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| Dr. Richard Lustberg, Ph.D. | ||||||
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| Posted on Thu, Aug. 25, 2005 | |
 Send me in, coach
The bigger the sporting event, the thicker the body paint. That seems to be many sports fans' creed today. No longer is it enough to wear your loyalty on your sleeve. Some fans feel the need to plaster it across their faces and bare chests in bold colors and block letters. In football, not only has the game changed, but so has fan involvement. Many ticket buyers actually believe they can influence the outcome of the game by what they scream or wear. I mean, why else would they do it? According to two noted sports psychologists, the line between the players on the field and the fans in the seats has blurred. This line-blur has led to fans interfering with balls in play or, as we witnessed last November at a Pacers-Pistons game, it can lead to players charging the stands. Dr. Richard Lustberg, a Long Island, N.Y., sports psychologist, recently attended a Mets game at Shea Stadium and noticed that the player who caught the final out of each inning tossed the baseball to a young fan. "Some kid gets a ball, that's great," Dr. Lustberg said. "But I have to think that this sort of seduces fans into believing that that boundary is not there." Dr. Joel Fish, a Philadelphia sports psychologist, knows that today's fan is made to feel like half-supporter/half-insider because of extensive media coverage. This can make it difficult for him or her to separate passion from obsession. Sports talk radio and 24/7 television coverage are enablers in helping what Fish calls the "10 percent" that need to feed their obsession. "It's a matter of degrees," Fish said. "But I'd say that going to a game is a real healthy thing for nine out of 10 fans. The other 10 percent, it becomes the center of their universe." Being a rabid fan is not psychologically unhealthy unless it intrudes on a person's job or home life, both sports psychologists say. Bitter rivalries such as Cowboys-Redskins and Yankees-Red Sox can draw the worst out of people. But they are "dangerous" only when it gets personal, according to Fish. "Fans go to games with an emotional agenda. That isn't new," Lustberg said. "However, boundaries between people in general have deteriorated in society. Look at road rage." Both men agree that fans who cover themselves in body paint can enjoy a "healthy release" in spite of what others might term "weird behavior." Said Lustberg: "Hey, we go to sporting events to escape our daily routines. Unfortunately, fans who don't always know where they begin and the game ends ... [and] some want to be part of the fraternity. "Of course, painting your face pretty much guarantees you'll get on TV, right?" So, why do fans hate? Why do they turn on players and owners -- even their own? The widening socio-economic gap between today's pro athletes and their fans is a factor. "I'll take that one step further," Fish said. "While we demand that our owners pay exorbitant salaries to show a commitment to winning, we also get angry at the players for making all this money. "In psychology, that's known as classic ambivalence." Illus. SPECIAL TO THE STAR-TELEGRAM/JOE FOURNIER |
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