Amy Sullivan has written a story in The Washington Monthly about Washington fandom, as her example she recounts - truthfully - the tepid response of our region to the Wizards’ recent playoff run. She then extrapolates this to divine the nugget of wisdom that D.C. is an area of outsiders and thus not loyal to any team. She goes to Marshall Wittman of the DLC to validate her theory.
Her sole mention of the Washington Redskins is in relation to the Texas-born Bush not being a fan.
This is one of the dumbest stories I’ve ever seen, and its a glaring example of how the political class of this town thinks D.C. revolves around them.
Washington, D.C. - the real Washington and the surrounding area (including Maryland and Virginia), consists of many people who have lived here for a long time or are native born (like myself). We DO have a strong sports culture.
It’s called The Washington Redskins.
In the D.C. metro area, it’s the Redskins at #1 and everything else coming in at a distant #2. Even less so for the Wizards and Capitals. Georgetown and University of Maryland college basketball (and now George Washington University) are the only sports that get remotely close to the Redskins. This town bleeds Burgundy and Gold. Maybe the cloistered political class doesn’t give in, but real DC/MD/VA area residents are Redskins fans - and they don’t much care about the Wizards.
Was Amy Sullivan sleeping when the Redskins returned to the playoffs and this town went nuts?
Gibbs Does His Best Work in the Playoffs
Few events in Washington sports remotely approach the buzz before a Redskins playoff game. When Joe Gibbs also happens to be the coach, that anticipation builds to a climax akin to the roar of a jet aircraft by game time.
Amy Sullivan must have been at some “important” Washington meetings when the place turned into a ghost town for the Redskins playoff appearance.
The trash blows past the hardware store like tumbleweed and the men inside speak of a “ghost town.” Imagine: a crisp clear Sunday, pregnant with possibilities for cabinet repair, deck sanding, maybe a new nail gun, and yet, there are no customers. And this, dead center in the nation’s capital.
“It’s amazing,” said John Woodfolk, 64, behind the key counter at W.J. Candey Hardware, two blocks from Dupont Circle. “You just don’t see anybody on the streets.”
Woodfolk is describing a phenomenon that some call the “Redskins Effect”: that trance-like state of calm that descends on the region when hundreds of thousands of eyes are staring at football. Today, at 4:45 p.m. — kickoff of the Washington Redskins’ first playoff game in six years — expect many area residents to retreat en masse to their dwellings or sports bars. Outside, life will continue, but according to those who’ve lived it, the pace will be quite different.
“When it’s a home game, we’re losing 60 percent of our business; it’s really something,” said Brewster Bassett, the head teaching professional at the Bull Run Country Club in Haymarket, who has watched his fairways regularly bleed golfers at game time. “It’s a funny effect. I kept on asking the general manager, ‘What’s going on here?’ And he said: ‘Football.’ “
How could you write a column about Washington sports with a straight face and not write about the Redskins??? How do you write a column about Washington sports and pretend that the Redskins are of no consequence?
Jesus.
UPDATE: You know, 500,000 people don’t usually stand in the rain to celebrate their team in areas where there’s no fan support.
I WONDER: Is her next story going to be about how Boston isn’t really into the Red Sox? Come. On.
if she wants to see some fan lethargy, come out here to san diego. i’ve been a chargers fan since childhood and i’m ready to just let them go to hell. the Spanos family has turned it slowly into a money-extraction device, with the city gov. just bending to their will. Donna Frye said “you know what, go to hell.”
and they are. and i can’t wait to see the door hit ‘em on the ass on the way out, frankly. too long on the public teat for no production, no return. screw ‘em.
whew. sorry. got a little off-topic
I dunno, fanatical interest in one team does not a good sports town make, particularly since the team plays a sport that’s little more than a front for selling luxory boxes. BTW, what’s with the scummy racist nickname for your team?
In Southern Florida (Miami, Ft. Lauderdale, Palm Beach) the fans are also bandwaggoners of the worst sort.
Now Miami and LA - there’s your bad sports towns.
Most good sports towns are dedicated to one team above all others.
To the contrary, a “good sports town” is dedicated to most all of its teams.
Good sports towns are Chicago, Boston, New York, LA–even Denver’s not bad with the exception that they don’t really support the Rockies.
DC is a horrible, horrible sports town.
Sure they have a pecking order–usually the team that’s doing best at the time.
Look if you go a NY Rangers game at MSG, it’s best you’re not wearing another team’s jersey unless you’re looking for trouble. The fact is that even when the Rangers go through one of their decades-long slumps–they still are popular. Go to a Caps game and most of the lower bowl of MCI is empty.
