When Is Changing Your Favorite Team Acceptable?

The Grantland Staff had an article up recently about whether Knicks fans should be able to switch to the Brooklyn Nets as their favorite NBA team. This conversation was prompted (forced upon the Grantland staff because Bill Simmons thought it was a great idea since it was based on something he had Tweeted) by a Bill Simmons Tweet on this subject. Each staff member of Grantland gave their opinion, some of which were valuable and others were not so valuable. Chuck Klosterman gave his opinion on this subject (or by giving his opinion did he really not give an opinion at all, and what does this mean outside the realm of sports?), which is always (not) fun to read. Of the things that Grantland does well, I do sometimes enjoy these "Dumb Office Arguments" a lot. They give each writer on the site a way to give their point of view. Of course it also gives the writers a chance to navel-gaze, which some of them truly indeed love doing.

I don't know if it is an important question or not, but when is it acceptable to change sports teams like this? Are Knicks fans able to change teams to the Brooklyn Nets or are they stuck with the Knicks? Personally, I don't see a diehard Knicks fan changing over to becoming a Nets fan, nor do I see the draw of cheering for the Brooklyn Nets. Still, I'm sure it is tempting for some Knicks fans to cheer for the Nets now they are in Brooklyn.

Over the weekend, news broke that the New York Knicks were dragging their feet in matching the Houston Rockets' $25 million contract offer to point guard Jeremy Lin.

Apparently this was the last straw for Knicks fans everywhere. Sure, the team has tried to put a quality team on the floor and made the playoffs this year by spending millions of dollars on an injury-prone power forward and a small forward who wants to shoot the ball 25 times per game and doesn't seem to make his teammates better. The team has struggled in some ways for a decade now, but not re-signing Jeremy Lin was the last straw. It feels kind of dumb to me for Knicks fans to bail now, but maybe the draw of seeing another team in the area is enticing enough for allegiances to be switched.

Bill Simmons, posed the question: If the Knicks, following the apparent financial advice of Carmelo Anthony, turn their backs on the most exciting, well-liked player to rock blue and orange since [insert beloved Knicks player Sprewell, Starks, Ewing ... Renaldo Balkman], would New York fans be wise to turn their backs on the team and become fans of the other New York franchise, the Brooklyn Nets? Simmons certainly thought so.

Of course Bill Simmons would think so. I think we have learned over the decade of reading Bill's columns that he seems to desperately want to be a front-runner. He gave up on the Boston Bruins because they had bad ownership, only to come back to them now that they have become successful again. Even still, you get the feeling he could easily become an LA Kings fan. If the Celtics ever start to field a bad team on the court (or have "bad ownership," which basically means not putting an NBA Title worthy team on the court) Bill already has the Clippers lined up as his backup NBA team. Bill completely ignores the Red Sox now when writing his weekly column, simply because they aren't fielding a good enough team to merit a mention. It's because Bill has such high expectations, not because he is slowly becoming a front-runner, that merely contending for a playoff spot isn't enough anymore. So for a guy who likes all Boston-area teams (which are the teams he has liked for his entire life), he seems to have a wandering eye when it comes to being fans of these teams.

Another issue I have with Bill, and his insistence on saying Knicks fans should switch to being Brooklyn Nets fans, is at what point is Bill going to stop making every franchise tortured in some fashion? I was kidding in a previous post when I wrote Bill is going to have every NBA team as tortured in some fashion 20 years from now, but it feels like it will come true. At a certain point in the future Bill is going to make it seem like 50% of NBA franchises' fan base are tortured in some fashion. Few people like the Dolans, but every fan base has hard times or periods during a team's history he/she doesn't like. I'm not saying Knicks fans shouldn't bail for the Nets, but jumping ship simply because times are tough (The Knicks made the playoffs last year by the way) seems like the definition of a fair weather fan.

We asked several members of the Grantland family, some of whom count themselves as Knicks supporters, for a verdict.

They also asked Chuck Klosterman. Why? It doesn't matter really. His response to the question posed was very impressive though. Just ask him, he'll tell you.

Mark Lisanti

Under what should heretofore be referred to as the Lin-Dolan Clause of Desperate Fandom, a team switch should be allowed under extraordinary circumstances.

