The Hope That Kills You
On emotional support sports fandom
The season one finale of Ted Lasso is titled The Hope That Kills You. Without spoiling the episode, Ted makes a big deal of the fact he doesn’t agree with the sentiment, and that it’s actually “the lack of hope that comes and gets you”. While that may be true for the athletes he’s attempting to inspire, it’s once again the time of year when I’m reminded of the emotional rollercoaster that comes with holding onto hope as a fan.
I grew up with a sports-mad father, and through him, inherited the fandom for a rugby league team that…is not known for being very good. We had a brief moment of glory when I was a teenager when we won the grand final, but usually, you’ll see us in the headlines for sub-par performances rather than successes. However, while I say I inherited that fandom, I never truly connected with that sport in a way that made me become too emotionally attached. In fact, until I was twenty-two, I would never have described myself as a sports fan at all.
And then, on a fateful trip to the USA in 2016, I discovered ice hockey (or, more accurately, the NHL).
As an Australian who has ice-skated maybe five times in her entire life, it’s a bit of a weird sport to fall in love with. But I saw the Washington Capitals (the Caps) play the Vancouver Canucks and something just clicked.
The captain of the Caps is Alexander Ovechkin (“Ovi”), a 38-year-old Russian who is Very Good At Hockey. And following a team captained by Ovi means that there’s often a lot to celebrate! However, while the Caps were Very Good for a while (we won the Cup in 2018 which is still one of the best days of my life), they now…try. Mostly. Sometimes.
I make a lot of noise about yelling at them and hating them for poor performances, but even when we’re at our worst, there’s still a little tiny part of me that thinks we have a Cinderella run lurking within us. Nobody expected us to make it to the playoffs this year, but in a Bradbury-esque feat, we scraped in at the literal final second after all of our closest competitors also decided to fall apart. And suddenly, there was that pesky hope.
But it’s not just me and the Caps. It’s playoff season in the United States which means there are sixteen NHL teams and sixteen NBA teams battling it out, and every single one of those teams has thousands of fans clinging onto hope. There’s superstitions (the year the Caps won the cup, I had brunch at the same cafe every game they played in one round because I was there when they won the first game of the series), and nausea, and screaming at your television because honestly, no matter where you are in the world, surely they psychically hear you through the power of fandom. Even though the athletes are the ones on the rink, or the court, or the field, being a fan means truly thinking you hold an element of control and if you just believe hard enough, things will swing your way. Because: hope.
When you think about it, being a sports fan is setting yourself up for failure and disappointment. There are thirty-two NHL teams, which means 31 teams and their fans are going to end the year on a low. Similarly, there’s 30 NBA teams, or 18 AFL teams, or 17 NRL teams, or 20 Formula 1 Drivers, or…you get the picture. Statistically, you’re probably not going to Win It All. But you could!
I use the word statistically, but I don’t actually like statistics. Don’t give me the odds of success when it’s actually all about The Journey. The beauty of sport isn’t in percentages, but in the What Could Be. Because hope doesn’t find a home in numbers, it finds a home in passion, and loyalty, and fandom.
If there was no hope, there would be no sports. Some years, your team is just going to be bad! Someone always has to win the wooden spoon! But fandom is all about the hope that one day things will get better and the pain will have been worth it1. We find community in hope. We build resilience through hope. We earn credentials that show we’re not just a fairweather fan but rather someone who refused to stop believing. It’s easy to be a fan when everything is going well, but it’s being there through the lows that gives you “true” fan status2 (you wouldn’t last an hour in the asylum where they raised me, and all that).
The hope is almost always going to hurt, but it’s the kind of pain that exists because we care.
Despite making our way into the playoffs, it turns out the Caps didn’t have a miracle lurking just beneath their surface. Rather than a Cinderella run, we became the only team to get swept3 in this year’s playoffs. And it sucked. Even though the silly statisticians said we had a zero per cent chance of winning the cup, the hope was there until the final buzzer. And then…reality.
I never imagined myself becoming a diehard sports fan, but it’s ended up becoming one of my favourite things. It’s brought me friendships, unforgettable experiences, and many treasured memories. And yes, sometimes it brings pain.
But the thing is, the hope won’t actually kill you. It’ll hurt, and you might need to have a bit of a cry, or a rant and yell about the clear bias of the refs, or the dirty play of the other team, or just about how much you hate everything about the sport in general. But eventually, the pain will subside, just like it always has, and it will have forged stronger bonds with your fellow fans who have suffered alongside you. There will be summer, and trades (which are a whole other genre of sporting heartbreak), and then, finally, a new season. And even though it won’t be spring (…well, it will be in Australia), once again, our hope will bloom.
Caps for the ‘25 cup, anyone?
In the years leading up to the Caps’ 2018 Cup win, they had what was commonly referred to as the second-round curse. No matter how good they were in the regular season, when it came to the second round of the playoffs, they would crash and burn. But then, after years of hope and disappointment, the stars aligned in an overtime game against the Pittsburgh Penguins. It lead to one of my favourite pieces of sports commentary ever, and something I still listen to on bad days. It’s John Walton yelling,
“IT’S OFF TO THE THIRD ROUND! THE DEMONS HAVE BEEN EXORCISED! GOOD MORNING, GOOD AFTERNOON, AND GOOD NIGHT PITTSBURGH, WE’RE GOING TO TAMPA BAY!!!! THE CAPITALS HAVE DONE IT!!!”
It’s moments like that of pure sporting jubilation that make the pain and the heartache and the waiting worth it.
Part of my PhD research looked at the ways hierarchies are developed in fandom communities (especially regarding the idea of “true”/”dedicated”/”big”/”real” fans). While we can argue about the existence and validity of hierarchies all day (and look, I’ll probably write about it more in the future), anyone who has ever participated in a fandom community would have encountered them in some way, shape or form.
One of the most significant factors in their development is time and – arguably – suffering. This is the reason bandwagon fans are often looked down upon, as they are seen to be coming in to benefit from the good times without demonstrating their loyalty through the bleaker years. Whether or not you think it makes sense (again, something to explore in a future post!), it’s a fundamental part of the sports fandom experience
For those unfamiliar with best of 7 playoffs (as opposed to sudden death rounds, like Australian sport finals), a sweep is when you lose the first four games of a playoff series and are eliminated without a win
I actually think i have never related to anything more! I was an avid sports player growing up but never a sports fan (i mean im from nz so rugby was always on but i never really cared yknow)
and then boom november last year i saw the highlights of a random nhl game (i cant even remember what game it was or who played) and it was like my whole brain rewired itself.
Suddenly i was paying $25 a month to watch hockey games and i was on twt talking plays with people i had never met. I also ended up in a similar position in that i became and *unfortunate* devils supporter. i spent all season thinking just one more win. if we can just push a little bit further. and it seemed everytime we won i was sure we were making it to the playoffs. but alas we did not and so the canucks became my playoff team.
The hope of their playoff run keeps me alive - but also slowly kills me. we talk about the feeling of hoping and then losing. but its worth it for the tiny chance of hoping and it pays off. Game 4 for the canucks (down 3-1, score 2 goals in the final 3 minutes to then win in OT) reminds me why we watch. I have never felt more excited for anything in my life.
Theres the hope that kills you. and then theres the hope that keeps you alive.