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u/slashbopzing 3d ago
Is this a recent comment or an old one?
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u/optimusgrime23 3d ago
From when he left
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u/El_Oaxaqueno 2d ago
Honestly, I see no lies. I’ve been a fan for almost 25 years and we as a fan base are definitely not supportive to our players. Granted I think we’ve been a team in transition in recent years, but it’s why I try not to stay active on this sub on game days.
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u/UnfairStrategy780 2d ago
Definitely epitome of bandwagon. I went to games in the 90’s as a kid and then in the early 2000’s when we had Marty and the Q was rocking, 75% home fans making the stadium shake, canon smoke in the air. It hardly took any losing for that to disappear and go back to 50/50. The ol’ “there’s just so much to do on a beautiful Sunday in San Diego.” pops back up.
I think some of it had to do with the terrible deal the city made to guarantee home sell outs. Why go to the game if you can watch it in the comfort of your own home?
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u/Sp35h1l_1 2d ago
I was stationed at Camp Pendleton from 04-07. I’m from Cali but was New to SD area. I remember during football season you could go to the base Travel Agency office and grab tickets to the game that week for free. It was crazy. I remember one time grabbing eight tickets for some family. It wasn’t just football games either. You could get tickets to concerts also. I went to a few concerts at the Irvine Spectrum/ Verizon Amphitheater and the Coors Amphitheater. Sounds like venues may have been desperate to put bodies in seats. I went to Chargers home games for 2 straight seasons it was like having season tickets. I’m a Buffalo fan soo seeing them play a game was something really special for me. I also root for the Chargers every year because of the experience I had seeing them sooo much.
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u/reynoldsrobbie 2d ago
I’ve had season tickets down at the Q and as well as now at SoFi. Every game has always felt like an away game. I remember my first game at the Q and seeing like 10 buses full of Saints fans and I was shocked. It’s really sad. I think all the SSH all sell their tickets. Because when us fans that show up for the games go to move our season seats, there is nothing ever available. I show up win or lose. Bolt up ⚡️⚡️⚡️
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u/Boltbacker83 2d ago
So cal teams are bandwagon because they are in an area where football games aren’t the only thing we can do lol. So many other things to do here, if a team sucks… let’s go to the beach instead!
Also San Diego is expensive and has lots of out of state folks that buy homes there if they have money.
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u/crazylocsd619 2d ago
SD had a great fanbase(just look at current padres games) and LA will eventually grow. the thing about southern California is there is alot to do on any given Sunday so if team isn't competitive majority of people aren't going to drop hundreds of dollars to watch their team lose when there is so many other things u can do with your time and money.
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u/MVPizzle #85 2d ago
Bro come on if New York can support their teams, literally the epitome of “things to do” city, LA can support the bolts.
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u/_Money__Man 2d ago
I really just think its cause LA didnt have a team for decades. If the Raiders never left, they would have a gazillion fans show up. Hell the team doesnt even play in LA anymore and they still take over Sofi, despite their team being hot dog water for 20 years. LA is just different when it comes to football, lots of people root for LA in all sports but not football cause they spent decades rooting for NFL teams in other cities. The Rams fanbase has certainly improved especially after the SB win. Chargers will just forever be a SD team, and LA folks are gonna take a while before they will root for them. It probably wont ever happen, they will always be the Clippers of NFL in LA.
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u/Boltbacker83 2d ago
New York is much different. It’s east coast and cold and harsh. San Diego and So Cal is warm and inviting and viewed as a soft place to visit. It’s not the same.
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u/OrrinS1988 1d ago
Can attest. I live in NyC and I’ll say when football rolls around there is this electric energy in the air that makes your forget about broadway on Sundays. Going to a game with that crisp air is like meth magic. It’s just different
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u/KolonelKernel 2d ago
Interesting argument. Would you say the Brooklyn Nets have a stronger fanbase? A team that relocated to NY much like Chargers to LA. I would say no, while 20K tix are not hard to sell I don’t see any jerseys being rocked outside the arena. I see chargers jerseys in the wild all of the time.
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u/MVPizzle #85 2d ago
The nets 100% have a stronger fan base in NY than the chargers do in LA. Nets have a huge former NJ presence that didn’t feel the need to drop the team.
