For my birthday a couple of weeks ago, Ryan gave me a copy of Craig Calcaterra’s book Rethinking Fandom: How to Beat the Sports-Industrial Complex at Its Own Game. Calcaterra is troubled by the ways team owners (and the media) dishonestly manipulate fans’ loyalty to line their own pockets at fans’ expense, and to the detriment of the various professional and college sports.
Calcaterra has many concerns, too many to discuss in this update, but among them these stood out to me:
- Victimizing taxpayers (and people who need government services) by diverting public funds to pay for stadia and other facilities from which the owners profit.
- Cultivating loyalty to teams to increase their revenues, without reciprocating with loyalty to fans (or even to players).
- Pretending to compete, as if winning was the main goal, but always actually prioritizing profits — content to lose year after year as long as the profits flow.
- Profiting from the uncompensated labor of college athletes, or the severely undercompensated labor of minor leaguers.
- Trying to break the players’ unions.
Calcaterra has advice for fans:
- Be a fair-weather fan – loosen up your loyalty to specific teams. Feel free to transfer loyalty to teams that are actually winning. Punish losing teams with your indifference.
- Root for players, not teams.
- Be ready to abandon sports entirely when you realize they are exploiting people — players, fans. Calcaterra has pulled back from being a fan of college sports (for exploiting the players) and pro football (for destroying so many of its players, more like a gladiatorial spectacle than a sport). He has not abandoned baseball, although he is more a fan of the sport than of any particular team.
- Be a metafan. Enjoy the sport in ways and venues not directly tied to (and profitable to) billionaire owners.
You could read the book — it’s 230 pages, but the pages are half the size of most paperbacks, so it’s really only a couple hours to read. He writes clearly and enjoyably.
Or you could say “Huh. We’re way ahead of you, Mr. Calcaterra. We are the EFL. This league has been a long lesson in the general direction you are pointing. Take a look at the rest of this update.”
(And, by the way, “no thank you” to abandoning losing teams, says this Mariners fan. Loyalty to the marginalized is a hard virtue, requiring all the practice we can get.)
Ok, even though I just touted the virtues of loyalty to losers, let’s start with a quick update on the EFL pennant race. Did it go from blazing to incandescent?
Blazing (yesterday):
- DC 74 – 41 .642 0
- OD 73 – 42 .635 0.9
- SS 73 – 42 .632 1.1
- CK 72 – 43 .630 1.4
- HD 67 – 48 .586 6.5
That was cooled off from a 0.0, 0.4, 0.7, 1.0 top four part way through the update, which I was ready to call incandescent.
So here’s today’s standings chart:
- DC 75 – 41 .643 0 — no change. Boring!
- OD 74 – 42 .637 0.7 — crept a bit closer, carried by Kaline’s kindness
- SS 73 – 43 .630 1.5 — getting a little cooler
- CK 73 – 43 .630 1.8 — ditto
- HD 68 – 48 .586 6.3 — ditto, at something a little above room temperature
- The Rest: At room temperature. Not a good thing for mammals.
No incandescence yet. It still could happen!
Notes:
- I’d be more excited about gaining 0.2 games on the Balk, but frankly the W’s are being kept afloat this week by Kaline generosity, taking it easy on Old Detroit.
- The Dragons are, along with the Wolverines and Alleghenys, one of only three teams to gain on the Balk Saturday. The W’s and D’s both gained 0.2 games, a piddly number compared to the Alleghenys, who gained 0.7 games in a single day.
- The EFL’s two best teams this week are the Seraphim (0.817 raw winning percentage) and the Cascades (.755). Neither gained on the Balk (0.547) because the Seraphim and Cascades are playing each other, while the Balk are feasting on Pears.
- Calcaterra would endorse what Dave and Andre are doing this week — going full tilt in their intra-family competition. For the season, the Seraphim have pretty much left the Cascades in the dust. currently leading by 27.2 games. But the Cascades have upped their game this week, winning at a .755 raw percentage they have matched only once this season (going .757 in Week 15). So far, however, the Seraphim have had the answer, with an .817 raw pace — their 7th week thus far with a raw percentage over .800. So, Mr. Calcaterra, I think we can agree: let’s hope these two teams continue at their epic paces, making it a week to remember and talk about at Thanksgiving.
- This is not the first intra-family cup competition. John, Mark, and Jamie have a round-robin tournament going. The first round was Week 17, the Dragons v. the Rosebuds. Portland had a very good week, a raw winning percentage of .595, about 0.080 points above its season average. But Pops was ready for the Kid: Haviland uncorked an .838 raw percentage for the week, the second highest of the season, only beaten by Week 3’s .911 raw percentage.
- The fils, Mark and Jamie, met in round two during Week 18. Again, the Rosebuds were good, winning at a raw rate of .556, still well above the season average. But elder brother was also ready for the Kid, producing an .808 raw winning percentage. That was the third best of the season for the Tornados, wonderfully timed to keep the younger brother in his place. And I do mean wonderfully timed! Flint Hill’s raw winning percentage in Week 17 was .262. Then came Week 18’s .808, Week 19’s .511, Week 20’s .141 (so far). Somehow Jamie saved up all his team’s goodness for Week 18.
- Note also this: For the season, the Tornados have a raw winning percentage of .519. The Rosebuds: .517.
- The final and decisive round of the Johnson Family Cup will take place in the season’s final week, the Dragons v. the Tornados. Those are two of our fiercest team names; I suppose the Rosebuds, no matter how thorny, are just the salad course for the Fire and the Wind.
- We need a team called something like Rain, so we can get 3 of the four classic elements.
- If we include Uncle Tom in the Johnson Cup, Kaline has already faced Flint Hill (Week 17) and Haviland (Week 18). Kaline clobbered Flint Hill, .663 to .262, winning 5.1 games to 0.9. Then Haviland stopped the Drive in Week 18, .779 to .607, taking 4.2 wins and 1..8 losses.
- Kaline and Bellingham will battle for Puget Sound bragging rights in Week 23, the first week in September.
- If we broaden the focus to all of the state of Washington, the Peshastin Pears will face Kaline in Week 24 and the Cascades in the final week of the season.
- Kaline and Old Detroit are competing for the Detroit City Championship this very week! I almost missed it! Neither team seems to realize what is at stake, either — both are poking along at below .500 raw pace this week, with the W’s doing a little better than the Drive. So far. Let’s see if either team can pick up the pace now that we’ve recognized what’s happening. We should have made sure the Tigers were in on this, too, so we could have a round-robin tourney.
- The Pittsburgh Alleghenys and the Pittsburgh Pirates will compete for the Steel City Cup in the final week of the season.
- Canberra and Old Detroit will face each other for the Mock Cup the final week of the season. If things go just right, that could also be the series that decides the EFL championship. Although, right now it looks like the Wolverines will have been out of the race several week by then.
- That leaves the Balk as the only team not to have a side-cup competition going. I guess you’ll just have to win the league championship.