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Fair Weather Fans
By: TJ Hartnett
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
Atlanta is a terrible sports town. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Atlantans simply don’t show up for their pro teams unless they are winning, and consistently.
Partially it’s because the south belongs to college football, and partially it’s because of a lack of championships and probably some other things factor in as well. It’s the way of things here, and I doubt it will change any time soon.
So how is it that the NFC Championship, the final game at the Georgia Dome for the Atlanta Falcons, was packed full of loud, screaming southerners? Why were tickets for Suntrust Park’s debut game so hard to come by when they went on sale?
Fair weather fans.
The Falcons were good, and they were on their way to the Super Bowl. Suntrust Park is sparkly and new, and there is excitement abound for the Braves this year; but mark my words, if the Falcons can’t win football games at a high clip in their own brand new stadium, Mercedes Benz Stadium won’t be seeing sellouts in November.
If the Braves don’t stay competitive, then Suntrust Park will be just as vacant as Turner Field was in August last year; because those fair weather fans will stop caring and that’s okay.
Look, it can be frustrating for die hard fans to cope with the sudden attention their team gets from people that would otherwise fail to show up. Die harders experience the lows that fair weather fans will never know; because they don’t subject themselves to it. So, what right do they have to experience the highs?
I saw it and heard it all over Atlanta while the Falcons were in the playoffs: remarks about fans coming out of the woodwork just because the team was good. It was certainly true – but warranted. They WERE good!
As I am a die hard Braves fan, I find myself occasionally annoyed by fair weather fans too but if I take a step back I realize that not only are they not committing any egregious crimes, they are benefitting the team they’ve suddenly come out to support.
Think about it: if the Braves miraculously made it to the World Series this year, fair weather fans would show up in droves to the ballpark and sports bars to watch them play.
Irksome as they may seem (this has been MY TEAM for years!), would I truly rather they didn’t bother to pay attention? Do I want my team to take the field to a stadium half full of fans while they battle for a championship? Of course not.
A roaring crowd can tip the scales in some cases and I want my team to have that. They should take the field or court or gridiron to a packed house of supporters. It doesn’t matter if the fans have earned the right to celebrate – the team has earned the right to fans.
Plus, not every die hard fan was raised to be a die hard fan. Everyone has to start somewhere. I, for one, am a die hard Braves fanatic not because my parents were, but because I watched John Smoltz strike out three batters out in 2003 to close out a win. They were good, and they hooked me.
What if the Giants had come back and won that game? Would I have come back to the Braves? I’d like to think so, but I’m not so sure. Good teams breed new fans. Just think about how many Georgian eyes were on the Super Bowl in February. If they had held on and won, how many of those eyes would have been converted into die harders?
So, next time your beloved team, wherever they are, starts winning don’t scorn those who haven’t suffered the losses with you. Instead, embrace them. Your team deserves them.
SEC Margin?
By: JJ Lanier
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
All good things must come to end…..or so I hear.
Sometimes it may end abruptly, much like the career of whomever it was that decided to give Jethro Tull the Grammy for Best Hard Rock Album over Metallica, Jane’s’ Addiction, and AC/DC. And sometimes it just happens to run its course, kind of like stuffed crust pizza. The SEC’s reign as the strongest football conference in the country seems to be dwindling with almost every passing week.
That’s not to say you don’t have a valid argument that it’s still the nation’s best conference, it’s just that margin of difference is more along the lines of a Prescott to Romo gap than it is a Rodgers to whoever the hell is Green Bay’s backup quarterback.
One of the things the SEC could always hang their hat on was the competitive balance throughout the league. It seemed that no matter who actually made the SEC Championship game I usually felt like they were probably two of the best teams in the nation. Because the conference was so strong, top to bottom, I believed no other team in the country could have played as difficult a schedule as either of those two teams would have played.
It was almost more of testament to their success when they made the SEC Championship than whatever bowl game they would play in afterwards.
The SEC still has competitive balance, just not quite in the same light as before. I mean, I could easily say my 6-year old’s baseball league has that same balance, but all I’d be admitting to is that each team has a few players that roll in the dirt, or run around in the outfield playing tag. Just because it competitive doesn’t necessarily equate to being good.
The SEC East is balanced, but I’m not sure anyone would, or should, take that as a compliment.
As weird as it is for me to say this, the SEC kinda reminds me of the ACC this year. Both the West and Atlantic divisions have strong play at the top (Alabama, Auburn, Clemson, Louisville) and teams like Ole Miss, LSU, and FSU that are underachieving, but still extremely talented.
On the other side, the East and Coastal divisions have a few teams (Florida, UNC, Virginia Tech) that have decent records, but it’s more an indication of how awful the rest of their division is as opposed to how good they already are.
Now, I know you could make this basic argument for just about any other conference out there, but that’s kind of the point I’m trying to make.
A few years ago, you could make this argument for all the other conferences, but not the SEC. They were just that dominant.
Five years ago, if you were in 2nd place in the SEC West and ranked in the Top 15, you were a team to be feared. Just this past week, on this website, I voted Auburn as the 10 best team in the country. Do they deserve it? This year, probably.
Do I feel comfortable betting any amount of money they’ll beat a 5-4 Georgia team this weekend? Absolutely not. (And I’m sorry, but I don’t mean that as a compliment to the Athens faithful).
It’s been an impressive run for the SEC the past 15 years or so. Unprecedented really. And while there aren’t any signs of their success stopping, but things are certainly slowing down. It’s ok though, it happens to the best of us. Even to fans of Jethro Tull.
Here Come the Terrors
By: Jason Bishop
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
The Glynn Academy Red Terrors took the field Friday night against the Bradwell Institute Tigers with the region championship already wrapped up in a little bow.
Bradwell was able to stay in the game through the first quarter; at the end of the first it was only 7-0 Glynn.
However, the flood gates opened in the second quarter and the Terrors had given themselves a 34-0 halftime lead. When all was said and done Glynn had defeated Bradwell by a score of 41-0
Coach Rocky Hidalgo elected to sit out RB/WR Randon Jernigan due to a sore hamstring and RB Jeremiah Anderson made his return to the team from an injury that kept him out since the first week of the season.
Jernigan’s return in the first round of the playoffs is questionable.
The final region standings saw the Red Terrors finish first, The Effingham Rebels finish with the two seed, the Richmond Hill Wildcats with the three seed, the Bradwell Tigers as the fourth seed, finishing last in the region with no playoff berth are the Brunswick High Pirates.
The Red Terrors will now turn their attention to the Jonesboro Cardinals, who upset Drew on Thursday night 38-26 to secure the number four seed in their region.
Jonesboro is loaded with athletes but is not nearly as physical as the Red Terrors.
Another great thing is that with Glynn securing the number one seed means they will be guaranteed for the first two games to be at home at Glynn County Stadium. A much different dynamic than last year’s run.
This Red Terror team is a very different team than last year’s. This team can score at will and can run the ball on anyone. Glynn Academy has rushed for more yards through 10 games than all of last year through 15 games. The Red Terrors are very dynamic on offense.
In other words, this team is better; still among the state’s elite on defense and now an explosive offense.
If you are a Terrors fan look for another deep run in the playoffs and maybe a State Title when the smoke clears.
Dolphins Growing Pains?
By: TJ Hartnett
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
The 2016 Dolphins offense is going to take a minute to get going, folks.
It is almost certainly not going to sing in four-part harmony the first time coach Adam Gase gives his unit voice in the Seattle regular-season opener.
The offense is a work in progress, and because the players are mostly young and new to each other and the coach, and his scheme, getting all that to look as if everyone has been together for years is close to impossible.
