Fairweather Fans

Recently, my friend Mark, who is a writer and homeless, asked if I would type up an article he wrote about the local baseball team so he could send it to the papers. The article, titled "Fairweather Fans," is a lament over the fact that fans of the local team have been giving up and switching to other teams after a few losing seasons, losses sustained as a result of poor choices made by the new owner.

"I'm not about to abandon our team over bad decisions made from lack of experience," he wrote. "It's easy to love a winner. But it takes real fan loyalty to ride out season after season of letdowns. Who in the world would want to be part of an organization that won't even support its team when it's down?"

I'm not really much into sports, or competition in general for that matter, so I didn't get much out of the article. I just typed it up and printed it out. But then, as I reread the piece, proofing it for typos, I began to hear another voice whispering, another meaning seeping through those words.

A guy makes a few bad decisions, and you just abandon him? You give up on him? Sure, its easy to love a winner. But when things are down, that's when team loyalty really means something. That's when you gotta believe that winning season is still out there. You gotta believe.

It's easy to love a winner.

I'm still on your side, brother. I'm holding out for that winning season. Praying that it finally comes.

I still believe in you.