The Celtics fan drinks white wine and wears red glasses. Hehas a car phone and is balding slightly. He does not have to standin line to get into the Hard Rock Cafe. He became a basketballexpert when Larry Bird joined the Green. When Larry retires,today's Celtics fan will move on to something else, perhaps thetheater or the opera.
The Bruins fan packs his lunch, wears a bowling jacket, andnever, ever misses a hockey game. He is slightly overweight andembarrasses his wife by talking too loudly in social settings. Heworks for the gas company, buys a lottery ticket every week, andcrosses the Tobin Bridge to get to the Garden.
The Patriots fan lives on the South Shore, owns afour-wheel-drive vehicle, works at Digital, and drinks beer. Hebets a football card every week. He still loves Doug Flutie, stillhates Raymond Berry, and is having second thoughts about seasontickets for next year. He is almost certainly not a she.
These are the cliches. These are gross generalizations, thecomposite sketches of the fans who follow our four professionalsports teams. Like all stereotypes, they are too simple to be true.Certainly there are blacks who are Red Sox fans. There have beensightings of females at Sullivan Stadium, and no doubt there areplenty of Bruins fans who make more money than Celtics supporters.And there are reports of Patriots season-ticket holders who'venever argued 'tastes great' vs. 'less filling.'
But the images exist.
Each of our four professional sports teams has aconstituency with a distinct identity. Unfortunately, there is noavailable data that could spit out an accurate composite of theaverage Red Sox, Celtics, Bruins, or Patriots fan. There are toomany millions of variables, and our impressions are too subjectiveto be diagramed or dissected. For instance, although there is aclear distinction between the paying customer and the couch potato,our anthropological study is limited to the legions who peel offseveral $20s every time they root, root, root for the home team.
Instincts, experience, and basic eyesight are the toolsused to compile this data. You can't scientifically prove thatPamela Jo Doe is the prettiest girl in the sophomore class. Youjust know it is true.
Who are the fans of our four teams?
RED SOX FANS
This is without a doubt the largest and most powerful fan blocin New England. The Boston baseball team simply is never out ofseason. Sox fans have split personalities: They carry fresh hopesinto every new season, but they truly believe that the Sox will letthem down in the end. No one under the age of 75 can rememberBoston's last championship team (1918), and the fandom has learnedto expect unhappy endings. Sox fans care and cannot put theiremotions on the shelf and go on to something else. To be a Sox fanis to suffer. The late baseball commissioner and academician A.Bartlett Giamatti once said, 'Somehow the Sox fulfill the notionthat we live in a fallen world. It's as though we assume they'rehere to provide us with more pain.'
This group is hardest to identify because it is so large andcrosses so many barriers. Maine fishermen are Sox fans, and so arelobbyists who stroll the corridors on Beacon Hill. Members ofFenway's 600 Club pay ridiculous sums to watch baseball in silent,sterile surroundings. Meanwhile, kids from West Roxbury still hopon the T and buy bleacher seats for the same price ($6) they'd payto see Back to the Future, Part II. Nuns like the Red Sox. Old menin nursing homes listen faithfully to every radio broadcast, andsmall boys in Groton (Massachusetts and Connecticut) spit in theirgloves and pretend they're Wade Boggs.
Eddie Andelman, a sports talk-radio czar for 20 years andthe unofficial voice of the fans in New England, says, 'Red Soxfans think of the team the way parents think of their children.They forgive them all the time and continue to give to them becausethey really care about the team. They think they're part of the RedSox, and they really feel that they're the 10th player on the team.'
Bob Lobel, sports anchor at WBZ-TV (Channel 4), says, 'Red Soxfans are the most universal. You're liable to see them everywhere.'
More than Boggs or Roger Clemens, Fenway Park has become theBoston baseball star. Hungry for the old days, hypnotized by theslow pace and pastoral beauty of the game, Sox fans are fillingFenway in record numbers. The Red Sox had one of their leastappealing teams last summer but still broke the franchisehome-attendance mark. This is the same draw that fills Durgin Park,where the menu states, 'Your grandfather and perhaps yourgreat-grandfather dined with us, too.'
