Beyond MoCo

Editorial: The Baltimore Ravens Are Not a Home Team and a Few More Thoughts on Fandom

By MCS Staff

Editorial: The Baltimore Ravens Are Not a Home Team and a Few More Thoughts on Fandom

Let me start this by saying that this is just a fun post. You’re entitled to like any team that you want for whatever reason. This is just one opinion.

Today is a pretty big day for football fans in our area. The Washington Football Team, who I consider our home team, is playing against the Baltimore Ravens.

Here are a few thoughts:

MoCo is a D.C. suburb, so D.C. sports teams are considered the home team.

  • We watch DC news, we deal with DC traffic, we use the DC Metro, etc.

I don’t consider Baltimore a home team just because Baltimore is in Maryland.

  • Folks in Miami don’t consider the Tampa Bay Buccaneers or Jacksonville Jaguars a home team. People in San Francisco don’t consider the Los Angeles Rams or Chargers a home team. Someone from Dallas doesn’t consider the Houston Texans a home team…and so on.

I’m a Baltimore Orioles fan because the Nats didn’t exist when I was growing up.

  • To me, switching favorite teams is a big no-no. You can do it…but are you really a fan if you switched to a team that’s performing better than your old team?
  • I don’t mind the Nats and I’m happy when they’re successful. That doesn’t mean I have two favorite teams, because that’s also against my personal rules.

Though I am an Orioles fan and I’m ok with the Nats, I’m a Washington Football fan and I despise the Ravens.

  • I didn’t mind them in their first few years of existence. I remember buying Eric Zeier and Rod Woodson jerseys on sale for $9.99 a piece from Sports Authority priced so low because of how bad the Ravens were. What soured me on the Ravens was the way people embraced them as a home team AFTER their Super Bowl win. Bandwagon = Not for me.
  • Who did you like before the Ravens existed? Did you just switch teams? That’s not right.

I consider liking the home team’s biggest rival the equivalent to something like being a student at Quince Orchard High School and walking around school with a Northwest High School t-shirt on (currently one of the biggest rivalry in MoCo sports).

  • To me it seems attention seeking and the reasons behind it are usually bandwagon based, though most think up some pretty clever reasons as to why they like those teams from random cities.

You have to stick with your team through thick and thin. It’s very easy to like a team when they’re doing well, which is why the Ravens have been able to maintain the fans that came over to them due to their success.

  • In my eyes there’s nothing that should make you abandon your team, including; disliking ownership, poor front office, lack of success, etc.

I get that sometimes we have roots that go beyond where we were born and raised, but is EVERYONE really from Pittsburgh or Boston?!

  • If the Penguins, Steelers, Patriots, etc. weren’t as good as they’ve been, would everyone have been a little quicker to drop grandpa’s favorite team?

The feeling of celebrating a home team’s success is unmatched.

  • The feeling of joy someone who chose a random team from a random area simply can’t match the feeling you get when a team that represents the area you’re from finds success.

 

Where do you all stand on these topics?