America is addicted to sports.
There is no denying it. It's sad but true. And with that addiction, obviously, comes us: sports fans. No two sports fans are alike, from their background to superstitions to favorite players to intensity. Below, I will list and briefly analyze each main type.
The die-hard
The die-hard is the guy you see at games with his face painted, decked out in team apparel from head to toe and probably already intoxicated hours before the game has even started. He will take a bullet for the team to win and screams in agony every time his team makes a mistake.
The showoff
The showoff brags about his supposed knowledge of his team and the game. He wants to make sure you know that he is a bigger fan than you and will tell you everything he knows about the game in a well-constructed, multi-paragraph speech. He will start rattling off useless statistics such as Clayton Kershaw's Pop Warner Football stats or Carmelo Anthony's free throw percentage on sunny days as opposed to rainy days, just to show off his knowledge.
The bandwagon jumper
The bandwagon jumper, or the fair-weather fan, is arguably the least popular type of fan out of all of them. He is only a fan when his team makes the playoffs but couldn't name more than five players on the team. These "fans" are not known to show interest in the team until or unless they start winning, have probably not watched an entire game from start to finish and disappear once their team stops winning.
The biased fan
The biased fan is an authentic fan but has little to no common sense. This is because he cannot judge players or teams objectively. Rather, he makes unreasonable arguments for his own team or players as the best in the league. For example, I know a Falcons fan who would rather have "Roddy White over Larry Fitzgerald, all day." Unfortunately, many New England sports fans fall into this category. This would include a friend of mine who thinks Tom Brady's career is hands down, without question, better than Peyton Manning's.
The clueless girl
Right off the bat, let me just say that there are certainly many knowledgeable female fans, who were probably born into a family of sports. But there still exists the clueless girl. She deserves credit for trying, but she is the one who comes into the room asking, "Remember the guy who made a lot of points when he hit a slam dunk in the fourth period?" She is trying to make conversation and pretends to watch the game, but unfortunately cannot tell which direction a football team is going at a given time.
The guy who thinks he is better than Albert Pujols
Worse than the biased fan, but less annoying than the bandwagon jumper, this guy is the one who thinks he is better than all the athletes on TV. He will frequently make complaints such as, "Are you kidding me? I could have caught that!" at an NFL receiver or exclaim, "Why would you swing at that pitch?" to a batter who swings at an 83 mph slider with nasty break from CC Sabathia. He thinks the sport is way easier than it looks and has clearly never played it before.
Of course, there are the normal fans who watch games every week and aren't obnoxious about their fandom. But they're normal, so what fun is it reading about them? Oh, and if you felt offended by the description of one of the above types of fans, well, then you probably belong to that category.
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Brian Tan is a sophomore who is majoring in economics and Chinese. He can be reached at Brian.Tan@tufts.edu.
