© 2024
NPR News, Colorado Stories
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
KUNC's The Colorado Dream: Ending the Hate State has arrived! Join us each Monday through Nov. 4 for a new episode.

It's Good To Root, Root, Root For The Home Team

Baltimore Orioles Nate McLouth (from left), J.J. Hardy, Robert Andino and Manny Machado high-five teammates after Game 2 of Major League Baseball's American League Division Series against the New York Yankees. Somewhere, commentator and Orioles fan Frank Deford is also giving high-fives.
Nick Wass
/
AP
Baltimore Orioles Nate McLouth (from left), J.J. Hardy, Robert Andino and Manny Machado high-five teammates after Game 2 of Major League Baseball's American League Division Series against the New York Yankees. Somewhere, commentator and Orioles fan Frank Deford is also giving high-fives.

My first protocol on rooting in sports is that you should stick with the teams that you grew up with. I know we're a transient society, but that's just it: Continuing to cheer for your original hometown teams is one way of displaying the old-fashioned value of allegiance.

If you grew up in Cleveland, say, and moved somewhere Sun Belt-ish, I know how hard it is, but the measure of whether you are a good person is that you must remain loyal to the Browns and Indians and that team that LeBron James left behind.

That's what's left of roots in America. You must root where your roots were laid down.

Now don't worry. Sports love is a two-way street. There is a proviso in this lifetime contract that allows you the right to get mad at your team. The problem with you Cubs fans, for example, is that you are too tolerant. But no, you must never leave your precious Cubbies for a more seductive team. No! Be steadfast for another century or so.

But us hard-bitten sports journalists, we have a problem. We're supposed to look down at you sappy fans, getting all worked up about your silly teams, while we must be neutered, remain above the fray. "No cheering in the press box!" is our equivalent of "Don't mention bombs when you're in the airport security line."

But, on the QT here, entre nous, just between us chickens, pretending to make emotional sports eunuchs of sports journalists is a charade, reminiscent of Tallulah Bankhead's saying: "I'm as pure as the driven slush."

You see, despite what most athletes think, we sportswriters really are human beings (well, at least on the side). At the Ryder Cup a couple of weeks ago, the terrific story was the spectacular European comeback from virtual defeat, but, surely, every American golf journalist was rooting for our team instead of the story.

OK, everybody is coming out these days, so, now, yes, I am too.

I have known since I was a child that I loved the Baltimore Orioles. I loved them before they were the O's, as they are, regrettably, known today. They were called "the Birds" then, or even better, "the Flock." So, no, I don't care what it does for my reputation as a hardhearted sports scribe who has always kept his true feelings to himself in the press box. I have suffered with my beloved Flock losing for 14 years in a row, and now that they are actually in the playoffs, I must go public and reveal that, yes, I am an actual fan.

Also, I'm not crazy about the New York Yankees either.

But never fear. Next week I will once again refrain from being a giddy Bird lover and return to my ugly, bloodless, objective self.

Copyright 2020 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Frank Deford died on Sunday, May 28, at his home in Florida. Remembrances of Frank's life and work can be found in All Things Considered, Morning Edition, and on NPR.org.
Related Content
  • Only two groups of people really matter in any game: the players and the officials. That's the lesson the NFL inadvertently taught football fans in the past four weeks, says Frank Deford. At many stadiums, the regular officials were greeted with loud ovations after their lockout ended.
  • When sport and language intersect, they can help define how we speak and think — consider the "level playing field." And in Washington Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin III, the sons of juniors, such as Benjamin Franklin Deford III, might have found a game changer.
  • Friday, the MLB debuted its new playoff format: Two wild-card teams from each league played in a high-stakes, single-shot game to advance to the full playoffs. The Baltimore Orioles defeated the Texas Rangers, and the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Atlanta Braves. NPR's Tom Goldman speaks with host Scott Simon about those games and the Rockets' Royce White, who plays in the NBA with a generalized anxiety disorder.
  • Cabrera became the 15th player in an elite baseball club that includes Ted Williams and Mickey Mantle.