Rattle wrote:

Ok. First, I need to declare something. Kind of like a punk rocker, walking into a bar bellowing with country music and filled with dudes in cowboy hats...

I don't know shit about sports. I feel so out of place approaching a sports discussion.

And I do mean I don't know shit about sports. No clue about any form of foot and ball, baskets, or any other bullshit. I have almost no clue. I understand teams and team loyalty. I understand sticks and ice. I understand group gatherings, ritual, and seeking liminality at a crucial point of conflict. I'm trying to grasp this and understand.

I understand some things well. I ski. Getting to the bottom of the hill fastest. Got that down. Running faster than anyone else. Not so good at that myself, but I grasp that one too. Driving really fast in a circle.. I can reason away the circle.. Somewhere between curling and American Football I just loose all interest and connection to the spirit of the competition.

The core of your argument, as I read it, is that regardless of the way a team is playing, the host (city) needs to be behind/supporting the team to achieve positive perception of it's success... Not just support in a operational context, but in a way showing exuberance and pure devotion. I understand this argument. I think it's valid.

I see it as a branding thing. It's even effective to push products. In the case of sports teams, It seems to work really well with a nation. Not so much between cities. It requires some kind of conflict below the surface that interfaces through the sport, in the form of devotion to athletes that embody something we find dear. I don't see that in cases where people complain about lack of support for a team. In many of the cases where it is present, it seems artificial, or at least a product of the league. Other times, you get anything from great ceremony to a riot.

Nothing seems honest about most professional sports to me. Why should I care? Some things appear to need more of my attention, and have more to offer for my devotion. College teams are more appealing to me to support than professional ones. The Olympics still stir my competitive spirit more than the NFL.

Why do I want to put my city's "branding power" behind a sports team? Using either monetary or emotional resources? Where is the gain? What does winning achieve?

Funny. Yeah. I get it. In the grand scheme of things, this ain't nuthin. I agree. And I don't know anything about other sports either. I can watch them and somehow feel like I can at least tell when something bad happens. But for whatever reason, I like hockey. And well... actually I like curling too. It's fun to play at least.

But you ask a good question and one that I don't have quantitative evidence for (although I'm sure it exists) but just an anecdote to try and answer with.

You know the city of Detroit, right? Dirty. Smelly. Always on the brink of falling into complete chaos. Well, when the Red Wings won the Stanley Cup in 1997, after a 42 year drought from a championship, I've never seen the city so 'happy'. People were cheering together. People were hugging each other. People were even acknowledging each other's existence. It was a monumental occasion. And through it all, not one thing burned and there were no arrests for violence. Contrast that with the Tigers winning the world series in 1994 and the front page of USA Today was 'merrymakers' atop a burning police car, or when MSU won the NCAA basketball championship and they practically destroyed Lansing, and you could tell that something had changed. The city was tired of being embarrassed and conducted itself with class. It wanted the press to be about its glorious Wings and their championship, not the city showing its worst.

That 'feeling' or esprit de corp, lasted a LONG time. Unfortunately, there was still tragedy , but another Cup in 1998 helped to heal the city again, and I swear things were different there for a few years. There was tons of investment into downtown. Things looked brighter and the future seemed to have a hint of promise. This being the late 1990s, there was lots of activity and hope.

Now I'm not saying that a sports team can lift up a city on its shoulders and carry it to a promised land all by itself. That clearly didn't happen in Detroit, which is back to its wasteland imitation. But for a few years there, the whole town was Red & White and people had something that made them feel good for a bit. You can't BUY that kind of spirit and who knows how to calculate the value of putting a smile on a face that rarely knows any happiness?

Think about it for just a second. Imagine the glee in Boston when the Red Sox finally beat the Curse! The surprise when Joe Namath came through with that promise to NY. The sheer emotion when the 1980 USA Olympic Hockey team gave us a miracle.

That, my friends, is what sports teams are for.

RE: SI.com - Allan Muir: Winning not enough to save Predators - Monday January 15, 2007