I'm pretty strict about whether a person can switch favorite teams or not. Generally, my answer is "no," that a person has to stick with a team. If I am going to make up some fake rule like Lisanti and Bill Simmons seem to do, I would say I have two (maybe three) rules for when a person can change favorite teams. I think it can happen when:

1. A team that competes with your current favorite team moves within your geographic area. For example, if I had switched to the Charlotte Hornets as my favorite NBA team (which I very nearly did, mostly because I was so young and impressionable at the time, but I managed to stay a Celtics fan) from the Boston Celtics then it could be understood. You can't switch back though and have to stay with that new team you have chosen. There shall be no dual fandom.

2. Your favorite team proves over a decade-long span they don't deserve your support. By this, I mean your favorite team hasn't either made the playoffs or has such bad ownership you choose to no longer support the team. By "bad ownership" I don't mean "your team isn't winning titles anymore, but is merely making the playoffs." Ownership has to clearly be screwing the team over to the point the team can't be competitive.

3. This one is a maybe. If your favorite team moves out of town. I live in North Carolina. If the Carolina Panthers moved to Los Angeles, then it could be understood why I am choosing a new team. To be honest, this idea is so unfathomable to me that I would switch I can't even imagine I wouldn't still be a fan of the new Los Angeles Panthers. This is a tough call because simply moving out of town in an age when a person can choose to see every game their favorite team plays on television doesn't seem entirely defensible. I guess it depends on how the team left town.

For example, if a Charlotte Hornets fan chooses not to be a New Orleans Hornets fan then I completely understand. George Shinn sucked and was a terrible owner. He left Charlotte and no one was said to see him go, though it would have been nice if he had not taken the Hornets with him. I would hope this hypothetical Hornets fan would eventually became a Bobcats fan though. Also, Sonics fans don't have to cheer for the Thunder. I'm torn, but I think in most situations if a team leaves town then the fans have a right to abandon that team.

Here, we have two: (1) a backbreaking, morale-obliterating move by an utterly incompetent owner who has zero regard for his fan constituency,

This is too vague. One bad move doesn't make it necessary for a person to choose a new favorite team. If one morale-obliterating move is all it takes for a fan to abandon a team, then he probably wasn't a serious fan in the first place.

(2) the arrival of another team within not only the immediate region, but the city borders.

I think the immediate region would suffice. Not many teams get another shot at a professional sports team after one has left. I can handle immediate region as being the criteria.

(And also, as long as we're on the subject, [3] the incompetent, suggestible owner is seemingly still under Rasputin-like sway of ousted managerial war criminal Isiah Thomas, who, we'll soon discover, has been adding ground glass to Dolan's smoothies as he tries to convince his mesmerized buddy to give him a controlling chunk of the team in the "statistically unlikely" event of "death by slow stomach bleeding.")

I can see why Mark Lisanti was hired by Bill Simmons. It seems Mark Lisanti wants to write exactly like Bill and the idea of having someone who wants to be him appealed to Bill so much he had to hire Lisanti...at least that's my takeaway from this passage.

Joe House

This is America.

It's Bill's buddy "House." He has a firm grasp on writing the obvious it seems.

For most sports fans in this great land, the question of what teams to root for — and where to spend fan dollars — is easy: Who are the locals?

Right for "most" sports fans it is easy. "Most" sports fans have professional teams in every sport right in that very state. This is so true, except for the fact it isn't true at all. So who do fans in Nebraska cheer for? How about the state of Tennessee? How easy is it to pick out your favorite baseball team if you live in Tennessee? What about Alabama, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico or Arkansas? How is it easy to pick out your favorite team when there isn't a local team? I completely disagree that "most" sports fans can just cheer for the local team.

You have to love the weird East Coast Bias of "House" who seems to believe every state of this great nation has professional sports teams in all four major sports readily available to them. "Most" people can't choose their favorite team in all four major sports just by seeing which teams are in the local area.

David Jacoby

Regardless of what some people believe (read: Bill), there are no rules for being a sports fan. You can be a fan of whatever team you want, whenever you want. The team you root for is a completely subjective concept, and there isn't some committee (read: Bill) that sets guidelines and allows you a window to make a switch. That is some bullshit.

