As it currently stands, the National Football League is slated to generate around $9 billion in revenue for the year 2014.  Moreover, the league is comprised of thirty two teams with each individual team averaging nearly $1.5 billion in total value.  These numbers add up to make the NFL the most lucrative sports league in the world.  In addition, the NFL is a major contributor to America’s economy.  Between television broadcasts, advertising, merchandising, stadium construction, and a plethora of other sources of both income and expenditures, the NFL’s existence seems to make a hearty contribution toward the balance of the nation’s economy. 

            

             Ironically, this money-making juggernaut is at the complete mercy of the fans who are responsible for every dime the NFL machine earns.  Without the fans, the sponsors would not have targets for their ad campaigns.  Without the fans, merchandise would not be sold.  Without the fans, the NFL would not be on television.  Without the fans, the NFL would not exist at all.  So how does the NFL collect its fan base?  From what I have gathered, the NFL focuses their point of attack on how Americans draw part of their identity through the football team they support.  This truth is prevalent through the methods used to grow interest within the league.  It is through these ideas and practices that I have based my research in hopes of developing an enhanced understanding of both identity as a whole and identity of a fan by looking at the NFL teams individually.

 

Methods of Research

            To begin uncovering the basics of how teams generate fan bases, I felt the need to go directly to the followers.  I selected four teams across the country that seemed to have varying levels of fan commitment.  The Jacksonville Jaguars were the first team selected due to their young age as a franchise (when compared to the majority of the other NFL teams) as well as their continuous poor performance during their twenty year existence.  Similar to the Jaguars, the Carolina Panthers were selected because they too entered the league only twenty years ago, but contrastingly, they are a small market team with varying good and bad years of performance.  Thirdly, the Seattle Seahawks were chosen for their recent success in winning the NFL championship (Super bowl) in 2013.  This victory was also their first championship win since their inaugural season back in 1976 where they suffered a putrid win/loss ratio of 2-12.  Finally, the New Orleans Saints were chosen for a number of reasons: their age, continued success since 1987, their rivalry with the Panthers, and the controversy that plagued them during the 2012 season.  Once these teams were weeded from the rest, I went to each team’s official forum and registered an account in order to open a discussion with each team’s supporters.  Once approved for each site, I was able to post a series of generalized questions that I felt would offer some valid insight to the motivations behind team selection, fan behavior, and their own perspectives of other fans.  All of the questions were open ended in hopes of eliciting fully developed responses from the fans.  Once all of the responses were collected and reviewed, I analyzed the data and compiled it into applicable categories.

 

            In addition, I reviewed a patent submitted by Vincent DiCesare which involved a method to promote fan identification with a sports team.  In this patent, DiCesare discussed marketing products to fans, the effects of income from these products, and why his process would benefit sports teams based off of normal market trends.  The success of this process was then evaluated by observing it at work in the NFL.

 

            My final method of research came from an article written by ESPN’s Matt Mosley; a respected writer and NFL analyst.  Being self-titled, “The Worldwide Leader in Sports,” ESPN has developed quite the reputation for knowledge in all sports across the globe.  The article itself was assessed for content dealing with how fans show support for the teams they like.  Those responsible for developing the criteria for what it takes to be the “best fan” also created a scoring system to see how each team’s devotees ranked.  I used that same criteria and scoring system to weigh any fundamental information involving methods that fans show support for their organization.

 

 

Why Americans Love Football

            It is no surprise that Americans love football.  For some, the world stops on Sunday as they find themselves pasted to a television watching their favorite team clash with their rival.  Sometimes it gets heated and becomes more violent than normal.  Sometimes it produces an epic drama seeming to reach beyond reality.  Sometimes it gets so pathetic that the only option is shutting off the television and finding something to calm the anger for a few hours.  Even still, America loves every last minute of it. 

