I'd be the first to admit that, at one time, I was a "homer." When I was young and emotionally-invested in the teams I pulled for, such as the Atlanta Braves, I thought they should have won every game... if only the umpires had made the right calls. This was especially the case come the post-season and most of all, the World Series. Those years are ancient history now, though, and while I will still pull for some teams, I honestly don't care a great deal at game's end so long as the game was an entertaining one to watch. Also, while I'll be the first to point out a bad call or a questionable one, I will rarely ever place full blame on the officials for a game's outcome. This can happen on occasion, but it's a much rarer occurrence than the before-mentioned "homers" would like to believe.
I think this kind of homer-mentality is especially present in football (both pro and college) and college basketball, much more so than professional baseball or hockey. In college football, teams play between 12 and 14 games, while in the NFL, teams play between 16 and 20 games. In college basketball, teams tend to play between 30 and 40 games. Baseball is much too lengthy of a season (162+ games) to genuinely believe a team will win all their games. It's an extremely rare occurrence in college basketball, but I suppose it is possible. It's also quite rare in the NFL, but has happened before (once). It's a bit less rare in college football, but still rare nevertheless. In all of these cases, a team - any team - finishing the season unbeaten is a very unlikely event. However, in these "homers'" minds, it should be more common than eating breakfast in the morning.
I've lived near Lincoln, Nebraska. I have family near Ann Arbor, Michigan. I currently live near Columbus, Ohio. In all three areas, there are more homers than there are people. Okay, so perhaps that's not possible. There are a great number of homers though, thinking their Nebraska Cornhuskers, Michigan Wolverines, and Ohio State Buckeyes are the best, even if the final score indicates otherwise.
At game's end, if one of these three teams loses, I'll see an array of Facebook statuses and comments pertaining to them, such as the following:
- "The refs blew another one..."
- "D**n zebras!"
- "What are they paying these guys for anyway?"
- "Nebraska/Michigan/Ohio State's opponent better thank the refs after this game is over."
- "This game looks rigged."
I even saw such posts when Ohio State was down 20 points to Wichita State last week in an NCAA Tournament Elite 8 showdown. If the game were close, I could maybe understand such commentary, but when one team is down by such a significant margin, one or two missed calls by the referees wouldn't have made much of a difference, I'm afraid.
It's not like if I were to take a math test and answered only 25 of 50 questions correctly, I would have thought, "Gosh, if I had only answered question #26 correctly, I could have aced this thing." Sure, I could be in denial and think such a thing. However, that won't do me much good in the long-term, considering I'd essentially remove any and all responsibility from myself, which would leave me more apt to repeating the same mistakes again. ...and if only my team had made those couple of free throws en route to losing by 36 points, then they could have pulled off the victory...
I think this kind of homer-mentality is especially present in football (both pro and college) and college basketball, much more so than professional baseball or hockey. In college football, teams play between 12 and 14 games, while in the NFL, teams play between 16 and 20 games. In college basketball, teams tend to play between 30 and 40 games. Baseball is much too lengthy of a season (162+ games) to genuinely believe a team will win all their games. It's an extremely rare occurrence in college basketball, but I suppose it is possible. It's also quite rare in the NFL, but has happened before (once). It's a bit less rare in college football, but still rare nevertheless. In all of these cases, a team - any team - finishing the season unbeaten is a very unlikely event. However, in these "homers'" minds, it should be more common than eating breakfast in the morning.
I've lived near Lincoln, Nebraska. I have family near Ann Arbor, Michigan. I currently live near Columbus, Ohio. In all three areas, there are more homers than there are people. Okay, so perhaps that's not possible. There are a great number of homers though, thinking their Nebraska Cornhuskers, Michigan Wolverines, and Ohio State Buckeyes are the best, even if the final score indicates otherwise.
At game's end, if one of these three teams loses, I'll see an array of Facebook statuses and comments pertaining to them, such as the following:
- "The refs blew another one..."
- "D**n zebras!"
- "What are they paying these guys for anyway?"
- "Nebraska/Michigan/Ohio State's opponent better thank the refs after this game is over."
- "This game looks rigged."
I even saw such posts when Ohio State was down 20 points to Wichita State last week in an NCAA Tournament Elite 8 showdown. If the game were close, I could maybe understand such commentary, but when one team is down by such a significant margin, one or two missed calls by the referees wouldn't have made much of a difference, I'm afraid.
It's not like if I were to take a math test and answered only 25 of 50 questions correctly, I would have thought, "Gosh, if I had only answered question #26 correctly, I could have aced this thing." Sure, I could be in denial and think such a thing. However, that won't do me much good in the long-term, considering I'd essentially remove any and all responsibility from myself, which would leave me more apt to repeating the same mistakes again. ...and if only my team had made those couple of free throws en route to losing by 36 points, then they could have pulled off the victory...
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