By Tam Nguyen, Nguoi Viet
In April, you might not have known the difference between Albert Einstein and Albert Pujols. Or, you might have thought a Yasiel Puig was a rare breed of dog found only in South America.
Kole Calhoun, left, of the Los Angeles Angels celebrates with Josh Hamilton after scoring the game-winning run in the 13th inning against the Baltimore Orioles on Thursday. (Photo by Greg Fiume/Getty Images)
But now it’s August, and you’ve heard your coworkers and neighbors talk for months about their favorite Southern California baseball teams, and you’ve started to pay attention. So now, you know that Pujols is the first baseman for the Los Angeles Angels, destined for the Hall of Fame. And you know that Puig is the dynamic young Cuban outfielder for the Los Angeles Dodgers. And that both are among the best teams in Major League Baseball.
Now, you can’t wait for the pennant races of September, the postseason of October.
This makes you a bandwagon fan.
Bandwagon fans are really not a true fan of their sports team. A fan might “jump on the bandwagon” in the middle of a championship run or right when a team wins a title. In the recent World Cup, for example, winner Germany gained fans who never knew about the team before the World Cup, know nothing about Germany’s storied soccer history and can’t name most of the 11 starting players.
We all know at least one bandwagon fan, maybe one of us is a bandwagon fan. Just be aware that longtime, loyal fans will dislike these bandwagon fans and wish they had jumped on some other wagon.
Jared McDonald, 70, an Angels fan, was sitting with a friend at a sports bar watching the Angels play. He looked like a longtime fan in his Angels cap and T-shirt. He is.
Bandwagon fans have irked him, he said, since the Angels won the World Series in 2002.
“I was a fan of the Angels way back before the World Series win,” he said. “From that year [bandwagon fans] acted like they had stuck with them through the struggles over the years.”
The Angels have not won another World Series title and haven’t reached the postseason since 2009. McDonald said the fans have been disappearing, but he expects a resurgence of them this September.
“The Angels are in second place but are closing in for the division lead, and yet the fans have not been very supportive,” McDonald said. “And I bet you if we make the playoffs, this place will get a lot more crazy.
“Those fans are bandwagoners, and it just hurts me that they don’t even stick around when the team is doing bad. But once there is a chance of winning the World Series, the flood gates open and fans pour in here or at the stadium to cheer for them.
“I would like to kick those fans off this wagon and let them go cheer for another team,” McDonald said.
Here are a few ways to spot a bandwagon fan:
- You see the fans of the losing team leave early. A true fan stays until the end of the game to watch for a comeback win.
- You see someone wearing the jersey of a championship-winning team one year and then the jersey of another winning team the next year.
- A fan follows a dominant team in one sport but doesn’t know the history of that team and its previous players.
- When you talk to a fan, he only knows one player on the team.
- You see a fan wearing the apparel of two different teams, such as a Los Angeles Kings cap and an Anaheim Ducks shirt.
I admit that I don’t know that much about baseball — or care that much about it. But thanks to a movie of my youth, “Angels in the Outfield,” I’m an Angels “fan.”
And come October, when the Angels are in the postseason, I’ll be rooting for them.
Now, just who is Josh Hamilton?
