So a few days ago I was surfing around the web and decided one of my favorite sports blogs, Deadspin.com. They are not only funny but very women friendly, never shying away from female bloggers who have opinions about the general state of female sports fans. I stumbled across an article written on the blog Mass Hysteria Sports by a female Red Sox fan under the handle FutureMrsRickAnkiel who was defending the pink hat and the people who wear them. I’ve never heard this before but I’m guessing it’s along the lines of what runs through my mind when I see a girl in a “Looking for Mr. Wright” tee shirt.

Let me start by saying I have no doubt that this blogger is a hardcore Red Sox fan and it sucks that she has to prove it to people. As in New York, there are a lot of bandwagon fans and it especially hard for female fans because we are always challenged about our fandome, with or without wearing a pink hat. Now, as you know from my posts and talking to me, I believe that the baseball apparel sold for men and women should be more equal, and it’s not because I hate pink. I happen to like pink, just not on my Mets hat. So what I’d like to do is address her points one by one and try to make my case. Again, I have nothing against this girl, and I’m sure I would enjoy going to a game with her and would be psyched is more of my girl friends were like her. Here we go:

• “The first and most obvious response to the “pink-hatters” tag is that bandwagoneering is hardly gender-specific.” I agree 110%. Everyone knows there are more guys pretending to like baseball than girls. Girls will mostly admit they don’t know much about it if they don’t. However, I believe that term is just being used in this case to talk about girl bandwagon fans and is in no way saying that ONLY girls are bandwagon fans. In fact, I wouldn’t think of a girl wearing a pink hat as a bandwagon fan, I’d assume she was a casual fan.
• “THERE IS NOTHING INTRINSICALLY WRONG WITH A PINK HAT” Well, see, that’s where we differ. I think there is somthing wrong with it, and not because it is girly. I absolutly support her right to look girly at baseball games. As this blogger, I own a few of Alyssa Milano’s “touch” items and I have a Mets belly-button ring (I love ebay). But here is the thing with the pink hat. It’s pink. It’s not the teams colors. I am old fashioned I guess, but I believe in rocking the Orange and Blue (or in her case it would be the Red and White). There is NOTHING wrong with wanting to be girly, I just think you can still be girly in your teams colors. Now, I may be biased because I live in NY with two teams who have similar logos on thier hats. I can’t stand having to figure out what hat someone is wearing because its a different color.
• “Don’t begrudge me or the other fine ladies of Red Sox Nation our chosen apparel.” I’m not going to. But she knows how hard it is to be a female baseball fan. You are always having to prove yourself over and over. Unfortunatly, wearing a pink hat has a stigma attached and if she wants to wear it, that’s fine. But she is just going to need to deal with the looks, questions and names. All the female fans have to do it and by wearing a pink hat or somthing of that sort, that’s what comes with it. It sucks, but that’s the way it is.

I say, wear what you want. I am opposed to the pink hats for the sole reason that they are not Mets Blue and Orange. And I am not going to sit here and say if I saw her from a distance I wouldn’t think that is probably a casual fan. I probably would. But that’s probably because I’m on the defensive, as all female fans usually are. I feel EXACTLY like this blogger does, I don’t want to be mistaken for a casual fan because men think women don’t know sports.

In closing, I hope this girl keeps on fighting the good fight for female sports fans everywhere. And please don’t think I’m telling her to blend in with the men. I’m not. I’m simply saying that if you wear a pink hat, that’s what people might think so until the times change, we just need to keep fighting the good fight.