I never realized how significant sports has played a role in my life – at least not until I became an adult and looked back on my life and things like this.
I have always had a deep love of sports. My father loved football and basketball. My grandfather loved baseball and boxing. I remember carrying around stacks of baseball cards when I was four or five years old. Until I was a teenager, stacks of baseball cards intermingled with my jewelry boxes and other more “perceived feminine things.”
Growing up in Toledo, we rooted for our hometown team the Toledo Mud Hens, one of the farm teams for the Detroit Tigers, so we were always kinda friendly with Detroit, even as I actively rooted for Cleveland until my father passed away. Then Detroit became my team as I learned to fall in love with the sport again without my dad.
Both my dad and I felt personal great excitement at meeting the 1968 and 1984 World Series Tigers when I was doing events for disability organizations, as a kid. So loving the Tigers even as they stink has seemed natural.
But not having a pro team in our hometown has made it more difficult to have a team to actually root for regularly.
My father had initially been a long time Cincinnati Bengals fan. I remember Bengals fever in the 1980s. We all did the Icky shuffle. We all rooted for Boomer.
But then, following their second loss in a Super Bowl in 1989, my dad became disillusioned with all of the bureaucracy, as he called it, surrounding the Cincinnati team.
He personally felt harmed by the league and I didn’t understand this at all, but by the time the 90s hit, none of us were rooting for Cincinnati.
As someone who enjoys the sense of community sports gives, particularly as it’s one of the few communities that actively allowed to be involved in and a part of as a disabled person, this was very confusing and difficult.
As a nine-year-old I didn’t understand why my father was not loyal to Cincinnati.
He may have felt personally harmed by Cincinnati, but all sports teams have bad years. He felt that Cincinnati was especially egregious and specifically doing something wrong that harmed fans but I don’t know if that’s true. In retrospect I realize my dad was a fair weather fan.
I also wonder if that’s the model of fandom that was set for me and my brother, as I’ve struggled to find my own teams particularly in the NFL – bouncing around from team to team unsure which one fit.
I know I’ve spoken/written about growing up in a Buckeye household as a Michigan fan, but I can’t help but draw parallels between how a lot of Ohio State fans are versus Michigan fans.
Michigan has been my true north. I’ve never deviated from following Michigan even when we had horrible years. However, my dad was always critical of Ohio State themselves when they lost. They would go through horrible stretches. Then he would denigrate the coaches and the team and the players and on and on and on.
That was the model of sports I grew up with and no wonder I’ve bounced around the NFL for so long. I didn’t understand what team loyalty was – at least not in the NFL. It really was Ashtyn who taught me what true sports loyalty is and now my eyes are open to the past.
In the 90s, when Jacksonville became a team my niece and nephew got my dad shirts to celebrate both Carolina and Jacksonville. I briefly followed Jacksonville, even getting some of my leg braces made with their logo since I didn’t have an official team.
At this point, the Lions were abysmal. That is the only reason my father did not follow them. He could’ve easily rooted for them. My family is made up of factory workers on his side. We may be Jeep workers but those workers have that same heartiness that Ford workers do. Detroit should have been an easy choice for following, as we lived in Toledo, but my dad had no loyalty.
As an adult I was a fan of the New Orleans Saints for a while. We rooted for them until I became disillusioned by some of the things I was hearing about Drew Brees. It’s sad how a sports personality can affect how we feel about certain teams.
I also again didn’t understand sports loyalty. I didn’t understand that you stick by your team no matter what. I was doing that with Michigan but all of the other sports I was watching did not have the same amount of loyalty. Not until I started following the Tigers when I was 22 did I have loyalty to another team.
The NFL though, it was just hard to find a good fit. Back around 2017/2018 a friend in the disability sphere that lived in New York recommended I check out the Philadelphia Eagles. Philadelphia, like Toledo, was a working class city. Philadelphia has similar grit to Detroit and other large cities.
Philadelphia was the first time I felt like I could follow a team and be loyal. And I have been. Philadelphia is my team. I am loyal to them. I was really sad when they lost to the Buccaneers. I really wanted them to play Detroit and then I would’ve had a true dilemma.
Ashtyn has always been loyal to Michigan, but her interest in sports has changed based on whether I’m watching sports or not. She liked Michigan teams, but she didn’t always watch sports.
As I have lived with her for the past 20+ years I’ve slowly integrated sports into our lives. When I started watching baseball actively, she cheered on Detroit and has become a Tigers fan. She briefly supported New Orleans as well. And she’s becoming a much more vocal Michigan fan even though she’s always been Michigan loyal.
When Dan Campbell came to Detroit she decided that she wanted to have her own sport for the first time. She told me that I could keep rooting for Philadelphia and she was going to root for Detroit. This was 2 to 3 years ago.
At the time I told her that I would follow Philadelphia, but that I had no ill will towards Detroit. In fact, I have a lot of fondness for Detroit. We live in the Detroit Metro area. I’m fond of this area. I’m fond of most of the sports teams in Detroit (exception being the Pistons – that’s a story for another day). As long as they were not playing Philadelphia, Detroit would be my team as well.
And then Detroit drafted Aiden Hutchinson – someone I had come to love during his time at Michigan and he made me keep rooting for Detroit through the last two seasons. As we entered this season there was a different energy and I was beginning to realize how much I truly love Detroit. I love Philadelphia as well but as my love for where I live has grown so has my love for this sports team.
Growing up in Toledo, Detroit was my hometown team. It should have been. Detroit is an hour from where I grew up. It was the team we got the sports channel for. But my dad’s own inability to be loyal to a sports team made him not want to root for a team that was not good.
Philadelphia will always be my team because it’s the team that helped pull me out of my NFL funk, it’s a team that made me want to be loyal in sports. The Eagles and the Lions had made me loyal to these city sports teams and I want these cities to have their victories.
This year I said that I would only root against Philadelphia if they played Detroit. And that’s how it will remain. I am an Eagle. I am a Lion. I can have both. I can root for both. I can wish both of these cities well and hope they get victory. Because when the sports team wins the city wins.
Ashtyn’s loyalty to Detroit – her message that we root for Detroit no matter what even if they lose is what resonates. As nonbelievers continue to say that the Detroit Lions can’t get into the Super Bowl even as they are one game away from it, I’m really truly understanding what loyalty in sports means.
No matter what happens the next few games, no matter what Detroit does, I will be proud. And that’s what I’ve learned over the last several years of trying to find my sports team. Whe n you find that team you will be loyal to no matter what – that’s your team.
I am ONE PRIDE.
I wish my dad would’ve taught me about this kind of loyalty when I was growing up. Perhaps I would have found Detroit and Philadelphia a little sooner.
Note: this article was originally published in 2024. Since writing it, Dom remains a proud Detroit and Philly fan for football. He has however sadly stopped following the Detroit Tigers, who made it clear they support the illegitimate leader of the US, Donald Trump. While being loyal to your city is one thing, Trump harms Detroit continuously. The Tigers are not loyal to Detroit.
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