There are not many blacks at Fenway. This is true of theGarden and Foxborough as well, but baseball in Boston seems to be aparticularly poor attraction for blacks. The Red Sox track recordin race relations is hardly exemplary. The Sox rejected a chance tosign Jackie Robinson, were the last team to integrate, and thisyear may have only one black on the roster -- Ellis Burks. Butbaseball is a proven weak draw even in predominantly black citieswith a history of star black performers (Baltimore, Cleveland, andDetroit).
Red Sox fans are loud and sophisticated. They recognize abalk, and they cheer when they peek at the out-of-town scoreboardin left field and see that the Yankees have fallen behind. Theyappreciate a game well-pitched by the opposition. They save theirwrath for Sox managers who stay too long (Don Zimmer, JohnMcNamara) and overpaid locals who don't seem to be performing well(remember Rich Gedman, Jim Rice?). Sox fans are most quiet when theRed Sox are closest to winning it all. The Red Sox played at homefor the seventh game of the World Series in 1967 and '75, and forthe seventh game of the play-offs in 1986. Each time, Sox fans saton their hands and waited for something bad to happen. Thelong-suffering constituents get nervous when the team is on thethreshold of victory. Most Sox players do not understand thisapprehension, but then again, most Sox players know nothing aboutthe ghosts of 1946, '48, '49, of Luis Aparicio, Bucky Dent, BillBuckner, etc.
Boston natives are far more likely to be Red Sox fans thanare nonnatives. Pro football is the regional rage in many pocketsof America, and college basketball gets all the attention inplaces such as North Carolina and Indiana. In New England, baseballis the game of tradition. The Sox are particularly big in the smallvillages and the mill towns where local amateur teams once providednightly summer entertainment. If you grew up here, you are probablya Red Sox fan.
The Sox fan is most likely to call a sports talk show and tosubscribe to a sports periodical. He rarely bets games. Heviolently defends the American League and the designated hitterrule. He has been to Cooperstown, and his wife doesn't mindspending money for NESN. He reads the sports page before anythingelse. He owns at least one piece of clothing that has a Red Soxlogo. He has a casual interest in the other sports, but the Sox arehis passion.
Dick Bresciani, Red Sox vice president of public relations,says, 'I think the Red Sox fans are the longtime New Englanders whogo back through generations of following the Red Sox. I think wehave more women fans than ever. I think you could break it awayfrom a Patriots crowd. There's a different mix in a Patriots game.We have more families and more kids' groups, and I think that'sbecause it's more affordable. I think the fans have gotten awayfrom being as rowdy as they were at one time. I think there's morepolicing of themselves. And since we went to the individual chairseats in the bleachers they aren't as bad as they used to be.'
Andelman adds, 'You can be a Red Sox fan and a Celtics fan,too, but there's not much crossover between the Red Sox fans andthe Patriots and Bruins fans. Baseball is a thinking person'ssport, and it's highly unlikely that people can turn their thinkingtanks on and off.'
CELTICS FANS
These are the trendies. Celtics fans were the first ones onyour block to have answering machines, microwave ovens, VCRs, andCD players. They read the stock tables before anything else. Theyare overachievers, usually firstborn children. They are the winnersin life. They want to be associated with winners.
We speak of Celtics fans of the '80s and '90s. There are, ofcourse, some Celtics fans left over from the days when they won thechampionships every year, but this nucleus couldn't fill half theGarden. This corps is surprisingly small considering the dominanceof the team in the 1960s. The Celtics became the city's in teamwhen Larry Joe Bird got here in 1979-80. Ten years of selloutsfollowed. As in many major-league towns, Boston's basketballfranchise is benefiting from the unprecedented popularity of NBAbasketball that was ignited by Bird and Magic Johnson at the startof the 1980s. Today's Celtics have more newcomer fans than anyBoston pro sports team.
