Pet Please #127: Fans Who Gather at Their Home Stadium for Away Games

Photo by Noah Graham/NBAE via Getty Images
Photo by Noah Graham/NBAE via Getty Images

I love super-fans.

I love super-fans (of sports teams) particularly because I’m not one of them. Sure, I root for certain teams, but almost nothing they do will ever impact my daily decisions in the slightest. So it’s fascinating for me to observe people who are the exact opposite of me.

One of my favorite things super fans do is gather at their home stadium when their team is playing an away game (usually in the playoffs). They treat it like a home game, except no one’s on the court. All of the action is on the big screen.

I love this because there’s something driving these fans to congregate even though their team is in a different city. They gather even though teams lose more often on the road than at home. They gather even though the players can’t see or hear them. They gather–and pay to do it–even though they could watch the game for free at home.

This might sound blasphemous, but it’s almost religious in nature. Aside from specific rituals, most of what you do at church can be done at home. Yet people gather once a week under the same roof because it means something to celebrate together.

So it may be a foreign concept to me–the type of person who might tune in for the last 5 minutes of a Cardinals World Series victory–but I like that there are people out there with vastly different levels of fandom.

Have you ever attended a game at your home stadium while your team is away?

1 thought on “Pet Please #127: Fans Who Gather at Their Home Stadium for Away Games”

  1. People do this!? That’s kinda of weird. I guess people go for the atmosphere, that celebrate togetherness you mentioned. I think I’ll just go to a bar or a park with a giant screen having that game on or even hosting a viewing of the game in the comfort of my home. However, I won’t mind going to see and feel why people do this. It would be a neat experience and maybe I’ll get to do a thunder clap with them. OHHHH!!!

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Discover more from jameystegmaier.com

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue Reading