One of the first thoughts I had about The OffSeason was related to the number of times in a given day that I am exposed to logos of the various Boston Sports teams. As a fan, I never really noticed or thought about it that much. Sure, I would get a bit self conscious if someone was wearing the same hat as me in the elevator, but that was about it. My guess is that non-fans too hardly notice it when someone walks by in a Red Sox hat or a Bruins sweatshirt. But as a person working hard to avoid being reminded of the exploits of local teams, logos tend to stand out as bright beacons of temptation. So, I wondered, how often am I seeing images that reinforce allegiance to Boston teams?
I certainly didn't think it would be hard to start paying closer attention to Boston logos. I'm a bit ashamed to admit that seeing people walking around The Hub in Yankees hats, or attire from any of the major Boston rivals for that matter, used to instantly raise my attention and ire. I felt it was somehow disrespectful and I was confident that the disrespect was intentional. In my twisted imagination, the person in question was trying to send a specific message to Boston fans, saying "I don't like you." Of course, this is patently absurd. People have a right to support whatever team they care to for whatever reason they choose. At times in my life I have worn the red B of the Red Sox in other cities just to feel closer to friends that were far away. It took me a while to realize that others might be doing the same kind of thing. A choice for something is not automatically a choice against something else, even when there is a rivalry involved.
So, I decided it would be fun to walk around with one of those audience head-count devices (thanks, Craig!) in my pocket. Every time I saw a local team logo, I would click the clicker and see where I was at the end of the day. After a week or so, I could average out the daily numbers and get a general sense of how often boston sports teams are promoted to the general public by the general public. The plan seemed simple enough. What surprised me was how hard it was at first to consciously acknowledge the logos, which were once simply part of the fabric of the city. It was also hard not to actively look for the logos and wait for them to simply be in my field of vision. I quickly realized that there had to be a few rules out in place to make this experiment really work. The rules were as follows:
- Logos to be counted would be from the four major pro sports teams in Boston (The Red Sox, Bruins, Celtics and Patriots) only.
- If a logo from the same source crossed my plain of vision twice, even in quick succession, it counted twice. After all, this is about impressions, not examples.
- If a person was wearing more than one thing (a hat AND jersey, for instance) that counts twice. Again, impressions.
- Partial viewing would not count unless it was utterly identifiable as a team logo.
- Knock off logos would also not count, assuming I could tell they were as such.
In the four days I have spent tallying, I've seen 75, 68, 22, & 64 logos for an average of 57.25 impressions a day. That doesn't seem like a very large number until you start adjusting for the amount of time these impressions are packed in to. It should be noted that I don't get to see or hear too many commercials due to the way I take in media, so these hits all come from seeing people on the street, or stickers on cars and trucks, or ads in the city. I'm out of the house generally only from 8am through about 6pm on a normal day, so we're talking about 10 hours. That already brings us to about 10 logos an hour. These days I'm not looking at espn or other sports related websites, so I don't see many logos online while I am at work. That cuts out 7.5 hours a day at least, which leaves us with 2.5 hours. Now I'm up to 22.9 impressions an hour, or one every 2 and a half minutes. I'm just an amateur sociologist here, but I have to imagine that anything someone is exposed to every 2.5 minutes is going to exert some sort of influence on that person.
As it happens, my line of thinking on this subject dovetails nicely into a recent episode of my favorite podcast, 99% Invisible. On the show, they make the point that sports teams are the only entity that people will maintain their allegiance to even if the quality of the product goes down. Certainly the fair weather fans fall away, but the Celtics still have a strong following in this city even though just last year they were a title contender, and this year they missed the playoffs (I gather). But, if your favorite granola bar suddenly came with mashed up fish parts in it, you wouldn't keep buying it just because it was still called Caramel Cocoanut Fudge. It's a curious mixture of brand loyalty and tribalism, with a healthy dose of scratch ticket addiction thrown in. After all, you never know when things will turn around. You can't win if you don't watch.
None of this is to say that sports should not be enjoyed. I just think that, like everything else that affects society at large, we should try our best to be aware of the forces at work on us, and stay in control. If there's one thing The OffSeason has taught me so far it's that the teams will win or lose even if you don't watch.
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