On Sports Fandom

Anyone who knows me, knows I'm big into sports. I've heard a sports topic come up from time to time about fandom. Who you should or shouldn't cheer for? In my particular part of the country, northern Indiana, there are a variety of "local" teams one could root for - and no obvious geographical frontrunner. 

Detroit is 4 hours away, Chicago 2.5 hours, and Indianapolis about 2. Major college teams are IU, Notre Dame, and Purdue - all still requiring hours of travel.

An oft used objection recently came up again and I felt it necessary to respond. The objection, if you cheer for ND football, you are morally obligated to cheer for ND basketball too, not IU basketball as so many do.

Well, I kind of understand that critique, but I think it's invalid. Here's my response:

Q: 

What do the Boston Celtics, Chicago Bears, Detroit Tigers, Notre Dame Football, and IU basketball all have in common?

A: 

They are my favorite sports teams and they all won championships in the mid-to-late 80's (the time frame I began to get into sports)

See, I picked my teams because they were good and fairly local to my northern Indiana residence. (The Celtics counted because they had Larry Legend, a Hoosier born and raised)

But apparently I'm "conflicted" because I cheer for one college football team and another school in basketball?

So let me counter this criticism with a couple of salient points. 

1) I didn't attend any of those institutions or work for any of those organizations. I have no inherent loyalty owed. I cheer for the teams, not the institutions. I don't owe fandom to any other sport beyond my choice.

2) I have stuck with these teams since childhood through thick and thin. And there has been a lot of thin. All of those teams were mediocre at best between '95-'01. And even when '02 saw some playoff runs and a title game appearance, no championships were won.

Isolating ND football and IU basketball only accentuates the lack of great success over the past 30 years. Their last two titles were in '88 and '87 respectively. I'm not conflicted or a cherry-picker or whatever. I am loyal (to a literal fault it would seem).

My story isn't that uncommon here in northern Indiana. Few attended/worked for either IU or ND. Many did grow up with IU BB and ND FB being successful and championship-caliber, while ND BB and IU FB were less than stellar.

So with a lot of "free agent" fans out there, why not choose to follow the better teams in each sport, even if they're from different schools? I know Ohio St. football fans are also OSU basketball fans for the most part, but do they also follow the baseball or volleyball teams?

It's not our state's fault we have two historically great teams from different schools. I'd say it's quite natural for the general population to generally pull for one school during one season and another for a different sport. 

P.S. There's a whole different discussion to be had about the Generation Z group of fans who follow individual players only and care little for the teams at all. But we'll leave that one for another day.