrilege. Yet one wide receiver made it cool to be a Pats fan:  Randy Moss. Here is Mr. I-Play-When-I-Wanna-Play lining up in the red, white, and blue catching touchdown passes from the greatest quarterback of this era buying into what we all know as the Patriot Way. While I wish that 2007 team could’ve finished the job and become the greatest undefeated team in NFL history, fifteen seconds and one miraculous catch made us 18-1 instead of the 19-0 we were so destined to become. Two things I respected (and a draw to Pats Nation) were the attention to detail and the “do your job” mantra extolled by Coach Bill Belichick that no player is bigger than the system, not even one surefire Hall of Famer Tom Brady.

Now what does this have to do with my fandom?

Simple:  I’m still a black man in a United States of America, and for enough people, my skin color trumps (not funny, but true) the love I have for the Red Sox and Patriots in 2017.

You can also say 45 and the alt-right have forced me to question what I like about New England – the football team, not the region. I’ve also explained to my god-brother just because the racism up North isn’t in-your-face as it is here in the South, it doesn’t mean it you won’t know and feel the covert microaggressions such as having no sales person open a fitting room at the Gap or being ignored at Chili’s and the manager begrudgingly has to comp the other members of your party in spite of your very presence. Let’s not go into why I feel the way I do about law enforcement as a few rotten apples view you as guilty forcing you to prove innocence – and even then, no apologies for the mistreatment or false accusations.

These circumstances, among others, are what brought us to the events surrounding Adam Jones from a few days ago at Fenway. Super fans who had too much to drink threw peanuts at him – and considering how black athletes have historically been treated in Beantown (see Bill Russell’s own comments for why), definitely a reminder not to visit during free agency. Even more than SEC schools, Boston-area fans tend to “own” their players more so than in some of the more segregated cities such as Chicago, Milwaukee, and St. Louis expecting them to stick to sports instead of addressing the inequities of society! Although David “Big Papi” Ortiz is best known for the expletive-laced saying after the Patriot Day bombing, one could only wonder about his own legend if he had not transcended race as the outfielder who willed the club to its third World Series crown in a nine-year span in 2013. Would he have just been another Dominican ballplayer without the October heroics?

Orioles notes: Adam Jones uses donation to continue conversation on race https://t.co/BGjipCKBUY pic.twitter.com/CGOU3dJDkW

— Baltimore Sun Sports (@BaltSunSports) May 14, 2017

I know, everyone loves a winner until he loses (Alabama quarterback Jalen Hurts), and to some, does something controversial enough to upset the hierarchy of privilege (when for 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick knelt during the National Anthem – which he was entitled to do within his First Amendment right, or is that a whites-only entity?) leading to scores of criticisms from the so-called morality police in addition to those who supposedly are the arbiters of right and wrong in an unequal nation (Bill O’Reilly, Skip Bayless). You know, the one that claims to have equal rights to all men except for those who pick my cotton or vegetables; value your outspoken nature until it exposes fundamental hypocrisies in how justice is meted; and marveling at your articulate speech and underpaying for your intellect (former President Barack Obama).

Not every sports fan represents the worst of humanity; sadly, they are the ones whose foolishness has come to symbolize an entire fan base. Growing up in the Natural State, it would have been nice to see a black starting quarterback for the Hogs in the past twenty-five years since the University of Arkansas joined the Southeastern Conference, but it’s pretty safe to say boosters have a hand in converting brothers to receivers, running backs, cornerbacks, and any other position simply to prevent seeing them under center leading the offense and otherwise being the face of the program. The talent has always been on the Hill yet the only brother that got serious run was Quinn Grovey – and I was ten years old when he kept Arkansas a regular participant in the Cotton Bowl!

I graduated from a PWI fifteen years ago – Henderson State. It’s pretty safe to say that was an incredibly fun four-and-a-half year period of my life where I met my wife and best friends; cheered on fraternity brothers as the football team barely won one game per season and unconditionally supported the men’s and women’s basketball, baseball, swimming, and softball teams in competition; learned about myself as a manager, mentor, and student alike; and those house parties in the WO! In reconciling my own sports fandom, we play the game not only to win but to also develop life skills that translate into higher levels of teamwork and leadership that will take us further than what some peon across the street yells at us from the free-throw line.

Being passionate can cross into being boorish if we as fans do not police ourselves from showing our worst characteristics.