Ok, well you are no fun. As much as I mock Bill Simmons for creating rules for everything, there are rules to being a sports fan. A person can't adopt the New York Giants prior to the 2008 season after dumping the Cincinnati Bengals as his/her favorite team and then start talking shit to a fan of the New York about Eli Manning having two rings. Waking up one day and deciding, "I don't like the look of this year's Saints team. I think I'm more of a Lions fan now because I like Calvin Johnson" is being a fair weather fan. These people are pieces of shit and should be stopped immediately. I hate the rules (in general) that Bill Simmons creates but few things are more annoying than team-jumping and fair weather fans.

If you're a Knicks fan and you want to root for the Nets, go right ahead. Who cares? That is what I will be doing.

Fine, switch. You will be considered a piece of shit and no one should take you seriously if Brook Lopez tears his ACL and Joe Johnson starts struggling and the Nets go 30-52 next year, while the Knicks happen to make the playoffs, and you jump right back on the Knicks' bandwagon.

Sean Fennessey

Imagine a man living in Oklahoma City.

I'm imagining him. He is tall, owns a farm and listens to country music, just like every other resident of Oklahoma does.

It's 2007. He is a lifelong Dallas Mavericks fan, a team that resides little more than 200 miles due south. He attends every home game, driving three and a half hours both ways to watch Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Terry, Josh Howard. The season is over. His team has just been eliminated from the NBA playoffs, a no. 1 seed humiliated by the exhilarating underdog Golden State Warriors.

Then this lifelong Dallas Mavericks fan can't jump back on the bandwagon after the Mavericks win the 2011 NBA Title. That much is clear. Also, if a lifelong fan of a team even thinks about switching teams because his favorite team had a disappointing playoff series then he isn't enough of a lifelong fan.

Seven weeks later, the Seattle SuperSonics draft a Texas Longhorn forward named Kevin Durant — the same Sonics that have been threatening to leave their native city. Oklahoma City is the rumored destination. The man starts to dream. His imagination wanders. One day, maybe I'll root for Kevin Durant. Soon, a team will be just minutes away. Season tickets will be cheaper. A fan base will be energized.

I would have no problem with this person switching, though I can't see why/how a lifelong Dallas Mavericks fan would do this. I don't take sports too seriously, but I couldn't switch from the Braves even if North Carolina got a professional baseball team. I just couldn't do it. So if this hypothetical Oklahoma City resident is a big Texas Longhorns fan, then I can see this move more. I think when a new team moves to a person's hometown, he/she has to make a decision which team to cheer for before the new season begins. He/she can't wait until after he/she sees how great Durant is to switch to the Thunder. Here I go making rules, but few things annoy me than me sticking by my teams through tough times and having to argue sports with a front-runner.

My point, and I agree with Bill Simmons on this, is New York Knicks fans should switch now and not wait until the beginning of the season. This is a tough switch to make. I'm not a Knicks fan, but seeing as how Bill has always been pro-if the owner doesn't put a great team on the court then a fan can switch teams, I see how he is in favor of this. Bill isn't all about sticking it through the tough years with his team, especially in the case of having a bad owner. Detroit Lions fans aren't impressed with Bill's stance.

Chuck Klosterman

I should link a picture of a man pleasuring himself since that seems to be most of what Chuck Klosterman's writing seems like it is to me, but this isn't that kind of blog, and I choose not to search for a picture of a man pleasuring himself. Let it be known though, that's what I think Chuck Klosterman's feels about his own writing.

At the professional level, you should always focus on whatever a team represents in the present tense: You should be motivated by the current roster, the current coaching staff, the current ownership, the uniforms they're presently wearing, the facility where the team plays, geography, and whatever bizarre interior drive dictates your self-created relationship with the franchise.

You should also be motivated by the food that is being served at the facility, what the parking situation at the venue is like, how many beers are on tap, whether halftime entertainment is worth watching or not, and whatever odd weird shit you enjoy about sports that Chuck Klosterman is too detached and clinical to understand which is why he gets paid to write for a site that features many articles about sports...because sports and the people who enjoy them are dumb, of course. Now let's leave Chuck alone so he can inspect whatever bizarre interior drive that dictates his self-created relationship with whatever band he has fallen in love with this week.


Honestly, if you truly love sports, you should fight the urge to root for anyone, ever. You should just appreciate the game itself.

