With the recent overwhelming victory of the SF giants in the world series, there has been a great backlash against so-called "fair weather fans", i.e. those who only root for their team when they are winning. Equal hate has been directed against those who jump on the bandwagon to root for their team, even though they can hardly name a single player.
Admittedly, I fall into the category of bandwagon fan. I am incapable of naming more than a handful of players on the Giants (or any other major-league team), but I was a huge fan as the Giants won the series. As one of these, I can say that those who bitterly fight bandwagon fans are ruining sports, both for the bandwagoners and themselves.
Sports have never been intended to be for an elite club only, one who memorizes the Giants roster while checking their fantasy football, baseball and basketball teams. Rather, sports are there for the masses, including those who can't name a single football play but love to watch the Cardinal crush opponents. Sports have always been the circus part of the "bread and circuses" appeal to the masses (circuses refers to Roman chariot racing, not Barnum and Bailey). Sport fanatics trying to exclude those who don't diligently follow every game are trying to defeat the purpose of sport, public entertainment.
Finally, there's no problem with "fair-weather fans", those who only start watching their team when the team is winning. This is perfectly reasonable. Nobody likes a terrible team, not even the diehards who boast about following the Giants even while they were losing. It's unreasonable to expect someone who has better things to do than watch sports their whole life to follow a team even when doing so gives them no enjoyment.
Sport-diehards doing nothing but hurt themselves when they tell everyday folk who don't follow sports obsessively that they aren't
"real fans" and make them stop following the sports.
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