Stand in the balcony and look down at a Celtics crowd and yousee sport coats, neckties, and balding pates. The fans hold cups ofbeverage in one hand and exhort the Green Team with the other. Theyhave learned to recognize illegal defense, no small achievement.Red Auerbach has taught them that the refs are out to get theCeltics. There is an institutional arrogance in the Celticsenvironment. The insiders believe that outsiders should feelfortunate just to taste the Celtics experience. Celtics fans boughtstock in the club when the franchise went public a few years ago.They've got certificates on the walls of their dens and offices.Every game is a stockholders' meeting: Gotta protect the investment.
The Celtics crowd is smug. These are the privileged few.They are winners just by virtue of the fact that they have tickets.They expect to watch winners. They expect victory every night. Theyattend just to be part of the victory and to applaud theperformance. They are like veteran theatergoers; they already knowhow the story comes out in the end. The Boston team went 40-1 athome in 1985-86, and Celtics fans remain spoiled by the great teamsof the last decade. There is an impression that no team can beatBoston on its home court. This was true until top draft pick LenBias died in 1986 and the rest of the team got old.
Celtics fans have disposable income. They don't flinch frompaying $3 for an ice cream bar. They bet on games for the sport ofit, and you can hear the bettors in the closing minutes when thescrubs are scrambling on the court playing havoc with the pointspread. The Celtics crowd is filled with well-dressed people whowork in the city, live in the western suburbs, and don't mind theincrease in tolls on the Mass. Pike. These are people with beepersstrapped to their hips.
Robert Nobtzel is a vendor at the Boston Garden. He sellsthe upscale Steve's ice cream bars and says, 'For me, Celtics fansare better. I make more money. It's more of an upper-crust crowd.They're more well-dressed. Bruins fans give me more of a hard timeabout the price, and if they see somebody buying, they'll yell,'You're crazy, paying $3.' Another thing I noticed is that atCeltic games, during the national anthem, it's quiet until the lastline. At Bruins games, they roar halfway through the song, and itkinda gets you pumped up.'
Jan Volk, general manager of the Celtics, says, 'We've got asolid corps, but I think it spans generations. I don't think youcan look at it and really single out a typical Celtic fan. It hasbecome a mature sport, and I think it was not for a long time. Ithink we have more individuals buying tickets than corporations.We've had some pretty ugly crowds. When you take a hot night inJune and start the game at 9 o'clock, it's different. It'sexacerbated by the combination of the temperature and theopportunity to drink.'
Andelman on Celtics fans: 'They are well dressed, wellmannered, but very passionate about the team. They wouldn't becaught dead at a hockey game. They eat nouvelle cuisine, and theygo to the bathroom before they go into the Garden so they won'thave to use the Garden restrooms. They drink very little andthey're smart enough to think ahead. They tip the ushers and behavethemselves.'
John Iannacci, an executive in the apple industry who lives inLunenburg, is a fan of all four Boston sports teams and says, 'Iwould say the Red Sox and the Celtic fans are like the yuppies. Ithink they're your higher-income bracket. It's a curious mix,really. A lot of it is people with money that go to the games eventhough they aren't real fans. They go because it's the place to go.'
BRUINS FANS
This group is loud and loyal. It's said that the Bruins haveonly 11,000 fans in all of New England -- but each fan attendsevery game. This, of course, cannot be proved.
The difference between Celtics and Bruins fans is easilywitnessed on those frenzied Sundays at the Garden when the Celticsplay in the afternoon and the Bruins follow with a night game. Kidshave been known to sneak into the restrooms and hide out betweengames to avoid paying two admissions. These youths are probably theonly crossover fans. It's difficult to find anyone who'll admit helikes the Bruins and Celtics equally. You are aligned with one orthe other. Some corporate types may have tickets to both games, butthey'll probably use the Bruins ducats to settle a score with asecondary client or a brother-in-law.
When the Celtics play, parking lots outside the Garden arefilled with foreign cars, all equipped with alarm systems. Afterthe basketball game is over, these folks go home and make room forthe American vehicles driven by Bruins fans. The Bruins drivers aremore polite and are not in as much of a hurry as their Celticscounterparts. Honk twice if you follow the Celtics.
