I'm not crying... my eyes are just a little sweaty today

How can you cheer for a team or player and not become emotionally invested?

How do you cheer for a team or player with no strings attached?

For instance:
Flyers fans,
Your captain just got blind-side traded to the Kings.
You can't tell me you don't care or that you've already moved on from that.
It's your captain.
It's the one player you put your faith in to be there.
You care.
There's emotion there.

Regardless of what some would lead you to believe, it is important to get emotionally invested in your team and it's players. Why? Because I don't think you can fully enjoy the successes or mourn the failures of a team or player if you aren't fully invested. Take the stats and the commentary out and you're left with emotion.

Look at Atlanta Thrashers fans. They are absolutely devastated that their team was taken from them. Why? Because they were emotionally invested in that franchise, that team, and those players. Does this mean that they will abandon the franchise now that it has been relocated? Some will and some won't. Some will not cheer for the Jets and simply support the players that were before anything else to them, Thrashers. They're hurting as a hockey fan base because they cared.


Your favorite player just got into a car accident. Do you:
A) Not care because it happened off the ice.
B) Only sorta care because it might effect your team.
C) Care immensely because you care about him as a human being as well as a player.

I hope the answer was "C" for everyone. These players are human beings and we should show them respect as human beings when situations such as devastating personal events occur and effect their lives.


Can you imagine if people didn't care when Vladdy got into is car accident? What if people didn't care that he'd never play again? Fortunately enough for Vladdy, people did care about him. And fortunately enough for Vladdy, they still care to this day. People still respect him and feel for him as a person. Getting choked up? That's because whether you realize it or not, you are emotionally invested.

Hockey is a great sport but there is and always will be a human aspect of the game despite any one's best efforts to make it not so.

So take a risk and make your investment in a player, team, or organization today. I doubt that you'll regret it.