The Great Escape
#MoreThanAGame
Being a female sports fan, I’ve been asked a lot in my life, “Why did you become a fan?” I’ve always thought that was an interesting question — if you think about it, we don’t usually ask men why they became sports fans. We just assume it was a natural interest based on their predisposition to what’s perceived as masculine.
As I’ve been building The Relish alongside my co-founder, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about why a place for female fans doesn’t exist. Why doesn’t anyone talk to this consumer, despite there being so many (millions) of female fans out there? I realize it’s because of that masculine perception around sports. People sometimes forget that just because something appears more masculine doesn’t mean women won’t find it interesting, too. That said, there’s still a better way to talk to women in a manner that better connects with their mind-set. The same goes for masculine and feminine perceptions. I know plenty of men who find seemingly feminine things just as interesting as a woman would, but there isn’t always a great place for a man to go to consume it in a way that speaks to him.
Just because something appears more masculine doesn’t mean women won’t find it interesting, too.
At the same time, as with anything, if you want to shift from misconceptions and preconceived notions based on gender stereotypes, you have to start with the story. While I hope we get to a place one day where being a fan isn’t about being a man or a woman and is simply about being a fan (I think we’re getting there), I know that we must start with the story first.
This is my story.
It was 1995. The Seattle Mariners had turned the entire Pacific Northwest region into a fan frenzy. Seattle hadn’t seen anything this exciting in sports since the 1979 Sonics won the NBA Finals (RIP). No one really knew just how big of a sports city Seattle was until that historic Mariners season, and for me it was the season that turned me into a die-hard baseball fan.
1995 was also the year my parents divorced. As a 10-year-old girl, there was nothing more devastating to me than the confusion of my parents’ marriage falling apart. While I certainly understand and fully support that decision now as an adult, I didn’t understand it as a child and it broke me apart inside.
My parents’ divorce wasn’t easy, as is usually the case when two people who shared a life together decide to end it. My brother and I, as many kids of divorce sadly are, were constantly stuck in the middle of a lot of messy squabbles. It was confusing, it was disruptive, it was painful and it was sometimes scary. Every day I wished I could be somewhere else. I wished I could shut off the noise and the confusion and just be a kid.
That’s when I found baseball.
I remember being unexpectedly called to the office at school one afternoon. My mom was there to pick me up. As I nervously walked down the hallway, looking at the teal “Refuse To Lose” Mariners signs that lined the walls, wondering if I was in trouble or if something bad had happened at home, I arrived to see my mom smiling back at me. She held out two tickets to the Mariners/Angels wildcard tie-breaker game.
It was my first baseball game.
I was so excited. Everything from driving down to the game, to arriving in the parking lot, to following the herd of fans into the Kingdome (RIP), to having a hot dog (with relish, of course) and cheering alongside everyone — everything was awesome. I was swept up in the excitement. For the entire duration of the game, I didn’t think about my parents’ divorce. I didn’t think about school. I didn’t think about anything else except for how much fun I was having.
I was completely mesmerized by the noise, the excitement, the cheers, the disappointment when a player would strike out, ground out or pop out. I felt like I was a part of something meaningful. At a time when everything in my life felt like it had lost its meaning, even at 10 years old, I was reminded that there can be meaning found in things outside yourself.
The Mariners won that day and everyone rushed the field in excitement. I kept asking my mom, “Won’t they get in trouble?!” And as I looked at the tears in her eyes, I knew it just didn’t matter. I also knew that for the first time in a while, my mom’s tears weren’t sad tears. She was happy, happy they had won, and I was finally happy again, too.
I was finally somewhere else. I was finally just being a kid. I never wanted that feeling to end. I was hooked.
From that day forward, I put everything I had into baseball. No one in my family was ever really a die-hard fan of anything. Becoming a die-hard fan was my own doing.
At one point, I took all of the $10 I had saved from my allowance and bought a small, old, black and white TV from a neighborhood garage sale, brought it into my room, took an old radio from our house and turned a corner of my bedroom into my Mariners zone. I applied aluminum foil to the antennas to get the perfect reception of Channel 7 (the Mariners’ flagship station at the time) and simultaneously tuned into 710 AM on the radio (which would one day become my employer). I’d sit there listening and watching and reading my Mariners Magazine, familiarizing myself with the stats and the players. I’d look at the pictures of players with their families and I’d wonder if they were happy. I’d convince myself they were, which made me love baseball even more. I collected cards and trinkets and every other thing a baseball fan might like.
I never missed a game. I was truly a die-hard.
When I entered high school, I also turned to football. I loved watching my high school football games and so began a natural progression towards the NFL and a love of the Seahawks, which in recent years has totally been worth it.
It took me longer to gravitate towards basketball. Just as the Sonics were getting good in Seattle, they were ripped away from the city in an ugly business decision that still leaves the entire area feeling jaded and misrepresented. It wasn’t until recent years of being in San Francisco and watching the Warriors and people like Steph Curry that I started finding an interest in the NBA again. Suffice to say, the bandwagon isn’t always such a bad thing.
While it’s a story for another time, as a kid, people used to always tell me that when you grow up, you should do something you’re passionate about. I was always passionate about two things: baseball and writing. I told myself I wanted to be the “Katie Couric of the Mariners” or a baseball journalist. As a 10-, 12-, 13-year-old girl, that was a seemingly made up opportunity that didn’t quite exist in the way it should have — to be a woman working and writing about sports. Today, that’s changed.
While there’s room for continued improvement, women have far more opportunities in sports than we used to, even just 20 years ago.
I did end up working in sports and for my favorite baseball team, no less. It was truly a dream opportunity.
I’ll admit, the way I consume sports has changed since I was a little girl. These days, I don’t need that outlet in the way I needed it as a child. But, I still love it. I still love going to games, I still love when my team wins and hate when my team loses. I still want to read stories and know what’s going on in the world of sports. I still like participating in the conversation. I still buy new team gear every season. I still watch and I still listen, just not necessarily to every single game.
What I’ve begun to realize as an adult is that baseball, and sports in general, captured my attention as a kid, but something was lost in the shuffle. Somewhere in the process of evolving as a fan I never lost my love of the game, but did lose the manner in which the game was connecting with me.
That’s a big reason we’ve built The Relish.
No matter what your story is, something turned you into a fan. And somewhere in the process, the way female fans consume sports and enjoy sports and want to talk about sports has been mostly ignored.
Regardless of where we are today and where we are headed, I will forever be grateful for that 1995 September ballgame. I will forever see baseball and sports as my escape from the trauma of divorce and a place that turned me into a fan and has instilled in me a passion to build a home for other female fans.
Ashley Wellington-Fahey is the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of The Relish, a smart, bold, fresh voice and newsletter for female sports fans. Ashley is a Seattle native and longtime fan of the Mariners, landing a dream opportunity in her hometown to begin her career in sports. As an avid Seahawks fan now living in San Francisco, she enjoys the friendly banter among
her rival 49ers friends and enjoys her seat on the bandwagon of the Golden State Warriors. Ashley takes her hot dog with everything on it, including cream cheese (aka the Seattle Dog). Her at-bat song is (not surprisingly) “Run the World (Girls)” by Queen Bey.
Visit us to sign up for our weekly newsletter, follow us on Medium, and socialize with us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter.