 

            The love of football, like most sports, seems to stem from the days of the coliseum where gladiators were pitted against each other for the ultimate test in strength, courage, and resiliency.  Gladiators were both loved and hated depending on the spectator, and eventually those spectating would claim a gladiator as their favorite.  That same gladiator would become the symbol of that spectator or the spectator’s beacon of courage or hope until the warrior’s usually untimely demise.  Over time, sporting events like this became more civilized (by today’s standards) and eventually led into the era of team-sports, but through the centuries the spectators continued to view individual athletes and teams in much of the same light.

 

            Another area of appeal comes from the “underdog” aspect.  America was built on heroic tales in which characters starting from the streets would end up millionaires through nothing more than hard work and a little luck.  America itself was the ultimate underdog in the age of the thirteen colonies; a band of rebels battling it out the with the world’s greatest superpower in attempt to free themselves from tyranny. 

 

            Now, these stories have transferred over to the gridiron.  An example of this is displayed in the comments of Seahawk’s fan, Volsunghawk who claimed his favorite player was Richard Sherman because Sherman was supposed to be too big to play at his position.  As a cornerback, a player is typically short and nimble in order to keep up with the speedy wide receivers that he must defend against.  Sherman, however, is a hulking six foot three yet overcame his disadvantage and is still one of the most dominate cornerbacks in the game of football.  Meanwhile, in the Panther’s forum, Bonecracker89 argued that each year a new team has the ability to become a champion despite starting the season poorly or even if they had a terrible season the previous year.  He went on to mention that it is through this concept that the drama stays alive through the whole season.

 

            In addition to the underdog stories, the short seasons also fuel interest in football because every game is highly significant as opposed to other sports around the world.  In the NFL, only twelve of the thirty-two teams are invited to the playoffs, and those invitations rest solely on the number of wins each team has.  With each team only playing sixteen games, the win/loss ratio between teams is typically very close.  Weighing in again, Bonecracker89 said, “Unlike soccer, basketball, or baseball, it's really easy to be invested in every game; whereas, in other sports, individual games don't bear as much significance because of their long seasons.”  (38 games played per season in MLS, 82 games in NBA/NHL seasons, and 162 games in MLB season)  Erebus, another Seahawk’s fan, echoed much of the same, but added in his thoughts on how no other sport requires everyone on the field to be as dependent on one another as they are in football.

 

            From examining these areas, the love for professional football can more easily be evaluated and understood.  Though the underdog stories and the short seasons appear to be two main origins for this infatuation, there are still many other contributing factors that can be analyzed to find importance.  However, that process is unnecessary for this particular topic since a baseline of comprehension is all that is needed in order to grasp the overall purpose of this research pertaining to identity.

 

 

How the Fans Contribute to Teams

            The way that fans contribute reveals the most about how people derive their identity from professional teams.  Fan contribution can be observed in numerous capacities to include game attendance and event participation, merchandise or memorabilia purchases, and emotional impact left on fans by team performance.

Mosley’s article focused on what it took to be the “best fans” in the NFL by collaborating with his seven collogues in order to reach a rating for each team’s fans.  The areas he used to calculate team ratings ultimately boiled down to two categories. 

 

            The first group dealt with fan participation.  Participation itself could be regarded in many ways to include how loud fans are in the home stadium, how often a fan travels to other stadiums to support their team on the road, team loyalty, how many fans tailgate at the games, and how creative they are with their costumes and personalities at the games.  In the eyes of other fans, the level of participation in these events and traditions determines the level of respect and acceptance the participant receives among the more dedicated fans.

 

            The second category dealt with the emotional impact a specific team leaves on its fans.  When a rough loss leaves a team’s supporters feeling despondent, Mosely actually considers it a good thing.  In addition, the more hated a team fan base is, the better the rating they receive.  While this may seem backwards from the typical stigma attached to these behaviors, it is actually logical when observed in the aspect of team support.  The enthusiast’s emotional response elicited by team performance confirms their commitment to the team.  Concurrently, being hated by other team’s fans is a sign of underlying jealously even though this notion would be wholeheartedly denied by most fans if accused of such.

