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Embracing the Role of Villain
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There are only a few professional sports teams which embrace the role as villain, with the Oakland/Los Angeles/Las Vegas Raiders being one.
The Raiders, under longtime owner Al Davis, had the “Just win, baby” mantra, with the team, its players, and their fans loving to taunt, berate, and mock opponents.
Other professional teams have developed large “hate bases” to go with their large fan bases, with success bringing fans … and haters. The New York Yankees and Los Angeles Dodgers in major league baseball, the Los Angeles Lakers and Boston Celtics in basketball, and the Dallas Cowboys (“America’s Team”) from the NFL springing to mind.
In college football, though, the game is too regional for there to be as much ingrained national hatred. The Fighting Irish of Notre Dame have always had there fair share of detractors, as have schools like the Alabama Crimson Tide during the Nick Saban era.
Perhaps the best example of a college football team which embraced the role as villain would have been the Miami Hurricane teams of the late 80s and early 90s, who fed off of the dislike other fan bases had for their program.
CU, though, has rarely been on the radar for dislike. Sure, during the Buffs’ run to national prominence there were grumbles – the Sal Aunese controversies, the “Fifth Down” backlash, the clip on Rocket Ismail’s last minute punt return in the Orange Bowl – but those brought about single game or single season haters.
For the most part, though, Colorado has enjoyed being a “likeable” program. Of course, when your team is losing as consistently as the Buffs have been losing the past few decades, there’s no reason for ire.
“Lovable losers” and “feisty underdogs” don’t generate too much hatred … There’s no reason to play the villain if no one sees you as a threat.
That all changed when Coach Prime was hired. From the first moment Coach Prime set foot on campus, with his “bringing my Louis” speech to the remnants of the woeful 2022 team, there have been those who have wanted the Buffs to fail.
A sold out Spring Game in 2023, played before a nationally televised audience on ESPN … for a team coming off of a 1-11 season? A Spring Game played by a roster which was almost all to be given their walking papers a few days later, in the greatest purge the game had ever seen? That wasn’t popular.
Many fans (and talking heads) across the nation couldn’t wait for Coach Prime to fail.
Then the Buffs went out, again before sold out crowds and now before national pregame shows, beating the odds and oddsmakers by starting 3-0 and achieving national rankings. Coach Prime and the Buffs generated millions of new fans … and millions of new haters.
The anti-CU crowd were rewarded in the end, loving how the Buffs stumbled to a 4-8 record, losing the last six games of that season.
And the haters didn’t let up.
This past March, The Athletic ran a story on “Villains and Heroes of College Football”, and was very clear on where they felt Coach Prime fit:
Sanders is going to do things his way. He’s unconventional and brash. And there was relentless coverage of his every move last year, even though Colorado turned out to be a bad football team.
Very few people do not have an opinion of Sanders. Some view him as the figure who is going to upend the status quo of the sport and win in a way that hasn’t been done before. Others view him as an entitled phony. His larger-than-life aura — and his ego — force people to pay attention.
There is this sense that Deion Sanders, above all, is about Deion Sanders. He didn’t make a single trip to visit a recruit in his first year as Colorado’s head coach — not one — but he is down to do a book tour before spring football kicks off. How many AFLAC and pistachio commercials can we sit through as he lines his pockets?
Also, Sanders’ methods of building his roster seem more like a short-term stunt than something from a coach who is in it with the genuine desire to build something sustainable.
And if you felt there were those in the anti-CU fans out there after the Buffs went 4-8, you know that the hater camp has only grown after CU went 9-4 in Coach Prime’s second season.
For me, this is new territory. Not that I expect every college football fan to love the Buffs, but, c’mon …
And, at least for me, adjusting to the role of villain hasn’t been limited to Saturdays.
As many of you know, I am a lifelong fan of the Kansas City Chiefs.
Now, before you dismiss my loyalty, I am not a Patrick-come-lately fan, nor am I a “Swifty” who recently jumped on the Kansas City bandwagon.
My bona fides … I became a Chiefs fan in my youth when hometown Montana State kicker Jan Stenerud joined Kansas City. The Hall of Fame kicker was on the Chiefs’ side of the field for Super Bowl I and Super Bowl IV, kicking a then-record 48-yard field goal in KC’s 23-7 win over the Minnesota Vikings for the Chiefs’ first Super Bowl win. I, like many others in Bozeman, were fans of Stenerud, and, by association, became fans of Kansas City.
