American Fan: Sports Mania and the Culture That Feeds It

There exists in America a peculiar, fascinating subculture. Its exotic rituals include withstanding subzero temperatures with an upper body clad only in brightly colored paint, shouting arcane statistics at talk-show broadcasters, adopting the graphic images of lucrative businesses in bursts of patriotic fervor, and finding a curious but tangible form of self-esteem in the spectacle of overgrown armored men banging each other into unconsciousness. Hello, sports fans, this is a book about you. In fact, about us! For true fans, sports are close to religion, a substitute for politics, an outlet for the most violent tendencies, and an excuse to vent primal instincts--in other words, to act like the maniacs we are. But for the professional leagues and the megacorporations that exploit them, sports is a lot more important than any number of brew-soaked stadium seats. It's a serious business with rules you don't break and customers you don't serve, and it makes a small group of talented and/or connected people very, very, very rich, often at the expense of "home team" taxpayers who never hear the crack of a bat or the swish of a net. In this scathing, passionate, hilarious book, Dennis Perrin, the acclaimed author of Mr. Mike, examines the species Sportus fannus from the point of view of a life-long member. But his love of America's great games does not blind him to their routine, often cynical misuse by a sports marketing establishment that goes to absurd lengths to glorify, even deify, professional athletes, just to sell a few more pairs of sneakers to awestruck fans at home.