Even more honestly, this is stupid. If you truly love sports then you do appreciate the game, but you would also naturally have a favorite team in that sport. I appreciate art. Is it weird that I have a favorite artist? I appreciate architecture. Would it be weird if I had a favorite architectural structure? Of course not. If you enjoy watching movies, wouldn't it be natural you have a favorite movie? The same principle applies here. Chuck Klosterman is too busy overthinking the issue to actually think about this. If you truly love a sport, it would make sense to have a favorite team. If I love watching the Olympics, it would make perfect sense if I had a very Olympian. You appreciate the game, but you also have a favorite athlete. It makes sense.


There are certain teams I always root for (and probably always will), and I will always feel stupid about it. It's a real weakness.

It's a true weakness. How dare a person cheer for a specific team in a sport he/she enjoys? It's madness to do this.


The word "fan" derives from the word "fanaticism," which is a bad thing.

This is why intellectuals should not be able to watch sports. Sports is an escape, while intellectuals, or pseudo-intellectuals as I would call Chuck Klosterman, aren't capable of seeing sports as an escape. They have to dissect it to search for some sort of hidden meaning or cause that probably isn't there in an effort to prove just how fucking smart they are and how dumb and irrational you are for liking sports. Sometimes I just want to scream really loudly for a player to run fast or tackle another player hard. I don't see it as a bad thing, even if the derivation of the word "fan" does seem like a bad thing to Klosterman.

Vaya con dios, in this case dios being Jay-Z. But there's no way I could do it myself. It's barely even crossed my mind. Maybe it's Stockholm Syndrome, or maybe it's just that I'm no longer living in Brooklyn, where the walking distance to the Barclays Center would be tantalizingly short and the lure intoxicatingly strong. Maybe I'm stubborn, or stupid, or both. But I'm sticking around. I'm going down with the ship, playing "Go New York, Go New York, Go" on a waterlogged and out-of-tune violin. I may be a bitter old biddy by the time the Knicks finally win a post-‘70s title; more likely, I'll be dead. But I just truly don't think I could ever imagine it any other way.

There we go. Great attitude. If she didn't write mostly about weddings, I would read something else Katie Baker has written.


Brian Phillips

I hate to make it sound like sports isn't the most important thing in the world or something,

You write for a sports site, it's okay to make it seem like sports are the most important thing in the world once or twice a month.


but ... do you like the Nets more than the Knicks? Would you maybe rather be a Nets fan than a Knicks fan? Then be a Nets fan.

That's what I don't get about this whole "Nets or Knicks?" discussion. Bill Simmons looks at it from the point of view of someone who wants to watch a winning team (which again, isn't shocking, since he seems to be a front-runner at heart), but if a person all of a sudden likes the Nets more than the Knicks then just be a Nets fan. If you still like the Knicks more, sit through the tough times and hope for good times ahead or just pay only slight attention to the Knicks if it is too painful to watch them play. If you are a fan (there's that terrible word again!) of the Knicks more than the Nets, then don't magically become a Nets fan because you are tired of cheering for the Knicks. How would it be possible for a Knicks fan to switch to cheering for the Nets if that Knicks fan doesn't like the Nets as much as he/she likes the Knicks?


Shane Ryan

Ditto the Giants — as wonderful as this year was, it will never compare to 2008. Duke's titles have been separated by about a decade each except for the ‘92 run, which was easily the least spectacular of the four.

Other than that being one of the best NCAA teams of all-time and it just so happened the '92 team played one of the best NCAA Tournament games of all-time against Kentucky...sure, the '92 team was the least spectacular. There were no non-spectacular Duke titles to me. I think it is crazy to say the '92 team was the least spectacular since it was the last time an NCAA men's basketball team won back-to-back NCAA titles (as commenter Steve pointed out, Florida won back-to-back titles in 2006 and 2007. I claim to be a college basketball fan and I missed this. Embarrassing. I will say I am not a fan of those two Florida teams so there is a chance I was blocking them out of my memory) and that was a loaded and dominant team. I loved watching that team.


So stick with it, fellow Knicks fans. Jeremy Lin is a passing fad, and that title is somewhere on the horizon, waiting for us in the fog. When it comes, you don't want to be the guy cheering for Brooklyn because you felt sorry for yourself.

