One of the most detestable part of American sports is when Yanks say "I don't follow a team I follow players" Makes me violently ill
Replies
Don't they regularly change the team that they support?
aug 22, 2025, 7:41 am • 0 0 • view
Yes but it's usually correlated with their favourite player going there. E.g. LeBron James going to LA or James Harden leaving Houston
aug 22, 2025, 7:43 am • 0 0 • view
Strange culture.
aug 22, 2025, 8:04 am • 0 0 • view
In any sense, Cobblers-Keywords is talking shit - this phenomenon does not exist in rugby.
aug 22, 2025, 8:06 am • 1 0 • view
Especially not in Wales
aug 22, 2025, 8:08 am • 0 0 • view
Indeed, when I went to an NBA game they dropped Chick Fil'A sandwiches suspended by parachutes onto the crowd at half time. If you can put me in touch with House of Luxury I want to organise something similar with Jenkins's Bakery Sausage Rolls
aug 22, 2025, 8:08 am • 1 0 • view
The Llanelli Molten Beans n Sausage Pasty Disaster of 2026.
aug 22, 2025, 8:11 am • 1 0 • view
If only Neath would do the same with faggots and peas from the market.
aug 22, 2025, 12:09 pm • 0 0 • view
I did move to Pontcanna around the time Halfpenny went to Scarlets but that was just a coincidence
aug 22, 2025, 8:06 am • 1 0 • view
I would have gone with "we're world champions!!!" Myself
aug 22, 2025, 6:40 am • 0 0 • view
1/ Not me. I follow five teams: Raiders (NFL), Blazers (NBA), Sabres (NHL), Reds & Royals (MLB; long story). When a player is traded or moved on from one of "my" teams, I refer to them as "former" players of "my" teams. The last time one of "my" teams won a title was in 2015, when the Royals won the
aug 22, 2025, 4:23 pm • 0 0 • view
2/ World Series (baseball). If a player from one of "my" teams leaves to "ring chase", I wish them well. The Sabres have never won a Stanley Cup; the Raiders last won a Super Bowl in 1984 (1983 season); the last (and only) time the Blazers won the NBA title was 1977 and the last time the Reds won a
aug 22, 2025, 4:26 pm • 1 0 • view
3/ World Series was in 1990. BTW: you can respect players on other teams without being a fan of the team for which they play. It's slightly complicated, to be sure.
aug 22, 2025, 4:30 pm • 0 0 • view
It's all tied into the prevalent American attitude that sports are first and foremost an entertainment product rather than a community thing.
aug 22, 2025, 8:06 am • 5 0 • view
Whoop Whoop!
aug 22, 2025, 5:12 pm • 0 0 • view
Yes and no. In some some areas particularly with American football & baseball it is extremely community oriented & cultural. Look at teams like the Bills or the Yankees (yes even now)These are v. Tied into the community & the culture of those communities. It’s only been recently that has changed
aug 22, 2025, 2:07 pm • 2 0 • view
Yes but even say when the B’klyn Dodgers moved to LA there are still ppl who are v. attached to them & refused to root for the Mets. But went on to root for the LA version in some cases & some didn’t. College is v. different bc you root for the places you went to yourself so it is a wider community…
aug 22, 2025, 3:45 pm • 2 0 • view
& it’s amateur ( or at least was) so there isn’t that sense of corporate control or 1 owner ruling the roost ( & local ownership is another thing). My father played 🏈for University of Buffalo on the 60s when it was a big team. Even now members of my family w/ no relationship to it support it..
aug 22, 2025, 3:45 pm • 0 0 • view
And he will only watch college football bc it is “cleaner” than the NFL ( the other thing he’ll watch is 7s). So in that sense it’s very different & much wider than in Europe even on the college level. And even that system is changing a lot. But there is a lot of emotions on supporting…
aug 22, 2025, 3:45 pm • 0 0 • view
The Baltimore Ravens a replacement team as the original team was “stolen”. So that team got a lot of support from that community even tho I think it only started in the 90s (?). But what really changed is that ppl were moving to a Vegas, LA, Phoenix , Florida & yes entertainment biz but ppl needed
aug 22, 2025, 3:45 pm • 0 0 • view
Something to put roots too. We have in America a sense of rootlessness that doesn’t really exist in Europe. And that rootlessness is very internal. So ppl needed to make these cities & these internal immigrants feel at home.