Bruins fans dress comfortably. They know the Garden isgrimy, so why bother wearing your Sunday best? Sneakers, jeans,flannel shirts, and windbreakers work fine. A Bruins crowd isawash in denim. Think of it this way: The Celtics crowd dresses forLA Law. The Bruins crowd dresses for Roseanne. The only ties are inthe sky boxes and the box scores.
Al Zappy, who works at the Garden arena souvenir stand, seesanother side of Bruins fans and says, 'The Bruins fans spend moremoney. They don't haggle about the price. They don't ask the price,they just say, 'Gimme two hats.' The Celtic people will shop andask me if it's any cheaper downstairs. They'll eventually buy, butthey will compare prices. Bruins fans spend the money withoutquestion.'
Tom Foster, who works a beer stand at the Garden, says, 'TheBruins fans like to drink more. We sell more beers at Bruins games.Celtic fans are more low-key. Personally, I like the Bruins fansbetter. They're more friendly. Celtic fans don't tip that much.Bruins fans talk to you more. They're easy to talk to. I just likethe Bruins fans a lot better.'
Lobel says, 'It's highly unlikely you'll find a Celticfan at a Bruins game. I don't think there's any doubt that Celticfans are more upscale and tend toward the corporate, professionaltypes. Bruins fans are hard-core. The loyalty runs very deep. It'salmost like a family-type experience, although a lot of the youngBruins fans in no way could have experienced all the tradition thatthe team has had over the years.'
Nate Greenberg, assistant to the president of the Bruins,says, 'I think there's always been a blue-collar fandom to hockey.We have upwards of a dozen Saturday afternoon games to try and getkids involved. The gallery gods are a good example of our fandom.Today they are the sons and grandsons of people who came here inthe '30s and '40s. They're hard-working, blue-collar types whoenjoy the game. We've had that loyal 10,000 that would come if wewere playing Malden Catholic at 3 o'clock in the morning. They'd bethere. This is definitely a beer-drinking crowd. There's noargument about that. About eight years ago, they took some kind ofa survey in the stands to find where people were from, and theyfound that the vast majority of people were from the north ofBoston. I don't know why that is, but that was borne out by thesurvey.'
Hockey fans like speed and violence in their game. Overall,fights are down, but there's an air of combustibility in the Bruinscrowd. A fight could break out any time -- on or off the ice.You'll see a lot of peroxide blondes, but not many hairpieces.Steal the wallets of this group and you'll find more union cardsand truck driver's licenses than in any other group. They endurethe same organ music as the Celtics crowd, but they like it. Thebeer lines are long; don't ask for the wine list.
Aside from Red Sox fans, Bruins fans are the most loyal.They pledge allegiance to the Bruins and know the Canadian anthemby heart. They also know their game. Ask about the meaning of thetwo-line offside and you might be booted out of your section.Non-hockey fans are an intrusion. Bruins fans are not rude, butthey are direct.
They don't worry about beating the traffic; they stay untilthe end of the game.
Kathy Gould, a security officer at Bruins, Celtics, and RedSox games, says, 'I can tell which team is playing by the cheering,the way they yell and jump up and down. Bruins fans are louder. Inotice one thing about the Celtics and the Bruins crowd, and that'sthat the Celtic crowd tends to watch the game more. Bruins fans areup and down a lot, moving around. Celtic fans tend to sit in oneplace. The Red Sox crowds differ depending on who they're playing.You don't hear as much profanity now at any of the three. There'snever any at a Celtic game. All the crowds are getting a lotbetter.'
Lobel says, 'I think crowd control got to be a real problemat Bruins games a couple of years ago, but it got better when theteam improved, and the Garden has done a better job. I know it'sgotten better at Fenway. As far as Sullivan Stadium goes, in yearspast it was pretty tough to take a family down there, but last yearit was hard to get a group together to make any trouble.'
