Why are YOU a Cardinals' fan??

[Arizona's Finest]

Because I grew up in Phoenix and absolutely hate everything about my city of birth, LA.

LOL same here except I don't hate EVERYTHING about LA.

Just the Lakers, Dodgers, Kings, Sparks, and La Brea Tar pits.

 

[gnomepete]

I was 8 when they moved to StL form Chicago. I didn't really know about football before then, but they've been my team ever since.

Pete

 

[speedy]

When I was 11 this Cardinal team moved in and they said this is your team. I have been faithful ever since...

 

[TruColor]

1969, living in Columbia, Missouri. My dad came back from a conference in St. Louis, and had gone to a Cardinals-Chiefs preseason game (the old Governor's Cup game), and brought back the program. I memorized all of the Cardinals players from that thing. Still have it too.

We moved to West Lafayette, Indiana a couple of months later, but I was hooked for life.

 

[Sandan]

I didn't like the Rams as a child.

I found out the Cardinals used to be from St. Louis.

I watched the Cardinals beat the Cowboys (my mom's favorite team) in '98.

Followed them ever since.

I remember that game well

 

[seesred]

Was a Wrangler season holder. Love football! When the Cards announced they were coming I got in line. It's great to root for the home team. It's great to know we are one of only 32 cities to have a team. Playoffs, super bowls are all extra.

I like the tailgating, I like the people all around yelling for our team. When I see another Car running by with a Cardinals something on his car I'm proud. Yes there were the bad seasons in wins and loses. But every year is something to dream about our team just might make it this year. I'm getting on in years and my big Cardinal buddys have passed on, but it gives me chills when they run onto that field.

Next my wife, children, grandchildren and other family members, it's the Cardinals. That's my short answer.

GBR
40

 

[Longcolts]

Cuz I'm a homer and the Card's play in my home state. Well that and the fact that I've been following them since the 70's!

 

[JeffGollin]

This is going to be long...

It started as a 3-year old in 1942, when my brother Jim asked me who I was rooting for in the World Series. "Yankees!" I cooed. He hit me in the stomach. I've been a (baseball) Cardinal fan ever since.

The following year, my Dad brought home a baseball autographed by centerfielder Terry Moore. At the age of four, I was old enough to ask my Dad "did the Cardinals win today?" And not being quite able to distinguish between the baseball and football Cardinals, I began to ask him that question about both Cardinal teams. The Chicago Cardinals were really really horrid during that 1944-46 period (I think they lost all their games at least one season) so my "did the Cardinals win?" question during football season was consistently met with a dour "Nope!" from my dad.

Early in 1947, we got our first TV (an RCA floor model - a bunch of mice took residence underneath it, but that's a story for another time). Because everything was in black & white, the Cardinal home unis looked like the b & W uni I wore in Peewees, and also (if you "reach" a little regarding the helmets) worn by the (Blanchard & Davis & Arnie Galiffa) Army team and later on by the Oakland Raiders. There was no bird logo on those early white helmets - they were all white. All I knew from an 8-year old's viewpoint was that those "black & white Cardinal unis sure looked cool", and I was hooked for life.

The Cards drafted Charley Trippi (to help form the "Dream Backfield" of Trippi, Christman, Angsmann & Harder), won the NFL championship in 1947 and lost to the Eagles in the final in '48 adding positive reinforcement to my Cardinal addiction.

As the years went on, two things fueled my Cardinal habit -

(1) family trips to pro & college football games - my first featured the NY Football Yankees (starring Buddy Young, Spec Sanders, Arnie Weimeister etc.) vs. Otto Graham, Marian Motley, Max Speedy, Lou "The Toe" Groza etc. and the Cleveland Browns). Somewhere during this period - around the time of Jim Lee Howell and Allie Sherman - my Dad become a rabid Giant fan and we had season tickets. High point was the game where Charley Johnson completed 16 straight passes to Sonny Randle vs. Giant CB Dick Lynch. (I also saw in person - "the greatest game ever played" when Colt FB Alan Ameche blew into the endzone through a "hole big enough to drive a truck through" to beat the Giants
in OT.

(2) I discovered "Street & Smith" and became a draft-geek. We all know about the various Cardinal personnel misadventure during that period - including trading star RB Ollie Matson to the LA Rams for half their entire football team. A few of the more obscure names from the past that became my favorite rookies - RB Roy Shivers; WR Fran Polsfoot; FBs: Thunder Thornton and Willis Crenshaw; Montreal Alouette QB Sam Etcheverry (who got injured and paved the way for Charley Johnson) etc. etc.

