Then & Now: The Evolution of a Sports Fan

           In the past few weeks I have discovered that I get a variety of sports channels that I didn’t before. Since I’m not that much of a baseball fan the summer is really dull for me. Imagine my excitement when I stumbled across NBA TV, NFL Network and NHL TV I got to relive my youth while watching old school games. Looking back to when I first started watching sports back in 1991 at the tender age of 6 to the 24 year old person I am today I miss the kid I was. Growing up in St. Louis, MO we only had the Cardinals and Blues in town and at that point in my life I wasn’t a fan of baseball or hockey. I only watched football and baseball so naturally I had to adopt another’s cities teams as my own and the best way to do so was whom ever I saw the most. Since Chicago is only a short trip away and Michael Jordan was on the quest to leading the Bulls to their first NBA title they were on all the time and I got hooked to the grace that Jordan played with. Also on the football end the Dallas Cowboys were starting to become the team of the 90s. After relocating to Portland in the summer of ’92 which was the same year the Clyde Drexler led Blazers met the Bulls in the NBA finals. It wasn’t right for me to claim my new hometown team as my own even to this day I don’t get the pride when I watch the Blazers play.

By the way I became a fan of my teams it was already obvious that they were good so I got to celebrate a lot of championships in those days. Nothing could have been better then ’92 and ’93 when both the Bulls and Cowboys won their respective championships. I couldn’t have been a happier kid when it came to sports but then in ’94 things were a little disappointing Jordan retired the ‘Boys got knocked off by the San Francisco 49ers and I thought things were going downhill fast. The next two years I expanded my horizons and started watching a little bit of baseball and a bit of hockey, I came to be a fan of the Cleveland Indians and Detroit Red Wings. In ’95 Jordan came back to almost lead the Bulls back to the NBA finals only to lose in the Conference Semi-Finals to the Orlando Magic, the Cowboys signed Deion Sanders and bounced back with their last Super Bowl victory and my new favorite team the Red Wings would extend their Stanley Cup drought to 41 seasons after getting swept by the New Jersey Devils. The Cleveland Indians also made the World Series for the first time since 1954 but ended up losing to the Atlanta Braves in 6 games. In the remainder of the 90s the Bulls obtained their 2^nd three-peat, the Red Wings won back to back titles in ’97 and ’98, the Indians lost a devastating game 7 of the ’97 World Series and the Cowboys won their last playoff game in ’96.

At the turn of the millennium I got a chance to experience what most sports fans do disappointment in your team. I now know what a true fan is once your team goes through losing and disappointing season how long are you going to stay with them. Looking back only the Red Wings have had any type of success since 1998 winning two Stanley Cups (2002, 2008) and losing last season. Luckily since of my love of basketball and of Jordan I naturally became a North Carolina Tar Heels fan I missed there title in 1993 but have watched and cheered them on for their two titles in 2005 and 2009.

Overall I am a more complete fan then I was in my adolescents as much as I appreciate all the wins and championships I got to watch as a kid I enjoy the way I feel when I can turn back and watch a Jordan or a Emmitt Smith in their primes do what they do best. Hopefully in the years ahead I will be able to experience the joy of watching titles won and one day I’ll be able to look back to now and know that as a sports fan I am very lucky to love the teams that I do through all their ups and downs.