I’m an LAFC fan: Why “Los Angeles Former Chivas” is Not an Insult

I’m an avid sports fan, going back to my youth in West Virginia. First the Mountaineers, then the Steelers, and now that I’ve been in Los Angeles for over a decade, the Dodgers. It was at a Dodgers game in 2017 that I first saw the 3252, the independent supporters’ group of the Los Angeles Football Club. They took over left field that night, chanting and singing the entire game — at a baseball game! — and wearing these cool black hats with one of the sickest “LA” logos I had ever seen. I was intrigued.

Fast forward to April 2018 and the start of the inaugural season for LAFC. My son and I casually watched the first game against the Seattle Sounders on TV, checking to see what the buzz was about. We had heard about the celebrity owners, and seen the shiny new kits, but now it was time to see the play on the pitch. It caught my attention that a new club like LAFC had fans who traveled all the way to Seattle. Quite soon my son and I erupted in cheers as Diego Rossi scored in the eleventh minute, a wonder goal if ever the term should be used, because I wondered for the first time, as I’m sure many other did as well: “could I be a fan of MLS?”

I’ve followed soccer since college, watching mostly World Cup and Champions League, with a few Euro championships and Africa Cup of Nations sprinkled in for good measure. I’ve admired the camaraderie and excitement that comes from being a die-hard fan of one club, but I never felt any club pull at my heartstrings. That was, until I saw Rossi’s shot hit the strings in the back of the net that day at CenturyLink and heard the songs of the 3252. I’m not ashamed to admit that I wasn’t a fan until the season started. LAFC won my heart, fair and square, on the pitch and in the stands.

Within weeks, I was following the team on social media and beginning to get familiar with all of the supporters’ groups within 3252. I went to my first game at the Banc, against the Loons, and started going to watch parties with the Lucky Boys in Pasadena. I was hooked on the experience — I’d finally fallen in love with a soccer club. When you like a team, you talk to other fans on Twitter and, of course, not everyone loved LAFC like I did. Whenever I encountered a hater, usually a Galaxy fan, the same tagline was used: “LAFC is just Los Angeles Former Chivas.”

I did not know anything about the history of Chivas USA, other than some faint memories of seeing their games advertised outside the StubHub Center as I drove by on the 91 freeway. (StubHub is the only sports venue in L.A. that I have never been to — having lived here over a a decade!) I remember thinking that it was pretty cool that a Mexican team had a companion team in MLS, and I hoped they kicked the Galaxy’s ass. I don’t know what it was, but something about the Galaxy just never quite appealed to me. I felt like they were a made-for-TV franchise, with their high-priced imported stars propped up by the league to fit its overall goals. I don’t recall hearing the news that Chivas USA folded; in fact, when I first heard about LAFC, I though it was weird that the city would have three MLS teams.

So after I saw this insult being thrown around, being the dork I am, I did my research. I found out that the claim that LAFC is the team formerly known as Chivas USA is not factually accurate. The two franchises have completely different ownership. (Don’t hold it against me but I’m a lawyer by day, and property rights matter; the fancy term for having different owners would be “lack of privity” and it basically means these two two companies are not legally related in any way.) None of the players developed by Chivas USA were brought over to LAFC. Incredibly, Chivas USA’s academy was absorbed by the Galaxy, not LAFC. All that happened is that one MLS team folded, opening a slot for another team to enter. That’s it.

I got to thinking, what’s so bad about being “Los Angeles Former Chivas”? There’s nothing wrong with succeeding where others have failed. If LAFC’s front office and ownership group are smart enough to learn from Chivas USA’s past mistakes, why knock them for it? And, more to the point, this so-called insult recognizes that LAFC is actually in Los Angeles, a location that cannot be taken away from the identity of the team and a key reason why many fans love the Black and Gold instead of the boys from Carson. If any fans of Chivas USA moved over to LAFC, that says more about the Galaxy’s inability to understand the true identity of the City of Los Angeles and their failure to capture hearts than it does about the loyalty of those fans.

So, here we are, on the eve of the first Blackout at the Banc. There will be plenty of Galaxy fans there, I’m sure. I bet more than a few of them will grumble about “those damn Chivas fans.” I’ll be there too, decked in black, somewhere in the fog. But I won’t be able to hear them grumble, because I’ll be bouncing in the North End to the pulse of the drums, with three thousand two hundred and fifty-one of my friends, singing sweet songs about the beautiful brand of football we get to witness, put forward by a “proper” football club, LAFC.