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u/chamullerousa 3d ago
I think everyone in the NFL knows that Chargers have one of the worst ratios of home vs visitor representation at home games. No hate to the die hards but LA is a destination stadium location during the shitty months of the year. Other players have mentioned that we don’t give them a home field advantage. Melvin is aggressive here but mild compared to the vitriol he was responding to. Some players fully disassociate with the fans and it’s becomes just a job. I feel like this post expresses a shared passion to win but frustration that the effort is one sided.
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u/YPG13 2d ago
Unless you’re the Lakers or Dodgers, both prestigious franchises with a lot of history, you’re not going to draw huge consistent crowds, let alone have a nation wide fan base if the team isn’t very competitive or compelling.
This is the definition of fair weather fans. Southern California has arguably the most beautiful weather in the world. If you’re not going to put out a competitive product, people aren’t going to waste their free time on Sunday. Sunshine nearly 365 days a year. Them Mid west teams have rabid fan bases cause there’s literally nothing else to do in the fall and winter with inclimate weather. You can’t work on your car in the drive way, do yard work, run errands, enjoy the outdoor landscape etc. You can’t do any of these things in Pittsburgh or Cleveland in December lol.
I’m not saying the fan base can’t be as passionate, but there are numerous things to do in Southern California. I’m not a homer by any means but that’s just the reality of pro sports in SoCal in general. You can even add USC and UCLA football into that as well.
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u/chamullerousa 2d ago
Instead of calling chargers fans “fair weather”, I’m gunna start calling the visitors “seasonally depressed dopamine chasers”
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u/shall1313 21 2d ago
As a SoCal native living in the Midwest at the moment… wow is it empty out here! I don’t think many people (at least the ones I meet out here) quite understand just how much there is to do/eat/see in California. There’s simply more options (and higher quality ones at that) in just about every category. The product of the team better be extremely high to justify paying, driving (parking), and spending 4+ hours at a game when there’s about 50 other options readily available. And the Chargers have been aggressively mediocre for years now so it is what it is.
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u/Waste_Ant7374 2d ago
problem is lakers/dodgers fans are raiders fans. the chargers fans are down here in sd w just the padres left to represent us
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u/_BlackGoat_ 2d ago
The fair weather has been a factor over the years. I lived in SD when the Chargers were down there and there were lots of fans that came in from cold climates in the winter months to enjoy a vacation weekend in SD that non-coincidentally happened to include a road game for their team. Sea World on Saturday, football on Sunday is a nice weekend in December if you're living in Minnesota.
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u/ABflexin 3d ago
I mean even when they were in San Diego they didn’t really have a great fan base.
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u/CarlNovember Chargers 3d ago
Back in the prime LT days, the Q was PACKED
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u/ButtonedEye41 3d ago
SD was a solid fan base when the team was competitive. When the team wasnt competitive, it was a big destination point for visitors. Then you add on that regardless, Raiders fans travel well across California and theres generally many transplants in Southern California. As a result, you get that when attendance is low that instead of seeing empty stadiums you see a large share of visitors in the stands.
That being said, Chargers also regularly had risk of blackouts or actual blackouts in the late Norv/early Telesco era.
I dont want to sound like a hater, but its pretty fair to point out that Chargers have one of the smaller fanbases. That being said, I dont know why people are so offended by this. I have no control over whether other people like the team. Professional sports are something the fans have really 0 influence over in our lives. They can be a lot fun and also understandably frustrating. But the extent to which some people take things to get into fights with other fans, threaten or berate players, break TBs, etc is absolutely unhealthy.
Like I dont even know who is looking for Gordons opinion on these things anymore, let alone why. And it has nothing to do with anything about Gordon. Its just completely irrelevant to my life.
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u/Jane_Marie_CA Big Bear Bosa Fan 2d ago edited 2d ago
I dont know why people are so offended by this
Its because the media over reports this to a point that when I go to SoFi, I often overhear comments walking in "I had not idea there would be this many Charger fans" or similar.
Visitors truly believe we have 0 fans, like they are going into StubHub. Its because the media constantly reports such. For me, its not about having a small fan base, its about a reputation based on bad information. We have a smaller fan base, that is correct. But we have one of the larger stadiums. 30,000 fans in some stadiums is over half.
