Roger Craig said:
How many loses like this do you take before you say enough?
If you want mediocrity, we have it, if you want more, then you GOT to replace folks, period.
After this many years, his recruits, his game, live with it.
This whole "fairweather fan" thing (ed. i mean explicitly calling other people "fair weather") that seems to come up after every loss is bizarre, insulting, and pretty childish. Being critical of your team suggesting changes (with varying degrees of politeness) and basically trying to figure out what went wrong and where are not examples of not being a fan. They are one of the many ways in which people who care about a team express their fandom. Sure, fine, if you think that being the best fan you can be means irrationally believing that everything is sunny all the time always and that NU will always win regardless of the evidence or even high statistical improbability of that (not *you* you, RC, just generally), then fine. Go ahead and think that way. I honestly don't have a problem with people who are ultrapositive about everything. That's actually great!
But what I dislike are people who think that their positive attitude makes them the best fan or, even worse, the only "real" fans there are (hence the others are "fair weather") and pass judgment on people who appreciate the game and team in a way that they don't agree with. Really, I am honestly glad that people can remain happy and uncritical and enjoy things that way. But for me, I didn't really *really* start paying close attention until NU started to stumble. "What's wrong?" I would ask. I learned a *lot* more about the game by trying to figure out what wasn't working. As much as I loved it when NU would just run people over for 4 quarters and dominate highly ranked teams, it didn't demand engagement the same way that a 7 and 7 season did. Part of it was probably maturation, but a big part was really trying to see why things didn't work. It was basically axiomatic that NU would win or at least lose in a close game to a national contender. But getting spanked by Colorado? What? I really had to think about what players were supposed to be doing, what positions were for, etc. It just made me engage a lot more.
If people think that being critical is being a fair weather fan or being a bad fan, whatever. But it takes a lot of effort to be critical, it takes some level of engagement and attention to think about what's wrong. To me a "fair weather fan" is a fan who never pays attention or cares about a team until they do well and then suddenly they're a superfan. Fairweather Fandom is about being "right" e.g. "I've always loved them!" (when obviously that's not true) or "I've always thought they sucked!" (when obviously that's not true, either). They don't know the history, don't care about the history, and won't bother to learn it, because they don't really care.
Cheering doesn't make you a fan, caring, paying attention, learning, discussing, etc. do. Not dismissing cheering, that's still a big part, but the Fair Weatherest of fans cheer. But fans who care will sometimes boo, sometimes criticize, sometimes be angry, but they will never *not care.*