aug 22, 2025, 3:45 pm • 1 0 • view
Also on owners. Local owners like Steinbrenner for the Yankees in the 70a or the Pegulas in Buffalo make a big difference. Lots of these teams were owned by local families & that’s gone. It is rare to have a billionaire family in KC. So as soon as it went corporate it really changed.
aug 22, 2025, 3:56 pm • 1 0 • view
I think on this I absolutely don't object to teams being founded to support new markets. It's the moving of teams that gets me - this idea that in order to build in one place you have to tear something out of somewhere else.
aug 22, 2025, 4:03 pm • 1 0 • view
I get what you mean tho but I think it’s one of the reasons why I don’t like American sporting culture that much. Also hate watching baseball, 🏈 is violence punctuated by committee meetings ( h/tGeorge Will) & hockey leaves me cold (my father worked for the Sabres too & I slept through many games..
aug 22, 2025, 4:16 pm • 0 0 • view
But I like playing all except American football which girls were never encouraged to play.
aug 22, 2025, 4:16 pm • 0 0 • view
I recognise it's a reality of the franchise set-up but (speaking as a big NFL, MLB and NHL fan) it's always been an aspect of American sport I've struggled with.
aug 22, 2025, 4:03 pm • 1 0 • view
Yeah it bothers Americans too. I remember when the 1st ice hockey teams went to Florida. It was like who plays hockey in Tampa? But the teams were following their ppl. All of those ppl from upstate NY were moving to FL, Phoenix & wherever. So look at it like a moving of a tradition like rugby…
aug 22, 2025, 4:09 pm • 1 0 • view
I agree it's definitely true of a number of the older teams (particularly in baseball) but I do feel the number of those is dwindling fast. The As moving to Vegas for example was a tragedy (and even the As used to be in Philly and Kansas City!)
aug 22, 2025, 2:20 pm • 1 0 • view
I do think those teams are the last bastion of American pro sport that is still really community centred. I've always had a theory that one of the reasons college sport is so uniquely big in the US is that unlike the major leagues those teams don't go anywhere, so generations of fans stay with them
aug 22, 2025, 2:23 pm • 1 0 • view
With the exception of the NFL, all core American sports (Hockey, Baseball, Basketball) are played over an insanely long number of games/season. There is less on the line until playoffs, and most years the team who finish top of the conference don't win the finals. Therefore, they can afford
aug 22, 2025, 5:40 pm • 0 0 • view
To have more games that are just occasions more than anything else. There is less on the line for the fans so they can swan around eating and drinking and taking in the entertainment. Hell, we regularly pay $20 to go to baseball here. I hate baseball, but it's an entertaining night out!
aug 22, 2025, 5:40 pm • 1 0 • view
Baseball is the most insanely boring sport but sitting with a couple or friends talking crap for a few hours over pints while something happens in the background is 👌
aug 22, 2025, 5:45 pm • 2 0 • view
Awful sport, great night out!
aug 22, 2025, 6:53 pm • 1 0 • view
Particularly in an environment where many places don't have a team and those teams move city regularly, you might well support a player because your team doesn't provide a community centre. Which is shit, and I hate the idea of attempts to replicate it here.
aug 22, 2025, 8:06 am • 3 0 • view
sports - I mean it's sport innit. I hate it when the Yanks say sports.
aug 22, 2025, 12:10 pm • 0 0 • view
That’s up there with the owner of the team being the first person presented with the trophy . 🤢
aug 22, 2025, 6:33 am • 3 0 • view
I mean I think that is probably the worst aspect of American sports? Maybe cheerleaders?
aug 22, 2025, 6:35 am • 0 0 • view
The fans.
aug 22, 2025, 6:35 am • 0 0 • view
aug 22, 2025, 6:37 am • 1 0 • view
You're both wrong, worst thing of Merican sports is when they do military support week and make poppy season look like a village carnival fancy dress event. A paid ad by the US Gov for recruitment and PR
aug 22, 2025, 6:44 am • 2 0 • view
I think it might be the sports themselves
aug 22, 2025, 11:34 am • 1 0 • view
They did the first cricket international though
aug 22, 2025, 1:20 pm • 0 0 • view
It's utter bollocks too.
aug 22, 2025, 12:07 pm • 0 0 • view
Hi, Canadian here, so somewhat outside (thank God) the American bubble, but Incan assure you that no real sports fan in North America has ever uttered those words. That’s gambling talk. Everybody supports a team.
aug 22, 2025, 4:37 pm • 0 0 • view