You Can’t Choose Your Allegiances Unless You’re a Rat. Here’s What 54 Years of Loyalty Has Cost.

Since 1972, you’ve been alive for 54 baseball seasons, 54 NFL seasons, 54 NHL seasons, and 54 college football seasons. Across those 216 combined seasons with four teams, you’ve celebrated five titles. That’s a 2.3% championship rate. A Boston fan with the same four-sport portfolio has celebrated 14 — a 6.5% rate. The last time any of your teams won anything, Bill Clinton was president, the internet ran on dial-up, and the Rangers needed 54 years of their own drought to finally win the Cup. You’ve been waiting 32 years since. The Mets’ last title was 40 years ago. Notre Dame’s was 38. The Jets? They won before you started watching.

But here’s the thing about loyalty: you can’t choose it. You grew up in New York, fell in love with the Mets, suffered with the Jets, inherited the Rangers, and adopted Notre Dame. Those allegiances were set by geography, family, and the accidents of childhood. A Boston fan didn’t earn those 14 titles. They were born into them. A Buffalo fan didn’t deserve zero. They were born into that too. The question isn’t whether your fandom is pathetic — it is — but whether the math of sports makes everyone’s fandom roughly equally pathetic over a long enough timeline. The answer? No. Some cities are just luckier. And you’re not in one of them.