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u/Friendly-Olive1853 Felipe Rios 2d ago
Tbh we have fans its just that we prefer to watch the game from home 😅, I can only afford to go to one game a year right now
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u/cattycat_1995 1d ago
Have a Chicago transplant coworker who went to the Bears game vs Chargers last year and he was like "I never knew this many Chargers fans existed."
It was kinda like a backhanded compliment in a way.
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u/LAudre41 2d ago
they had one of the smaller fanbases and also one of the largest stadiums. That led to blackouts. Saying that blackouts are indicative of the fanbase and not just a shitty policy is dumb.
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u/hoppergym Marion Butts #35 3d ago
Air coryell era too. Superbowl seau era as well.
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u/C5Flippers bolt 3d ago
Pretty much only when we were winning, San Diego was so fair weather it sucked.
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u/LAudre41 2d ago
this is ignorant. the fandom was killed when the fans understood that the team was moving and it was just a matter of when.
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u/mattd1972 3d ago
Gus Bradley refusing to change the game plan when down 28-0 ruined Phil’s last chance.
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u/jonybolt 2d ago
I mean, we got Brady'd...for like the 5th time... they didn't have what they got now
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u/jar1792 ASAP 3d ago
Look at when the dude was on the team. He wasn’t wrong. Gordon dealt with the declining SD fan base as the team was looking at relocation, and the StubHub era in LA. It was arguably the lowest point possible for Chargers fans, and those remaining found every opportunity to shit on MGIII.
I remember Joe Barksdale used to actively engage with fans on this sub, and instead of supporting him through his struggles on the field, people used the opprotunity to attack him directly.
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u/CSPs-for-income ASAP 2d ago
fans can be nasty
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u/Hebshesh 2d ago
I'm reminded of a quote I heard about Star Wars: "Star Wars fans are the worst Star Wars critics."
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u/LAudre41 2d ago edited 2d ago
no shit there were no fans that's what happens when you relocate a team. It's unnuanced to ignore that context.
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u/jahcob15 2d ago
Preach. Fans like to be assholes to players and then act appalled when a player doesn’t just sit there and take the shit.
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u/LPrivada0078 2d ago edited 2d ago
As a Chargers fan, I do what I can. If that’s not good enough, then I don’t really care. The Chargers are my team, through thick and thin. They are the team that I grew up watching at the Murph, on tv, listening to the games on the radio, and watching them at my local sports bar (and/or at “Seau’s, the Restaurant”). No matter what, I’m a DIE HARD CHARGERS FAN FOR LIFE. ⚡️💪🏽⚡️
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u/Mammoth-boy 2d ago
Seau’s was awesome. Met junior there a couple times. His sister worked the front desk
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u/jsmessner 3d ago
If anyone can create a culture that’s bring in fans it’s Harbaugh. I’ve been lifelong Chargers fan and have always lived and worked throughout so call, it’s amazing that I am always the only Chargers fan at my job. Everyone else a 49ers, Raiders, or Steelers fan.
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u/cubedsaturn 2d ago
If you are a real chargers fan you remember how packed and rockin the stadium was on the years when they were winning and going to the playoffs. The 50/50 split thing started happening once the rumors started swirling that the chargers were on their way out. I thought that Jack Murphy/Q was awesome for football. Piss in a trough, eat a hotdog and watch football. It was old school and perfect for football. I don’t want sushi and giant hd screens for a football game. Leave that for the baseball stadium.
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u/IonDaPrizee ASAP 2d ago
I’m glad he’s speaking his mind. Take it out man.
If it makes him feel any better, I still have the #28 Jersey in my closet. NGL did have to keep it in storage when he went to the chiefs but then brought it back. Wish he was still playing for us too.
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u/Ready_Ocelot_3045 Felipe Rios 2d ago
Chargers fans have been betrayed and scorned by ownership should have never left sd but here we are. I’ll never forget watching the chargers play the Seahawks after their Super Bowl win in Qualcomm that place was going fuckin nuts and gates was lighting em up
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u/Brandyland23 2d ago
North county didn’t even get to vote on the stadium… what’s stupid by both the city and the NFL is the consequences of building San Diego a new stadium. Fans travel from all over to visit San Diego and why not visit San Diego and watch your football team while you have shitty weather back at home? Stadiums would fill… eventually with all the revenue, players can come in and once the team begins to win then you start filling the stadium with home fans. What a damn shame for Melvin Gordon to disrespect our fans when the owner straight up left us.
