This is in response to Casey Peterson's letter to the editor, "Students should root for Rays," expressing the belief that his dedication to the Tampa Bay Rays somehow reflects the dedication of all Rays fans.
The fact of the matter is, the Rays have a ton of bandwagon fans. The state of Florida as a whole is notorious for bandwagon fans when it comes to professional sports. Just this decade I have seen the fan bases of the Orlando Magic (2009), Tampa Bay Rays (2008), Miami Heat (2006), Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2003), and Florida Marlins (2003) grow exponentially. Those fans didn't seem to stick around in the same numbers.
To be honest, I had no idea the Rays even had fans, beyond a select few, until the 2008 season. In fact, their lack of a fan base is the reason they played a series in Champion Stadium at Disney's Wide World of Sports during the 2007 and 2008 seasons. If you decide to root for a team just because they are winning when you're an adult, you're a bandwagon fan regardless of how bad the team has been in previous seasons. Your only sound argument is that the team is close to this university. However, that is a shallow argument because many students who attend this university are from cities much closer in proximity to the Braves or Marlins.
I have news for you, too. No one in South Florida cares about the Rays. Not to mention that many of us National League fans believe the American League is for players who can't handle baseball as a whole. That just may be because I'm of the opinion that all baseball players should have to hit, field a position and, you know, play baseball. Do you think David Ortiz would even be in baseball if he couldn't be a designated hitter? Do you think pitchers in the American League would be so brazen about giving hitters chin-music if they actually had to man up and step into the batter's box themselves? Nice jab at girls basketball, though. Can you define double-switch for me?
Truth be told, Casey, I pulled a Control-F on that article for "Rays" because I couldn't even find the part you were mad about. The point of the article was to encourage people not to just jump on bandwagons. You won't have to worry about that with the Rays until they climb those three games back into relevance. I'm impressed you even had that lousy excuse for "you know what grinds my gears" printed.
