Are Sports Losing Fans?
Written by Mac Morey on April 27, 2021
The pandemic took a lot of things away from us. Friends, family, time with those people we could have had otherwise, jobs, and hobbies.
Another thing the pandemic ripped away from us was professional and collegiate sports. What was one of the only consistent forces of entertainment in the nation for over a century was taken away.
Now I know I and many others hated those months without being able to watch our teams, but have others already faded away from their fan hood?
It seems that the numbers would concur with that. Especially in younger generations.
In a survey of 2200 respondents in the middle of March 2021, 35% of Gen Z (1997-2012) indicated that they were ‘not a fan of sports’ almost 10% more than the next largest share. 27% of the Baby Boomer generation (1946-1964) indicated they were not sports fans while Gen X (1965-1980) and Millennials (1981-1996) had the lowest shares with 25% and 23% respectively.
Gen Z also had the lowest share of respondents who identified as an ‘avid sports fan’ with only 21%. The largest share belonged to Millenials with 35% identifying as avid fans. Only 24% of Baby Boomers indicated to be avid sports fans but had the largest share of casual sports fans with 49%. Gen X registered 46% casual sports fans and 29% avid sports fans.
Of the 1138 female survey respondents, only 14% considered themselves avid sports fans, compared to 43% of 1062 male respondents. 52% of women indicated to be casual sports fans while 35% did not identify as sports fans. 39% of men surveyed identified as casual sports fans while only 17% did not identify as sports fans.
This seems to show a wide spectrum decline of people being ‘avid fans’ or even just regular fans of sports in 2021. I know the reasons for that carry from too much politics to just plain loss of interest but it does upset me that one of the foundations of our nation is on the horizon of what could be its inevitable downfall.