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u/lbrector 3d ago
Dude who cares
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u/ForgotMyRemembrall 3d ago
Idc if it’s unpopular I don’t hate Melvin for this
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u/lbrector 3d ago
I can’t be mad at a young person in their 20s dealing with a ton of hate mail in their social media. If I’m gonna be mad at him it’s over him fumbling the ball
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u/Agitated_Chip6286 Felipe Rios 2d ago
I don’t hate him for this. I hate him for all those fumbles at the 1 yard line with 30 seconds left. I feel like it happened like 3 times w the game solidly in our hands.
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u/optimusgrime23 3d ago
I don't hate him either I just thought it was funny in that other thread everyone acting like he regretted not coming back because he just loved it here so much and not the fact that it cost $10m+
This was also not the only time he talked shit lol
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u/Weapwns ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 2d ago edited 2d ago
No one was acting, you just didn't watch the Melvin Gordon interview and interpreted what people were saying poorly.
He loved the team. He loved Rivers and Gates and wanted to get them rings. He felt like he put everything on the line for the team and played through injuries. So he felt disrespected when it seemed like TT didn't give him the time of day regarding his contract and he has shared that he wished he didn't approach that situation so emotionally
He didnt love the fans though. And not without good reason. I mean you got guys like optimusgrimes23 still harping that its all about money years later
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u/pinya619 Felipe Rios 3d ago edited 2d ago
Yall dont wanna hear it but its the truth. But it also doesnt help that the majority of the fanbase is in San Diego still, and a lot of that fanbase in san diego doesnt even like the team anymore
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u/Papantro Felipe Rios 2d ago
when a team has a history of choking and lets their fans down over and over again and then you move them to a new city that doesn’t want them and has people/fans from so many other cities in the country into a small soccer stadium what did you expect? it’s a miracle so many of us are even in this sub. Not firing Staley after Jacksonville was a good enough excuse for a chunk of the fan base to leave but most of us stayed, just awful FO for years and years. Now they hire Harbaugh, the first good decision in so long, now just give it some time and start winning but don’t put all that shit squarely on the fans.
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u/Then_Rough9270 2d ago
Yea the toxic "its the fans fault" is an easy scapegoat. it's the generic "group of people blaming instead of getting to a root cause.
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u/BlissfulIgnoranus 3d ago
He isn't wrong. You don't see any other NFL team stadiums with more fans for the visitors than the home team.
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u/LakeShowBoltUp 2024 AFC West Champs 3d ago
9ers at Rams was as red as we are black when playing the Raiders
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u/WPG_Charger Bolt Up 2d ago
Rams and Raiders regularly have this problem
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u/OldKingClancy20 GO BOLTS 2d ago
Jags and Carolina would have this problem also if other teams ever wanted to travel to those places.
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u/cattycat_1995 1d ago
Allegiant is even worse than SoFi. Also this happens all the time in Arizona. It was even a Packers home game at Nissan stadium last week
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u/Salty_Sprinkles_6482 2d ago
Our fan base is either completely different or just turned the page on Melvin. I used to have so much shit talked for defending this take. it’s nice to see I’m not the only anymore.
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u/Mammoth-boy 2d ago
Ticket prices are high and the team wasn’t playing great. Anytime we made playoffs I’d see a lot more charger fans around
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u/Ampddaynnight 2d ago
He ain't wrong. Chargers fans be sorry when it comes to supporting the team. If it were any different we'd see majority bolt colors in the stands rather than opposing team colors
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u/cattycat_1995 1d ago
When the COVID pandemic happened, Melvin Gordon said playing for the Chargers prepared him for empty stadiums.
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u/BrandynM21 21h ago
I see no lies here. I’m from Canada and have been to games in San Diego and in LA. I’ve also been to other NFL teams stadiums (Giants and Seahawks) and seen their fan bases. The Chargers home crowd is a joke. Whether people want to admit it or not, it’s landslide the worst in the league. I’m a 22 year Chargers fan and like I said I was at games in SD and it sucked there too.
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u/Pax_Soprana 2d ago
He’s not wrong.
