Being a Superfan
“Hey 57! I used to fuck guys like you in prison.” Far and away the most creative sentiment I’ve ever heard addressed to a basketball player as he tenses up for a foul shot. Being a fan means nothing. Being a superfan is everything. With both the ASP’s Saturday deadline and the UAlbany v. Siena basketball game fast approaching, I am stumbling a fine line between writing and pre-gaming. As I scramble to finish this article, I find myself getting purple and gold face paint all over my keyboard.
New paragraphs aren’t started because of new ideas; they’re started because I just got back from shot-gunning a brewskie in my kitchen. Sports are about one thing and one thing only. Winning. “I play for fun.” Pussy. “I like staying in shape.” May I suggest light beer? Winning is winning, and coming in second is just another way of saying “fucking loser.” When you’re a superfan, you’re on the team. When the team wins, you win; go out and celebrate by getting shithoused. When the team loses, you lose; drown your sorrows by going out and getting shithoused. Superfans are often shithoused.
If you want to be a superfan, you need to know your shit. Who is the UAlbany mascot? If you answered anything other than “Adam Thorpe,” you are not a superfan. If you answered “Great Dane,” congratulations, you go to UAlbany. That doesn’t make you a fan. If you answered, “Lil’ D,” kill yourself. Who is more important to UAlbany basketball, Jamar Wilson or Coach Brown? I’m not sure but I’d let them both Eiffel Tower my girlfriend.
Athletes are expected to display a certain level of composure, poise and sportsmanship. This is true both on and off the court. Superfans are required to achieve new heights of intoxication, belligerence, and ignorance with every basket. This is true both in and out of jail. It would be of low class for an athlete to trash the car of an opposing player after a tough loss. Superfans pretty much have to.
Superfans are commonly referred to as the 6th man on the court. They are an essential part of the team, and they need to be at every game to ensure continued success. The only acceptable reason for a missing a game is because you are too drunk to drive there, but not too drunk to think you can. In the event that you strike and kill a star player on the opposing team in a DWI hit-and-run, it is acceptable to support your team from Albany County Jail.
Superfans must make their presence known at all times. Half of this objective is accomplished by wearing the proper attire. Every inch of exposed skin that isn’t painted with your team’s colors is a sign of weakness to your enemies. Team members constantly compete amongst themselves to keep each other at their best. Superfans compete by thinking of the most outrageously funny and blatantly offensive things to display on their clothing. Making a jersey with your last name, the number 69, and the phrase “dribbling our balls doggie style since 1910” is a good start. A true superfan would simply have a shirt with a graphic of a Great Dane fucking a Siena nun from behind. Who knew rabies was an STD?
The other part of making your presence known is being vocal. If you can speak the next day, you weren’t shouting loud enough. You need people to hear your comments over the noise of the game, the whistles, the buzzers and the crowd. If you really want to remind the Siena point guard that he “loves the cock,” you better chant it with some authority. As far as what you say, the more it pisses people off, the more effective. Remember, your ultimate goal is to get in a fistfight after the game. Fighting rules. When thinking of the next tide-turning chant, just make sure it has equal parts vulgarity, ignorance and audacity. People expect college kids to be brutish, drunk and disorderly. Superfans exceed all expectations.
To be a proper superfan, you need to really be into the game. It’s life and death. If you get stabbed over your conduct at a game, purple and gold should flow as surely from your veins as cheep beer flows through your urethra. You’ve been with the team from the start. You’ve trained with them. For every Gatorade they’ve drank, you’ve drank a beer. For every basket they’ve made, you’ve drank a beer. And for every rich, snobby, Catholic girl at Siena, there’s a hotter rich snobby Jewish girl at UAlbany. And she actually puts out.
**Originally Printed in the Albany Student Press
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Kevin Said,
December 22, 2006 @ 4:57 pm
i often am a superfan at my high school, and i loved ur article