 

            Aside from Mosley’s article, fan contribution can similarly be visible through their merchandise and memorabilia purchasing.  According to Vincent DiCesare and his patented method and system for promoting fan identification with a sports team, “The higher the level of fan identification, the more likely fans are to attend the team's games or events or support the team through the purchase of goods associated with the sports team.”  DiCeasre’s patent was modeled around the idea of marketing personalized products associated with a fan’s team in order to increase team profits.  In essence, DiCeasre believes that fans rely on symbols of support which publicly display their level of commitment to their favorite organization such as team jerseys, mugs, blankets, commemorative merchandise, and other items; the more personalized the item is, the more a fan will identify with said item resulting in more sales of that item.  This mode of identity ties in directly with what James Paul Gee labeled as “affinity-identity” which is consequent to the affinity groups which they belong.

 

 

How the Teams Obtain Fans

            As mentioned previously, NFL teams are unable to function without fans which provide the funding to finance the organization.  This concept leads to the question of how the teams actually compile in their followers.  Research has warranted the conclusion that teams attract fans through their overall performance, the caliber of players they employ to include the caliber of those players’ personalities, and through the team’s location, tradition, and appeal.

 

            The level of performance each team exhibits is probably the most crucial manner to assemble followers.  A sustained level of success over several seasons is pivotal to become an elite organization.  The sustained success provides more opportunities to attract new fans rather than having one good season and then bottoming out.  Moreover, continuous success maintains current fans as opposed to them seeking out more prosperous football clubs.  This concept is also visited in DiCeasre’s patent where he states, ” attracting new fans as well as maintaining existing fans is an important part of managing any sports team and is often the subject of competition between sports teams or sports organizations.”

 

            Saints’ fan Lee909 mentioned his love for the team started shortly after hurricane Katrina ripped through New Orleans.  After the destruction left behind by the storm, it appeared that the Saints would be written off for a while as they rebuilt their city.  That particular organization had other plans and went on to shock the world by going 10-6 the following season and continuing their success for another two years until finally winning the Super Bowl in 2009.  Lee909, though actually from England, mentioned how that series of events led him to become a huge fan of the team.  This same sentiment resonates through America in many of the same ways.

 

            Secondary to team performance are team location, tradition, and visual appeal.  Many of the NFL’s older teams seem to have the largest and most loyal of fan bases.  The Washington Redskins, for example, have been in the league since 1932 and is the third highest valued team in the league despite only visiting the playoffs four times in the last twenty-two years.  This can be attributed to the team’s traditions as well as their location or locations (in some cases where teams have relocated and maintained many original fans while adding fans from the new location). 

 

            In cases such as the Jaguars, the team gained fans from their location in conjunction with the appeal of their uniforms and logo.  Jaguar Warrior professed that this was the case for him when the Jaguars debuted in 1995.  Again, looking to DeCeasre’s patent, it was discovered that, “in large cities having more than one professional sports team, the competition for fans between the sports teams can be much greater than in smaller cities with fewer teams.”  This leads to the accurate conclusion that location is directly related with the number of potential fans a team can acquire.

 

            Lastly, the quality of players and player personalities share a role in fan accumulation for NFL organizations.  DeCeasre’s business model made it clear that using extra income to buy players of high quality is essential to team success.  This applies through both the idea of team performance as well as appealing to fans who become attached to star athletes such as Payton Manning or Marshall Faulk; both of which were forced to leave their teams even after leading their teams to success.  Along with this fact, likeable personalities add entertainment value to the league and in some cases provide role models for adolescences.

 

 

Final Thoughts

            Taking everything under consideration, it is evident that fans collect a portion of their identity through the NFL team they support.  The evidence supporting this fact lies within the buying and displaying of “symbols of support” in addition to fan’s levels of participation within different areas of team interest as well as methods teams use to expand their fan bases.  The culmination of these areas contribute to an individual’s identity through the affinity groups (as discussed by Gee) pertaining to respective teams.  Through the influences of the fans, teams are put in position to increase chances of victory thereby generating more supporters which enlarge monetary income for the organization.  Without fan identity, the NFL would fall flat in the world of business.