Outside of completely annoying me by calling the '92 Duke team's run "easily" the least spectacular, which to me shows Shane Ryan needs his head examined, I agree. I wouldn't have a problem with Knicks fans becoming Nets fans, but to do so simply because the Knicks didn't sign Jeremy Lin and they don't like James Dolan right now seems a bit weak to me. It was just a year ago that Knicks fans had dreams of getting Chris Paul to play in New York and they were loving the day when they could try to get their own "Big Three" together.

Fine, choose to cheer for the Nets, but don't go back to the Knicks once the Nets start stinking again. That's mostly what I would request. The Nets have all five starters making at least $10 million. I didn't realize having Joe Johnson/Gerald Wallace/Brook Lopez on the same team made for such an attractive team.

Carles

If you are a Knicks fan who hasn't turned on your team already, you might as well wait until the third year of Jeremy Lin's contract to find out if he is a star or an oft-injured salary cap albatross who never matched his first-year production. Linsanity could end up being a cultural reference that is on the same level as Crystal Pepsi, pogs, or the Bash Brothers.

Exactly. This is my favorite take on this topic. What brought this issue up originally was a reaction to Jeremy Lin signing with the Rockets and the Knicks not matching the contract, then signing Raymond Felton. It's typical New York media-type overreaction to get all depressed because a guy who hasn't even played a full season in a Knicks uniform and doesn't even fit in with the current team (meaning Carmelo Anthony as the leader and top dog of this Knicks team) isn't being re-signed. Take a step away from the ledge. I think re-signing Lin would have been a good move, but don't get mad at the Dolans for not re-signing him, get mad at the Dolans for trading for Carmelo Anthony in an attempt to appease the Knicks' fans want for a superstar player on the roster, and then allowing Anthony to help chase Lin off. You wanted a superstar player, you got one.


The Brooklyn Nets are just as annoying as the Knicks when it comes to operating as a wannabe superstar destination that doesn't have enough flexibility to build a complete team, so Knicks fans might as well stay put and hope Amar'e finally has the career-ending injury that fulfills his destiny as the Most Injury-Prone Man Alive and wipes his contract off the books.

This needs to be a completely different question. Why are the Brooklyn Nets such an attractive team for Knicks fans? Other than the fact they are now located in New York state of course. The Nets have an owner who isn't exactly making astute trades (I can't believe the Nets took on Joe Johnson's contract) and I don't see re-signing Gerald Wallace and Brook Lopez as a huge step up. This Nets team seems like a 5th or 6th seed in the East at-best, at least to me. This is the team Knicks fans should want to switch to?


Brian Koppelman

The Dolans, even more than other owners, do not care about the fans, the legacy, the history, or anything, really, at all. James Dolan seems to me to be like "Wormtongue" from Lord of the Rings, and his father is Theoden, under a spell and powerless to even see what’s going on. But we, the fans, are not powerless. We can decide to recognize that the throne is, for all intents and purposes, empty. We can decide to recognize that the team we loved does not exist anymore. That it can never exist as long as the Dolans own it. We can decide to see the Knicks for what they actually are, not what we wish them to be, like the husband who realizes, finally, after everyone else has told him, that his wife is not only cheating, but poisoning his mac and cheese. I am done eating poisoned mac and cheese. And I am done with the New York Knicks. Let’s go, Brooklyn!

We will remember this in 2017 when the Knicks win an NBA Title and Brian Koppelman is writing a column about how great it felt to stick in there with the Knicks all these years. You can't undo a passage written like this.

Rafe Bartholomew

But basketball is different nowadays — it's so spread-out, the talent comes from all over. So I'm from the city that once produced the best basketball players on the planet, and the Knicks, whether they're a lottery team or NBA champions, aren't changing that.

Well, haven't you given yourself the false illusion of self-importance while living in the past. The fact the city of New York used to produce great talent seems to give Bartholomew a reason to get up in the morning. Chuck Klosterman would frown through his beard when he hears this type of statement.


I don't see why a person would choose to be a Nets fan unless he/she was really upset with the Dolan's ownership of the Knicks franchise and just can't stand it anymore. You have the next few months to switch to the Nets as your favorite team, but the grass isn't always greener, and don't come crawling back to the Knicks pretending you never left if the ship ever gets righted.