by Stacey Getz posted in: Commentary

I’m a sports fan, not a sports fanatic. There’s a difference.

Fans don their favorite team’s colors week after week and relish in the inevitable emotional roller coaster ride that characterizes a season. Fanatics, on the other hand, experience emotional extremes that distort their worldview and compel them to think and act in ways that often defy social norms. Fans innocuously paint their faces and wear foam fingers. Fanatics subversively throw punches and set cars on fire. Fans opine around the water cooler. Fanatics call in sick after their team misses a game-tying field goal that could have ultimately landed them in the Super Bowl (sorry Ravens die-hards). Fans would agree that college football lost a great coach this past weekend. Fanatics would claim the sport lost a great man.

Again, there’s a difference.