There have been high spots (like when we drafted EJ Junior and Neil Lomax in the 1st & 2nd rounds or when OJ Anderson debuted as a rookie) and low spots (like the Clyde Duncan and Stouffer draft picks or the knee injuries that wiped out Wads and cut short Eric Swann's career).

I've remained a football Cardinal fan all those years - it didn't matter if they were from Chicago, StL, Arizona or Racine, Wisc. They've always been "the Cardinals" and that remains good enough for me.

 

[CardLogic]

It started as a 3-year old in 1942, when my brother Jim asked me who I was rooting for in the World Series. "Yankees!" I cooed. He hit me in the stomach. I've been a (baseball) Cardinal fan ever since.

 

[justAndy]

Because I'm a blatant localist. So much so that my newest tat is the borders of AZ with the state flag filling up the inside.

 

[john h]

Since the media is doing its' annual...You're a Cardinal fan?? Oh, man are you going to suffer thru a horrible year! I thought it'd be fun to rally the troops with this. Course, it's much easier to pose the question now since the last few years have been great. Well, this thread may turn out fun...OR it may go absolutely nowhere. LOL BUT, I'll start...

I'm enjoying being a Cardinal fan because we're good! Notice, I said good and not great. Let me explain. My dad lives in CT. and is a huge UCONN Huskies' fan. Well, they've gone undefeated the past 2 years sometimes winning by 50-60 points. So, when we get on the phone, all he wants to talk about is how much they won by. Yeah, winning is great, but I ask you which have you found more satisfying...Beating the Rams?? ....OR beating the Cowboys, Vikings, Eagles, Giants, etc.

So, the Cards are good. They can win. Question is..Will they... And that's one of the things that makes me happy these days. It's exciting! Knowing we have a real, legitimate shot! GO CARDS!

Because I moved to Chicago in 1945 and the first NFL game I ever saw had the Cards playing. Soon they had the dream backfield with Charlie Trippi who was from my home state. Cards fan from day one and have never looked back. When baby ducks are born the first thing they see when coming out of the shell is the mother be it a cat or dog. Well when I came out of my shell I saw the Cardinals. A Mr. Bidwill was there even then.

 

[earthsci]

85008

 

[DemsMyBoys]

Because the Wicked Witch of St. Louis inherited my team. She didn't understand football. She didn't know what the term "legacy" meant. But she enjoyed going out and standing on the sidelines at the end of the game. Where we fans would helpfully point out to her that her team was wearing the blue and gold uniforms and she needed to go stand on the other side with them.

One day some bad men waved a big wad of money under her nose and she decided to move the team to the city of her birth where everyone would treat her with love and affection and wouldn't care that she didn't even know the names of her players.

So I moped around for way too many years until I saw a game on TV where a tall, thin guy with dreads named Larry made a catch that made me put down my nachos and pay attention. I bought myself some Cardinals gear, called all of my friends and family and said, "I found a team! I found a team! And it's not the Chargers and it's sure isn't the Raiders and if any of you have any sense you'll drive six hours across the desert and come to a game because the Arizona Cardinals are something special."

And on January 18, 2009 I answered the phone about 73 times and was graceful in victory and resisted saying "I told you so!" and I knew I would never be bitter about the Wicked Witch ever again. Unless someody mentioned her name in my presence.

In Whiz I trust.

 

[Duckjake]

Because the Wicked Witch of St. Louis inherited my team. She didn't understand football. She didn't know what the term "legacy" meant. But she enjoyed going out and standing on the sidelines at the end of the game. Where we fans would helpfully point out to her that her team was wearing the blue and gold uniforms and she needed to go stand on the other side with them.

One day some bad men waved a big wad of money under her nose and she decided to move the team to the city of her birth where everyone would treat her with love and affection and wouldn't care that she didn't even know the names of her players.

So I moped around for way too many years until I saw a game on TV where a tall, thin guy with dreads named Larry made a catch that made me put down my nachos and pay attention. I bought myself some Cardinals gear, called all of my friends and family and said, "I found a team! I found a team! And it's not the Chargers and it's sure isn't the Raiders and if any of you have any sense you'll drive six hours across the desert and come to a game because the Arizona Cardinals are something special."

