Every team has its bandwagon, unfortunately LA's been in the Championship so many times the team owns the rights to this particular bandwagon. The NBA's only been in existance since '47 and the Lakers have been in the championship 31 times - that means every other year, the Lakers are there. No wonder there's no such thing as a Clippers fan.
I'd be very hesitant to agree with you about fan loyalty having anything to do with a team's relocation though - if the owner's an asshole, he's an asshole through and through no matter the community support. Ask a Cleveland Browns fan.. is there anyone more loyal than a deranged fan who sits in a set of bleachers denoted the Dawg Pound while wearing a Dollar Store rubber pork-chop mask? Or a Seattle Supersonics fan, who must be scratching his head trying to figure out how a third-rate market like greater Oklahoma City gets their team while the Washington/British Columbia area lost both of its teams to markets four times smaller. Or ask a Quebec Nordiques fan or a Hartford Whalers fan, whose talented teams were on the brink of success before quickly running off to immediately win championships in the wintery wonderland that is Charlotte, North Carolina, and Denver. I'm sure a few Houston Oilers fans feel robbed after selling out the Astrodome for the better half of the 80s and 90s only to see their team ungraciously shipped off to Nashville. Nashville. Yippy-yi-fucking-yay! As much as I want to agree that LA is a pro football vortex, I have to disagree - fan loyalty isn't in question - douchebag-owners are at fault, and Al Davis is the creme de la creme of douche. And as long as professional sports mandate that teams have majority ownership by one owner rather than a community-based nonprofit partnership such as the Green Bay Packers, then it doesn't matter if you sell out the stadiums or arenas - if that owner wants to ship your team off to Vegas or Billings, the fans, the city, the league will be hard-pressed to stop them.
i do completely agree amicu. i think i was making more of a "there is no loyalty in LA" kind of statement. luckily for the lakers, los angeles is a destination city so they've been able to attract many great players since they live in the land of glitz and glamor. the true testament of a teams loyalty is what the fans do when the team goes through a rough stretch where they aren't even making the playoffs - fortunately for the lakers they've yet to have to feel that, so we'll never really know how many loyal fans of that team actually exist. my dad is a huge browns fan, so i know what you're talking about. to this day he still can not stand the ravens and that has become almost as bitter a rivalry as the steelers-browns is. it's very sad that the owners control the market and can do what they want with the team.
i just wanted to shed a little light on the other side of the coin though: first of all the league has to approve any move of a team, so the league does have the power to stop it if need be. in the case of the supersonics, however, the fans knew about a possibility of a move for three years and yet attendance to games still remained at an all time low. in ok city when the hornets were playing there as they were having their city rebuilt, fans were flocking to the city from miles around to watch the only pro team the state had. (score: SEATTLE - 0, OK -1) the owners said they would leave the team if the city built a new stadium (which was part of the purchase agreement), but every time that the vote came up the city voted it down. meanwhile ok city built a BRAND NEW arena to try and attract the team, and this was before they knew they would get a team (SEA - 0, OKC - 2) then when the owners finally said they were gonna actually move the team the city cried out in an outrage and started whining over the team moving - too little, too late. i'm pretty sure that the fans just assumed that the nba would never approve the move and they would just keep the team there. but alas, it was not meant to be. now i'm well aware that the new owners were from OK and there had been whispering about a move since before they took over, but the old owners did throw that stadium clause in the contract to prevent them from moving the team.. it was the city of seattle that then basically made the move happen by being bystanders in the process. seattle did get to keep the name, colors, championship and history so if the nba decided to expand again seattle would be in the running for a "new franchise" that would just pick up where the other one left off, much like the cleveland browns did. but in clevelenad's situation part of the move agreement was that cleveland would get another team in 5 years, not the case in seattle as there is NO guarantee the city will ever get an nba franchise again.
fan loyalty may not be the reason a team is moved.. unfortunately loyalty and financial support can mean two different things in the world of sports. i know a lot of people that are loyal to their local teams but have never once spent a dime on going to game, buying a jersey or even a key chain. but it's usually those ones who like to talk the biggest talk and gripe the most about how the team is doing while they sit at the bar watching the game in their old navy t-shirt...
Quote
Quote
Limited Time Offer!
Don’t Miss Out!
Last Chance!
