It seems like who your root for is something people are fiercely loyal too. To the point where I see videos on TikTok of guys clearly upset and heartbroken about disappointment after disappointment, saying things like all I know is misery etc.
Curious if you have personally every switched allegiances to another team.
44 comments
Hell no.
Nope
When I was a kid, absolutely
That is illegal here
Yeah. Seattle Sounders FC —> San Diego FC after 20 years or so. I didn’t like the shirt sponsor Seattle got, which is really petty and PC in retrospect, but then San Diego got a team not long after. Saved me from being at least half-traitor.
I would never
No. I won’t devote much attention to off-season moves and the like when my team is in a low point, but I’m not switching.
Was a warriors fan before I actually watched basketball, mavs fan when I did. Always been rangers, stars, cowboys, and kstate other than that
yeah, my dad was a San Diego Chargers fan because he lived there during an era when they were really good, and I followed them as a secondary team. But then they moved to LA, bye bye.
I would stop rooting for any Houston team that moved, too. I was here when the Oilers left but I wasn’t really a sports fan at the time (little kid) so I didn’t really need to “switch” my allegiance to the Texans when they were founded lol.
Are people not fiercely loyal to their sports teams in other countries? Why are you asking us?
Yup. Used to be a packers fan. Lions fan now.
Not me personally, although when my parents moved from Chicago to Wisconsin they switched their basketball support from the Bulls to the Bucks.
Ironically they still seem to prefer the Bears over the Packers.
Nope. Forever a miserable Knicks fan.
Edit: But a lot people only follow players they like so there is some bandwagonning.
not seriously, no. as i’ve moved cities i will attend home games for the local team, and usually support them casually (if it’s not a rival/divisional foe for my hometown team) but I won’t switch fandoms or even follow them closely.
I married into serious fandom of a different team from the one I’d grown up casually supporting, if that counts.
No.
Hell frigging no.
If you are able to switch your fanhood, you were never a fan at all.
I have added allegiances living in various states, but NY teams are always my first allegiance hands down if say a CO team plays a NY Team, other than the Rockies playing the Mets, ranks Yankees, then Rockies, then Mets, but that is more because Mets fans spew so much vitriol at Yankees fans.
Yes, but only if they’re both from my city. For example, I used to be a Chicago White Sox fan, but now I’m a Cubs fan.
I’ve moved around. So, yes.
Nope. The Orioles are still my favorite because when I was little i thought they were the Oreos. But I’ve never seen a game 😂
No, and I don’t associate with people that do this.
No.
Have I ever been disloyal and traded my honor for petty comforts? No.
Started off liking not loving the Braves in MLB, only because my dad would watch every game. I absolutely hated the Yankees for beating the Braves what seemed like all the time. I decided I wanted to pull for a new team that hatred lead me to the Redsox then they lost to the Yankees in 2003 but I didn’t give up on them. That’s still my team to this day.
I was born in Chicagoland and was a Cubs fan. Moved to Phoenix in 1973, still a Cubs fan. Arizona Diamondbacks came into existence in 1998. That’s when I became a Diamondbacks fan. (I was still salty about the.”94 strike.)
So, yes!
Never.
I’m not sure why this is a question for Americans!!! Have you seen a European soccer fan? We have nothing on the football fans!
Favorite team? No. But I’d root for my local team when I lived in cities that were in the opposite conference from my favorite team
Grew up Catholic, so naturally rooted for Notre Dame. Went elsewhere for college and so stopped rooting for Notre Dame and started rooting for my Alma Mater.
Also grew up a Green Bay Packers fan because as a kid I loved Brett Favre. Then he left and I started rooting for my hometown team.
Glad I made both changes.
If you switch teams — you were never a fan of the original team in the first place.
Yeah, I switched from watching the Bears to the Cubs.
I stopped being a Houston Oilers fan when the team moved to Tennessee.
No. You are born into a team and they are yours forever. If my team moved id probably just stop watching the sport.
I have not. I’d feel like a fake fan.
No. And I don’t know anyone who has. I have preferences among other teams. But my favorite is my favorite come hell or high water.
If the team moved, maybe. I have heard of a few Brooklyn Dodger fans who stopped being fans once they moved to LA in 1958. How many Seattle Sonics fans support the Thunder, I wonder.
For me personally I wouldn’t change my team loyalty, unless it moves and divests itself of its own past (see the Baltimore Ravens). None of my teams have had that issue so I stick with them through thick and thin
Hell no, even though they break my heart/embarrass the fuck outta me every year. They’re still my guys .
No. Ive been a Minnesota fan only my entire life.
naw, my teams are the teams close to my hometown, no matter how shitty they are.
I have *added* teams that I’ve liked to my list of teams I support, but my faves will always be my hometown teams.
Hell no. You don’t change where you’re from, no matter where you live. Detroit vs. Everybody
I may or may not be in the process of a geomagnetic reversal between my favorite baseball team and my second favorite baseball team. Obviously it’s just baseball and all, but I think there is something about the process, psychologically speaking, that might have metaphorical resonance with moving to a new country or converting to a different religion.
I grew up a diehard Atlanta Braves fan, because back then they were one of only two teams (the other was the Cubs) that you could see on TV every game. I lived in a region of the country that had no major league teams at the time, so there was no logical geographical favorite. I was an intense and dedicated fan for a long time, but I started to lose touch with the game because my life got really busy and certain developments in baseball (like the shift) made it less interesting to me. So I was a casual fan for ten years or so. Then as my son started to grow up I wanted to share the game with him and so I started getting back into it. We live in the NYC metro area, so he’s gotten to go to Mets and Yankees games, and started to become a Mets fan. But more than that, we went to a LOT of minor league games in the Mets system, and so we had experience watching (and sometimes interacting) with various players as they made their way up the organization to the majors. So when some of those guys that we saw way back in Single A baseball in Brooklyn started to break through to the Mets and we got to see them at Citi Field, that solidified my son as a hard core Mets fan and since they were always a team I liked anyway (back when I first became a fan of the Braves they were in the NL West, so I don’t feel the same intensity about the division rivalry as Mets fans usually feel towards the Braves, lol) they became easily my second favorite team. I still watch and cheer for the Braves, but when they play the Mets I feel genuinely conflicted, and it’s been a couple of years since I’ve been to a Braves game at Citi Field because I honestly don’t know how I’d feel about the game, lol.
Baseball, when the A’s played their last game in Oakland as many did. I turned to the Mets because I felt it canceled out. I’ll stand by perpetual mediocrity or losses but never Las Vegas sell outs.
No. I have, however acquired a team.
Kansas City did not have an NHL team when I was growing up and hockey isn’t really a thing there so I had no reason to pick one. Then I moved to Pittsburgh and lived there through two Stanley cup years in a row, so I acquired the Penguins because they were my first experience having an NHL franchise. Still loyal even though I no longer live in Pittsburgh.