In a good sports town, you can pick up the sports page–at any time of the year—and there’ll be full coverage of whatever team(s) are playing. There’ll be opinion and analyses. There will be TV and radio shows.
That only happens at one time during the year in DC.
As a result, you don’t get good sports reporters in DC because there’s only one game in town.
Tony Kornheiser used to write for the Style section in NY and Wilbon is probably the best of a bad lot. They’re both personalities as opposed to sports writers.
No, Lupica isn’t much good—and neither are a lot of the folks who appear on ESPN.
I don’t like Wilbon and he isn’t the best sports writer in DC (He’s a Chicago guy who hates the DC teams. I like his personality but not his column). Kornheiser is a humorist and is better, as is Boswell. Sally Jenkins is an abomination.
(FYI it’s now Verizon — not MCI — Center. Heheh.)
Heck, y’all couldn’t even hang on to the Washington Senators, and the best you could do is the cast-off Montreal Expos.
Philadelphia seems to do pretty well in supporting the Phillies, the Eagles, the Seventy-Sixers and the Flyers. And New York manages to support two Major League Baseball teams, two NFL teams, two NBA teams and three NHL teams. Maybe when you were thinking that “Most ‘good sports towns’ are dedicated to one team above all others,” you were somewhat influenced by the fact that most good sports towns only have one good team. (Think Denver here.)
Most “good sports towns” are dedicated to one team above all others. And football is surely a big money sport, but so is every other sport - you think baseball, basketball, and hockey don’t count on luxury seating? I’m not going to argue about the team name, I’m tired of it.
Actually, I happen to like Tony Kornheiser and Thomas Boswell. But then you’re gonna tell me someone like Mike Lupica is the be-all and end-all. The Redskins have been through a 15 year slump, still popular. I’m not saying that DC is The Greatest Sports Town In America, but to say we’re not a sports town at all - Sullivan’s thesis - is braindead.
And we make up for the dearth of sports shows in the offseason by having about 7 Redskins shows during the season
Agreed, which is an area where I think DC and especially Boston and Chicago excel and where LA and Miami suck, hard.
I think a better measure of how “good” a sports town is by looking at how well they support the team when said team is terrible. It’s easy to jump on the bandwagon of a winner. It’s another to fly team colors when they’re chasing a 10th straight losing season.
Concerning the Luxury Box as the raison d’etre of pro football, there are so few games that the payment for the box has a disproportionate impact on team revenues. D.C., being a town where the only true business is lobbying, is a perfect spot for pro football, since the luxury box is the perfect corporate perk.
Concerning L.A., the notion that fans don’t support a team if they’re not winning has been thoroughly discredited just by the fact that the Clippers and Kings have sold out most of their games for the past decade. The Dodgers have been awful since 1988, and have drawn at least 3 and a half mill every season, and the Lakers have led the league in attendance the past two years in spite of the team’s mediocrity.
There’s also college BBall. When I was at Georgetown the students were not the only rabid fans of the Hoyas. A lot of regular Washingtonians were too.
BD,
I think he’s referring to the LA Kings of the NHL.
And I’m not sure what Sullivan’s point is. Does losing in the first round really count as a “run” in the playoffs?
It was a good series and every game was close, but still. They zero chance of making any noise past the second round, had they made it that far.
And the whole “great sports town” thing is overrated anyway. Philly is considered a great sports town as far as fan interest and passion go, but that doesn’t change the fact that we haven’t won a championship in anything since 1983 (professional anyway. 1985 if you count Villanova.)
Even racehorses from Philly are jinxed.
Oh, and Dana, Philly does support all four teams, but you can’t deny it’s the Eagles and everyone else.
I was at the Phillies game this past Friday night, and there were at least as many Red Sox fans as their were Phillies fans.
And had the Sixers been a five seed in the playoffs, i don’t know that there would’ve been a ton of interest. The team isn’t going anywhere.
On BOTH sports-talk stations, the Eagles draft got more discussion than the Phillies and Flyers (who happened ot be in the playoffs at the time) combined.
One thing i will say, though, is that Philly is a much bigger college basketball town than pro. The Palestra remains the greatest college hoops venue on the face of the earth.
Steve - How does the Kings selling out vindicate LA as a sports town? Aren’t the Kings from Sacramento?
I’m with you, O-Dub. Writing about Washington as sports town w/o mentioning the Redskins is sort of writing about sports in N.C. w/o mentioning college basketball or NASCAR.
Thanks for the clarification. My apathy towards hockey has been exposed!