My Analytical Writing -- ATL Fans Aren't as Bad as They May Seem

Many fans and sports writers alike love to downgrade Atlanta as a “bad sports city” or they claim that the area teams have some of the worst fans in the country. These people like to talk about the poor attendance teams like the Braves, Hawks, Falcons, and Thrashers see at their home games, and many like to claim that the fans are not as knowledgeable about their teams or the sports they play as other regions like the Northeast and California. I think there are reasons for these perceptions, though I do not agree that they are fair to the Atlanta sports fans, nor that they are true. Casual onlookers may see poor attendance in Atlanta and may be quick to generalize the fan base, but I feel they do this without putting much thought at all into their claim that Atlanta fans are “bad fans”.

The weather is lovely in the South, is it not? While other places in the country are freezing their butts off all winter long, we rarely encounter temperatures below freezing. Our mild winter climate makes Atlanta and the rest of the South an attractive place to move. If one were to spend even a short amount of time in downtown Atlanta, they should not be surprised to find that many of the people they meet are not native to the area – they were born and raised somewhere else and then chose to move here. What does this have to do with sports? Quite a lot. If someone, a sports fan was born and raised in another place, they are likely to follow the team they left at home – the team their family follows. Why would they want to go see the Atlanta Falcons when they can watch their favorite team on television? This is also apparent when an Atlanta team plays a team from New York, Chicago, or another big northern city. A good illustration of this is when the Atlanta Braves play the Chicago Cubs. During these games the fans are split about 50 – 50 between the teams. It can be aggravating to hear people cheering for the visiting team, but these relocated sports fans are only taking advantage of the opportunity to see their favorite team play in their new home.

I am now 34 years old, and have been following the Braves, Falcons, and Hawks since I was about five years old. Not many people in Atlanta can say this. I learned to love sports from my father, who is from Massachusetts. He has not followed the Atlanta teams since he was young; he followed the Boston Red Sox and the Boston Celtics. Since many of the sports fans in the South are originally from other places, the fan base has not been able to mature like other places in the country who have had teams since early in last century. The Braves and Falcons have only been playing in Atlanta since 1966, and the Hawks did not move to Atlanta for Saint Louis until two years after that. Nobody has had the opportunity to follow the Atlanta Falcons or Braves for longer than 42 years, which means not many children in the area are following the same teams as their parents. Just for comparison’s sake, consider the Pittsburgh Steelers who are 75 years old, the Philadelphia Phillies who are 125 years old, or the New York Knicks who are 62 years old. These teams have all been around and played in the same city long enough to build generations of fans, and the Atlanta teams have not been here long enough to do so, which affects attendance.

Lastly, claims that Atlanta fans are not as knowledgeable as other places in the country are irresponsible. People do not avoid Braves games because they do not understand baseball; they do not go because it costs upwards of $100 to bring a family to a game. Everybody knows that football fans in the South are some of the best and most knowledgeable in the country, and who can blame them when we have one of the best and oldest college football conferences in the country. A visit to Athens, Georgia on a home-game Saturday can easily illustrate how rabid southern football fans can be. These fans just are not quite as interested in the NFL that has not been anywhere near the South until 42 years ago. The writers who say that Atlanta fans do not know much about sports are just being lazy; instead of investigating reasons for poor attendance, they resort to being hateful.

I understand why some people may think Atlanta sports fans are not very enthusiastic about their teams, but if they were to think about the nature of the city and the region where it lies, they may come to different conclusions. Since Atlanta is a city of transplants from other places, and the sports teams are young relative to teams in other cities, the fan base is going to be different. Atlanta has a sports tradition that may not be as rich as those in places like New York, Boston, Los Angeles, or Chicago because it has developed under different circumstances than the sports traditions in those cities. It is my bet that the “bad fan” label will be one that is forgotten in Atlanta in the near future.