Andelman is not a hockey fan and says, 'Bruins fans aretotally illiterate. That book The Big Bad Bruins outsold all otherhockey books by about 10 to 1 because it was a picture book. Theygo to the Garden in order to drink and go to the bathroom, becausethat's all they're interested in. The average Celtic fan is acollege grad, but the average Bruins fan dropped out two gradeshigher than the hockey players dropped out. You can be a Bruins fanand a Patriots fan because there's enough violence in both games.But you can't be both a Bruins and a Celtics fan, because the onlything the Bruins fans hate more than French-speaking players is theCeltics.'
PATRIOTS FANS
Few New Englanders admit to being Patriots fans. GreaterBoston's football fans are out there, but finding them is liketrying to find people who admit they voted for Richard Nixon in1972. We like tradition, and football has none, not here. Townteams started playing baseball at the turn of the century, and theSox are in season 12 months a year, just like politics. We haveponds and rinks, and ice hockey is a part of youth in New England.Basketball was invented in Springfield. Football simply has nolocal roots. This is the game that makes people go goofy in smalltowns in Texas, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida. We have neverunderstood this football phenomenon, and our local pro footballteam for three decades has been sport's longest-running soap.
Patriots fans travel in packs and engage in serioustailgating before every game. A game-day trip to Foxborough is anall-day safari, and fans come prepared. Spread the tablecloths,fire up the portable gas grill, and pass the lagers. Think of everybeer commercial you've seen in the last five years ('It doesn't getany better than this'), and you get the picture.
Andelman on Patriots fans: 'They are the ultimateblue-collar workers. They go to these games and like to have boozefor breakfast, and every other word out of their mouth is'expletive,' and all they do is talk betting numbers. They lie. Ifyou go to a pay phone outside the stadium, they're lined up 50 deepan hour before kickoff, and each guy says he's calling his motherto say he got there safely.'
John Iannacci, the fan, says, 'I think hockey and footballhave many of the same fans. Those sports attract the same type ofpeople -- those you might say are a little on the wilder side. Thelast hockey game I went to I brought my wife, and I don't think I'dbring her there again. I think the beer consumption at Patriots andBruins games is higher per capita than at Celtics and Red Soxgames.'
Jim Greenidge, former director of media relations for thePatriots, says, 'They've got their hard core. They're rooting oneway or the other. Some of the fans actually like the excitement ofthe team. I'd like to have put a stop to all the negative stuff,but the fans have grown up with all that stuff and sort of enjoyfollowing it. Even in the off-season it was kind of a weirdfranchise. I think it's a blue-collar crowd -- your average Joeout there. I think the Celtics fans are more white-collar than thePatriots crowd. There's nothing convenient about going to ourgames. It's outdoors and really cold. If they had a roof, it mightbe more of a white-collar following.
'The Patriots crowd is an awful lot like the Bruins crowd,'Greenidge continues. 'They're tough on officials. They're tough onboth teams. Kids don't go to games anymore because of the ticketprice, except for the Red Sox games. It's a guys' afternoon out.'
Lobel says, 'Patriots fans, I think, are searching for theirown identity. They're a breed of their own.'
These are hard-working guys, guys who work with their handsand talk with their hands. They won't back down from a fight. Afootball crowd is a macho crowd. They can be extremely abusive. Butthey'll also help one another. There is a convivial atmosphere inthe parking lots. Count Patriots fans as those most likely to cometo the assistance of someone whose car is stuck in the mud orsnow. A vehicle is the Patriots fan's most prized possession, andthis crowd is most likely to leave the game early. You have to beatthe traffic, and history says that the end of the game is usuallydisappointing.
Greenidge is black and addresses the issue of how few blackfans attend Boston pro sporting events: 'There aren't an awful lotof blacks, even at the Celtic games. At Patriots games, there arequite a few blacks, obviously not as many as they would want, butthe distance is a factor. I talked to fans in the Roxburycommunity, and they'd say, 'I haven't been there, but I hear thetraffic is awful.' It's low. I know I get stares going to a Red Soxgame. People wonder, 'Who's that guy? Why is he going to the game?'I honestly think
