Editor’s Note: Read the Spanish version of this article here.
Editor’s Note: All opinion section content reflects the views of the individual author only and does not represent a stance taken by The Collegian or its editorial board.
Ad
Many Americans like to coin the United States as the greatest country on the planet. While that might be true in some aspects, in the context of sports culture and fandom, that’s plainly and simply not the case.
Across the U.S. at any given time of the year, people are likely chomping at the bit to get into their nearest arena. In America, sports are a passion and a love, and they oftentimes foster a family.
You look at the U.S. and see fans of teams like the Buffalo Bills and the Philadelphia Eagles who seem to bring a different meaning of culture to sports. Maybe you think of SEC football or blue blood basketball with all of their traditions.
While some might call those fans crazy for the lengths they have gone to, only a few fans of those teams take their pride and turn it into a lifestyle — something the rest of the world seems to be able to capture oh, so elegantly.
If you go to a random game on a Tuesday night in America, the craziest thing you might see is some random drunken fight between two opposing fans.
If you take a look back throughout history at some of the craziest moments of fandom in American sports, you see things like the Washington Dawg Pound demolishing the Cleveland Browns Stadium, a college fan base tearing down a goal post and some other moments seemingly few and far between.
For the most part, fans in the U.S. go and sit for the majority of games, regardless of importance, something fans of foreign sports wouldn’t even dream of doing.
If you look at big events like FIFA or the International Basketball Federation, you won’t find a single person in the stands who sits for a second, much less one that sits there quietly like you could have found in game five of the NBA finals or the Super Bowl.
You can’t even find that in simple regular-season games for the Premier League or even Eurobasket. Not only do fans in other countries refuse to sit, but they also rain down daunting chants onto the opposing teams — chants that no doubt have a lot more effect than the simple cheers found in America.
Ad
So many foreign athletes coming to the United States say how different the culture is.
One example of this is when Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic returned to Miami to take on the Miami Heat for the first time since his incident with former Heat forward Markieff Morris — an incident that caused Morris to miss 58 games.
The Heat’s home arena, the Kaseya Center, is known as one of the hardest arenas to play in. Bleacher Report ranked the arena as one of the top 10 loudest places to play in 2011 when it was known as the American Airlines Arena.
Yet despite the downpour of boos and no doubt what seemed like intimidating hostility, Jokic’s response was simple to the Miami crowd.
“I play in Serbia, brother,” Jokic said to a reporter after his game in Miami.
The passion, desire and energy that other countries outside of the United States bring to their fandom have been impossible to create here. If you don’t believe me, look no further than the players who have played professionally both in the U.S. and abroad.
In 2019, Joseph Casciaro did several interviews for The Score highlighting some of these stories.
In Casciaro’s interviews, he had forward P.J. Tucker calling overseas fans “gangs” and guard Goran Dragic talking about the fans getting so into the games that they throw stuff.
When you hear from players who have vast experience both in the U.S. and abroad, it should leave no doubt in your mind. Too often we see people fall in love with a player or a movement, causing them to bandwagon over to a team, seemingly void of any loyalty.
If you remember 2015, just try and think back to the days of the Carolina Panthers and Cam Newton. Too often, it felt like I was seeing Panthers jerseys and shirts in Colorado, despite the Broncos going on to win the Super Bowl that year.
It’s small things like that — things that wouldn’t be tolerated abroad — that have Europe and a large part of the world leading the pack when it comes to establishing a culture around their professional sports clubs.
Reach Damon Cook at letters@collegian.com or on Twitter @dwcook2001.
