WOMEN AS SPORTS FANS: Is it possible?

In reference to the question posed in the title of this blog, may I likewise respond with a question: Why wouldn’t it be possible? Why wouldn’t a woman also be a sports fan in the U.S. of A? Perhaps the next question is: How do women become sports fans?

This would make an interesting sociology study, I suppose, but for me it came very naturally. I have three brothers, with one of them being five years my senior. Face it, whatever my big brother did when I was growing up, that’s what the other three little duckies did. I remember learning how to play baseball when I was four years old. We just cut a broom handle down to make a bat, he would toss the rubber ball in my direction, and BAM…off I ran to first base, like I knew what I was doin’!!

Once my big brother got to junior high, the sports world opened up for me. He played small boys basketball, and could not wait to pass this essential knowledge and skill on to his little sister. He was a harsh task master, too, stressing the fundamentals. “Dribble to the side of your body”, “don’t look at the ball…know where the ball is”, and his favorite thing to bark at my sub-four-foot-tall self: “the free throw is NOT a JUMP SHOT”!! If I heard it once, I heard it thirty times. Thankfully he allowed the “granny shot”, so I was not in hot water very often.

One Saturday afternoon in the winter of my seventh year, my brother sat me down in front of our Grandmother’s black and white TV, and told me to watch the player with the number 14 on his jersey. I was to watch everything he did, because he was a point guard, and with my lack of vertical existence, that would be my position on the basketball team. Number 14 on the Boston Celtics was, of course, Bob Cousy, and he remains one of my favorite athletes of all time. His Mitchell and Ness away jersey from 1962 hangs in my home, along with an autographed basketball. My love affair with basketball continues to this day.

So that is baseball, and basketball…football wasn’t as popular at our house because there were only four of us. I must report here that I did develop an excellent spiral pass over time. When my brother became the manager of the track team, we made a track that went around the perimeter of the house. We even had hurdles to jump, and made a long jump in the sand pile out at the corner of the backyard.

Needless to say, even cards and board games were very competitive between the four siblings. Battle, Go Fish, and Monopoly were absolute throw downs! To this day I cannot play a board game with any sense of civility…it is pathetic. I will play Mexican Train, but sulk for hours on end when I lose…just a mess.

So, I guess my conclusion regarding how a woman can become a sports fan is based on having other sports fans to influence her during the formative years. My mother was a roller skater, and my grandmother was a musician and dancer. They appreciated the importance of an active lifestyle, and encouraged us to “play outside”. We would swim, and play some kind of ball all day during the hot Houston summers, only to stop for a quick bite of lunch.

So if some day you are ever to meet me, just make sure there isn’t a ball flying around the gym or field. It might look like I am being rude while talking with you, but in truth, if there is a sport being played, it will capture my attention. I am a woman, and an avid sports fan, and the twain have permanently met.

Tammy The Fan