And on January 18, 2009 I answered the phone about 73 times and was graceful in victory and resisted saying "I told you so!" and I knew I would never be bitter about the Wicked Witch ever again. Unless someody mentioned her name in my presence.

In Whiz I trust.

LOL I remember the first St.Louis Rams v Cards game in Arizona where people from LA came to root for the Cards because they hated GF and people from St.Louis came to root for the Rams because they hated BB.

 

[DemsMyBoys]

LOL I remember the first St.Louis Rams v Cards game in Arizona where people from LA came to root for the Cards because they hated GF and people from St.Louis came to root for the Rams because they hated BB.

Now,THAT is funny.

There's absolutely this weird irony that my new team was itself moved.

 

[Angel]

Because whenever anyone asks me where I am from, my answer is Arizona.

LOL....I know the feeling. I began watching the Cardinals because they moved to my state. I was sick to death of being told that "nobody" is from Arizona. I am FROM Arizona one of my parents and one of her parents are FROM Arizona. My children and grandson are FROM Arizona.

I never watched football before the Cardinals moved here, I happily spent my Sundays in the mall, laughing at the guys clustered around the TVs in Sears. Then my hubby said...Hey this NFL team is moving to town, we should check out a game. Beginning my life of planning around the season (my moronic stepbrother actually got married on 12/27/1998), spending as much of the summer as affordable in Flagstaff, watching the freaking draft.

And I wouldn't change a minute of it….

 

[Lomax to Green 84]

I can trace my infatuation with the Cardinals back to Thanksgiving day 1979. My grandmother gave me 1 dollar and 25 cents and allowed me to walk to the gas station about 3 blocks from her house. There at the gas station I bought a copy of PRO Magazine and on the cover was a rookie runningback named OJ Anderson. He had this really cool uniform (all white with black and red stripes on the pants and black and red stripes on the jersey and this quirky looking redbird on the helmet).

The irony is that my dad grew up a diehard Big Red fan but up until I was 10 years old my favorite team was the Steelers. That fateful day in 1979 changed everything. OJ Anderson became and still remains my alltime favorite Cardinal and the Big Red have been in my blood for 31 years.

 

[Captain Matt]

What Holian didn't say....

He dragged his little brother right along with him. Grandma lived in Mattoon, IL - just down the road from Charleston (and Eastern Illinois University for all of the Romo fans out there). When the Cards started holding camp in Charleston we would go watch Lomax, Nieko Noga (sp?), EJ Junior, Freddi Joe Nunn, Roy Green, and etc. And they were real life giants to a little kid. Been a die hard ever since. I inherited my brother's OJ Anderson jersey when I was probably 9 or 10 and wore it until it fell to pieces. When they moved out of St. Louis nothing really changed.... we just had to travel a bit further to watch a game.

 

[Catfish]

Like Jeff Gollin, I was a St. Louis Baseball Cardinals fan before the football team moved in from Chicago. I batted from the left side, and patterned my swing after Stan Musial. Also, growing up in Kansas, we could get the games on radio when conditions were right, so listened to ol' Diz, and later Harry Carey describe the games to us. Having the football Cardinals move to town was just icing on the cake for me. They became my new underdog heroes.

When Charlie Finley purchased the Philadelphia Athletics and moved them to KC, I had a new underdog team to root for, and I kept the Cardinals as my football love. I now had two underdogs to cheer for.

In January of '62 I went into the service, and after a year of training in the US went to a reconnaisance squadron based on Guam. I spent 7 of the next 8 years overseas, involved in some way or other with the Vietnam War. I came back to the states in October of '69, and settled in Mesa, where the Athletics soon replaced the Cubs as our Spring Training team. I had some wonderful years with them winning several AL championships and World Series Championships.

Meanwhile, Coryelle took over the reigns of the football Cards, and they got respectable in the mid-70's to mid 80's. When they moved to Phoenix I was ecstatic. I thought surely that they would be a steady winner with Lomax under center, but his bad hip caused them to sink into oblivion.

I kept going to the games in SDS however, and we even tail-gated out of the back of my little Bronco II. Soon my daughter and her husband, as well as my son, also purchased season tickets, and the 5 of us had a great time, until my health forced me to more or less watch the games from my family room. Now I have HD, and the team is winning so that I get to see even homes games on TV. And yes, the Cards are still the love of my life, after my family and friends.