I don't want to keep you too long, but I had to write about something that really chaps my ass.
I spent four years at Elon (that's now what chaps my ass), and throughout those four years, the athletic teams received basically no support from their student-fan base. It was discouraging to see the football team play in front of a more than half-empty Rhodes Stadium crowd. It was disappointing to see the basketball team the first two years try to compete when the amount of fans in the gym could be counted on fingers and toes. As for the rest of the teams, they were lucky to draw a handful of people.
Many of those with whom I graduated from Elon have moved on to graduated school, and now they seem to feel it is their responsibility to support the school at which they take graduate classes. Where was this sense of obligation while they were at Elon? I, too, am at graduate school, but I don't support the University of Memphis Tigers blindly, seemingly renouncing my undergraduate athletic roots. I still check on the Elon football score every Saturday. I still have allegiance to Elon athletics.
I know what most of you are saying: Elon's teams were perennial losers, and at my new school, I have a chance to cheer on winners. Well, that's a fickle attitude. And maybe, if Elon athletic teams had your support while you were there, we would've seen a different product. True, that's a big "if," but we'll never know. So while you all enjoy your new schools and your new sense of athletic community, just know that you're also constantly chapping my ass. The sign of true fans is how they respond during tough times. Do they stick with their team? Do they run to a new one? Do they choose not to acknowledge the team's existence? I think I know where some of you out there stand.
3 comments:
It would also help if there was some GOOD management behind the scenes at Elon. Now that White is leaving, maybe there's some hope.
Of course they hired back the guy that LEFT for a better job in the marketing department. Hopes of some better efforts? Doubt it.
Its pretty sad when Burlington doesn't even know that Elon has a football team.
I have to put a word in for the people who can't bring themselves to be fans or followers of too much.
Popular news - Mostly useful, but why follow all the intrusive, irrelevant details. Music - don't really care if so-and-so comes out with a new song if it's crap. Sports - I'd rather be playing them. Fashion - don't have enough money to follow it, would like to but wouldn't if I did cause somebody down the street probably needs a jacket. Celebraties - Do I really need to comment?
You may be sensing a loyalty problem - as in someone like this can't commit to anything - and for some people this may be the case. For others it might be about an intense commitment to something - to one thing - that doesn't make room for little loyalties here and there. For many others, it's probably about balance in life and living one's own life.
What's wrong with cheering for the hometown team from time to time? Nothin. What's wrong with encouraging ya boys in their game every week? Nothin. What's wrong with throwing yourself into a sports team (college or pro), spending hours upon hours in unthinking crowd mentality, being crazy for people you don't even know to hit eachother on the ground as if it were you doing the hitting, and decorating entire rooms of your house in over priced paraphernalia? No comment.
I'm with you, Travis. The game management at Elon is terrible. And the worst part is, not only did they rehire Durham after he left them, they allowed him to negotiate the terms of his contract. Just wow.
And "call me crazy," my point, essentially, was that people who went to Elon for four years demonstrated a lack of school spirit, but now now, they attend graduate school and love the sports teams there.
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