More Perks, Less Responsibility

Earlier this month, UConn won the NCAA Men’s National Championship. Their victory against Purdue captured their second consecutive title and sixth in program history. 

UConn was the pre-tournament favorite to win the title, but I was rooting for them anyway. Not because I hopped on the bandwagon, but because cheering for UConn is one of the final remaining connections I feel towards my home state of Connecticut. Now that my parents and childhood friends have moved out of state, I have little reason to ever revisit Connecticut let alone put it on my radar. 

But there’s something beautiful about March when, like clockwork, the NCAA Tournament reminds me it's time to revisit my Connecticut roots. It’s a cyclical nudge similar to what millions of secular American Jews experienced earlier this week with Passover, a pithy reminder of their ancestral history.  

When I watch UConn in March, I don’t just think about UConn’s team in and of itself, but also how they (and the women’s team too) has put America’s Northeast on the college sports map. Connecticut and New England at large don't boast national powerhouses in the two major college sports - basketball and football. 

Not to mention, the majority of Americans don’t really concern itself with Connecticut. Outside of being suburbia for New York City and Boston, the Nutmeg State doesn’t really have much personality. 

But come March, everyone from die-hard hoops fans to interns filling out office brackets knows exactly where UConn stands. 

In case you haven’t gauged already, I’m more of a casual UConn fan, because I root for them without investing in them. While not always mutually exclusive, rooting and investing in a team connote different things. 

One who invests in a team proactively allocates physical and emotional resources - he comes prepared with knowledge of schedule, players, history, and legacy of the team. There’s a yearning to be one with the religiosity of the franchise and incorporate one’s identity among the mass fanbase. Those who root for a team take a passive approach towards involving themselves in the team’s success. Winning is more of a wish than an action item - the makeup of a casual fan. 

While dissecting the dichotomy between rooting and investing, I’ve stumbled upon my interest in sports fans who have second favorite or, what I call, second-tier teams. Whether they’re a call-to-action interest like UConn is in March or a second favorite team in a sport for which one already has a heavy favorite (like Nuggets are to my Knicks), there’s something about fans’ proclivity for having second-tier teams. 

The concept of having a second favorite team isn’t new, but was long peculiar to me.  

When aiming to grow small talk into a larger connection, I’ve always followed the generic “Where are you from?” with “Oh, do you root for (insert local team)?”. When asking some iteration of “Who are your teams?”, I expect people to give me an answer akin to a 1:1 ratio - one team per sport. For basketball I like the Raptors, for baseball I like the Jays. But when someone answers more than one team per sport, I feel nitpicky. For hockey, you like the Leafs, but also you root for the Canucks? 

I recently wrote a semi-judgy article about people who root for both Mets AND Yankees, a joint allegiance that still irks me. But civic discord aside, I’ve gained an understanding why people root for multiple teams over just one. Here are few common examples:

• Growing up, your second team was featured in the national game of the week or on national television ….like TBS for the Braves or WGN for the Cubs

• Your favorite player from college went to a pro team

• You care about other family members’ teams

• If you moved to a new city and want to be part of their culture

• Predominantly older people, most likely boomers, compartmentalize their favorite teams by different leagues, e.g. having one American League team and one National League team.  

There are dozens of reasons for having a second favorite team, but I’m more fascinated by the outcomes we gain from these second-tier teams that escape our first-tier teams. 

The notion to “care” about two spectra of teams - one your identity runs through and one you’re passive towards - speaks to separate ways to approach life. Some people watch a film to invest in a character’s journey and others watch to be entertained. 

With a second-tier team, we get a sense of distance, more of a voyeuristic approach to viewership. We ante the minimum bet of our emotions, removing the zero-sum game aspect from fandom. We have gained an advantage over our emotions. If our second-tier team wins, we’re upbeat. If they lose, we’re even-keeled. 

This type of reaction is antithetical to the stereotypical fanatic with his painted face, worn-down jersey, and foam finger; This is a cautious and stoic attentiveness into fandom. 

Only recently have I analyzed the role of the second-tier team for my fan experience. Fandom for my second-tier teams have been a relatively positive, low stakes commitment that has kept my priorities in check, keeping me sane. From a fan-team relational standpoint, I’ve learned that “good things” can in fact happen to me. 

None of my top-tier teams (Mets, Jets, Islanders, Knicks) have won a championship in my lifetime. But through second-tier teams, I’ve been rewarded with great memories of victory.  

In 2011, I worked for a Providence, Rhode Island radio station, covering Bruins playoff games on their road to winning the Stanley Cup. In February 2018, I became incongruously emotional when the Eagles won the Super Bowl. I’m a Jets fan, but since my beloved cousin is an intense Eagles fan, I was overcome with empathy and relief - a concoction that leads to embarrassing overflow of waterworks. A few days later, he and I attended the parade in Philadelphia - my first title parade ever. 

As enjoyable as those two championship episodes were, nothing compares to the perfect storm of this past year. For 2023-24 was the Year of the Dragon Second Tier Team, as the Nuggets, Michigan football, and UConn Men’s basketball all became juggernauts. 

These are three teams I would normally monitor passively - infrequently checking standings and players stats or watching only if I coincidentally flipped to the game’s channel. But this year, it no longer behooved me to follow without investment. I needed some stock in the teams and if I didn’t have emotional unconditional stock, then I wanted financial stock. 

As much as I tried to tap into a reserve chamber of fandom energy - what’s needed to get my ass to the sports bar or to schedule my plans around their games, no affection for a second-tier team could match an investment quite like a monetary wager. 

If you’re going to root for a second-tier team, in which winning can’t ascend you emotionally like a top-tier team, a financial incentive may get you closer. 

Fortunately, the Nuggets, Michigan football, and UConn Men's basketball paid off dividends. 

Before each of their respective seasons, I placed a $100 future bet on each team winning their Championship. This new avenue of financial investment didn’t necessarily translate into my watching regular season games - I think watching the arc of a season is for top-tier fans - but once I locked into the playoffs, my fandom leveled up to that of a multi-decade season ticket holder who has memorized every players’ college, hometown, and horoscope. 

Although each of these teams were odds-on favorites, each team took care of business, winning their titles and thus netting me a good amount of money. 

While additional cash is nice, the potential to win money as the dangling carrot to watch games is at odds with the spirit imbued from watching my first-tier teams. 

UConn, Michigan, and the Nuggets will continue to hold some iota of personal meaning wherever life takes me. But rooting for those teams, or any second-tier team for that matter, will always safeguard from true fandom that speaks to the soul.

You can’t compare second-tier fandom to that of the teams after which you choose your car’s color, name your pet, get a tattoo, buy a baby blanket for your newborn child. 

Sometimes we invest in our tier-one teams too seriously, undermining the fact that, no matter who we root for, we all experience a larger number of seasons that end incomplete rather than fulfilled. Therefore, it’s good to balance that inevitable angst by having a second-tier team - the more casual outlet to embrace the joy while being able to eschew the pain.