It was great having a hometown hero be a Super Bowl champion!
I then waited 50 years … that’s five decades … for my team to get back to the Super Bowl. Along the way, I had to endure living in Boulder during John Elway’s first two Super Bowls in 1986 and ’87 (fortunately for me, the Broncos had the decency to get killed in both games).
The Chiefs, like the Buffs in the late 80s and the early games of the Coach Prime era, were popular in the early days of their new found success. When Kansas City and Patrick Mahomes were seen as the upstarts who could bring about an end to the stranglehold the New England Patriots had on the Super Bowl, the Chiefs were popular.
Now, after nine straight AFC West titles, seven straight AFC championship games, and a record run in the Super Bowl, the list of haters has grown exponentially. (The wall-to-wall national talk show pundits are unavoidable, and I see the distain daily on Twitter/X, where many of you who I follow on social media are both CU and Denver fans).
While I understand that many of you loath the Chiefs, let’s agree on one thing … The conspiracy theory that the NFL, and by proxy, its officials, favor Kansas City … is a joke (if you would like to go over a particular play or game in greater detail, I’ll be happy to have that discussion in the message section).
Kansas City is the 33rd-largest media market in the nation. If the NFL was going to promote one team over the rest of the League, wouldn’t that be a team from New York or Los Angeles (or at least Dallas)?.
The multi-billion dollar cash cow which is the National Football League is not going to risk its golden goose by clandestinely promoting the Chiefs. In fact, the NFL has become the dominant force in sports because it doesn’t allow large market teams to strip talent away from small market teams (see: MLB), or let players build mini-dynasties on their own (see: NBA).
In fact, if you use one word to describe the secret sauce for the NFL, it would be …
Parity.
The NFL goes out of its way to try and prevent dynasties. From the Draft, which always has the Super Bowl winner, regardless of regular season record, drafting last … to revenue sharing … to salary caps … to scheduling (first place teams play first place teams the following year, while last place teams are scheduled to play other last place teams), the NFL does all that it can to try and keep any one team from dominating.
The Chiefs may defeat the Philadelphia Eagles next weekend, becoming the first team in NFL history to win three straight Super Bowls, but it won’t be, as much as the haters would assert, because the NFL wants them to win.
But, even if the Chiefs lose, they have already made history, becoming the first team to ever make it to five Super Bowls over the span of six years. They are also the first back-to-back champion to even have a chance at a three-peat. Eight times previously, teams have won back-to-back titles. Three of the other eight made it to conference championship games before falling, while the other five didn’t even make it that far (the Broncos won back-to-back Super Bowls in 1997 and 1998 … then went 6-10 in 1999).
Oh, and for my Bronco friends who are excited about the future of the franchise under quarterback Bo Nix, there’s this …
Bo Nix spent five full seasons building stats in college. He will turn 25 in a few weeks.
At the age of 25, Patrick Mahomes had already won three AFC West titles, been to three AFC Championship games, been to the Super Bowl twice (with his first win), and already had an NFL MVP and a Super Bowl MVP award in his trophy case.
Oh, so I guess it isn’t as hard as I thought it would be to play the role of a villain …
Now I just need the Buffs to put together a few more seasons with nine or more wins, and I can get really good at it …
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2 Replies to “Embracing the Role as Villain”
Sorry Stuart, this column needs to go in the round file on my floor or in the dumpster.
Funny how every time there is a questionable call in crunch time it goes in favor of the Chefs. An example, the helmet to helmet hit called against the Texans. The defenders crashed into each other and fell on Mahomo. Crap call that lead to a Chefs TD. And how about Mahome running out of bounds and slowing down to draw a flag. Even he admitted that was wrong on his part. Maybe not against the rules yet it goes against the spirit of the game. Mahomo is to the Broncos like Elway was to the Chefs.
Fly high Eagles even if they have the worst fans in sports.
BTW, KC ditch the chant, that belongs to FSU.
Lol sneaky way for Stuart to get us all to read about the chiefs and his love of them! Go Birds!