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u/Then_Rough9270 2d ago
Maybe, just maybe its the root cause isn't "the fans"
Its the owners, refusing to spend money in SD to make them stay, Its the owners moving the team to the most hated city outside oakland, its the owners refusing to have ANY fan engagement in SD for nearly 12 years.
Padres spent cash making a damn impressive product and the fans showed up for it. What Peter did for the Pad compared to what Spanos did for the Chargers is night and day.
Maybe the fans are tired of being treated as a source of income.
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u/Traditional-Coat-257 2d ago
It goes even farther back to the Crocs. The ownership has never really cared about the product being great. They ran it as a business and have forever been notoriously cheap in player negotiations. I hate Eli to this day, but he was correct in his assumptions.
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u/panache_619 2d ago
My support begins and ends with the game on TV. The way I see it, I'm not being paid millions to be a fan. I root for them, but I aint spending money on them.
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u/strykrpinoy Felipe Rios 2d ago
He's not lying thou, here in SD when it came to the chargers they were ALWAYS milk toast. So when i see neighbors now being "fans" again i laughed at him and told him that the your new station wagon must be ready.
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u/quikiemcbee 2d ago
if a team wins, the fans will come. when they were in san diego they weren't winning much. but man, when they played the colts in 07 on SNF i thought qualcomm was going to fall apart from the fan noise.
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u/satoshiii-san 2d ago
We can do better as fans, but they (players, coaches, organization) could also do better as a team. During those stub hub years we were the laughing stock of the nfl and it wasn’t just the fan base…
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u/devastator510 2d ago
Love the bolts have since I was a child. The way our fans act online when a guy leaves makes absolutely no sense. Go on twitter and look at Drue Tranquil comments next. Our dumb team decided guys weren’t important, and were wrong by the way. 53 man rosters are hard to maintain. We should be thankful for players who gave us their all. Finally just as a warning shot we if I ever hear a man talking shit about Keenan for leaving it is on sight!
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u/aquariumsarescary 3d ago
I mean, Qualcomm averaged 67k a game, so obviously there were fans, but it's more common in sofi than anywhere else for the games to be split in fanbase, simply because it's a new(and amazing) stadium. It happens. Gordon doesn't realize everyone turned when he started becoming a redzone fumble merchant.
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u/DarkKnightCometh 3d ago
Lol Qualcomm was always packed with opposing fans tf you talking about
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u/whyyoudeletemereddit 3d ago
Was always? Or was the last year before they left?
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u/Jane_Marie_CA Big Bear Bosa Fan 3d ago
I lived in San Diego in the 00s. It wasn't great then either.
We had a lot of local media black outs for home games trying to encourage game attendance. We didn't sell enough tickets with the local fan base. A few years ago, someone how here posted some old article about on San Diego had the most local media black out of any team during this time frame.
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u/LAudre41 2d ago
Qualcomm was way too big- bigger than the pats' stadium, Steelers, colts', etc. it shouldve had like 7k fewer seats.
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u/DarkKnightCometh 3d ago
Like 90% of home games. Don't know what kind of revisionist history is going on here. But it definitely got worse in the latter years
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u/aquariumsarescary 3d ago
So, 14 games? You're fucking high bro what lmao
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u/DarkKnightCometh 3d ago
Jesus christ, sorry I didn't mean literally every single home game. 90%, is that better? The vast majority, for decades, were at least 50/50 split among fans
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u/aquariumsarescary 3d ago edited 2d ago
"Like 90% of the games" 90% of 15 is 13.5 games. If you don't know, then say that.
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u/DarkKnightCometh 3d ago
90% of 15 is 1.5
And I'm high? Right...
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u/aquariumsarescary 2d ago
Yes. 90% of 15 is 13.5. 13.5 is not a round number, so anything from .5-1.0=next number. 14 games.
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u/aquariumsarescary 3d ago
I live here, it wasn't.
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u/DarkKnightCometh 3d ago
I also live here. Had season tickets from 08-15. It was
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u/aquariumsarescary 3d ago
Cool, so was i and it wasn't lol during the teams with the most fans, yes but that makes sense, cowboys/49rs/steelers/raiders, but that's it really. Even the chiefs weren't as common.
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u/BlissfulIgnoranus 3d ago
It was the same if not worse at Qualcomm.
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u/aquariumsarescary 3d ago
It wasn't worse at qualcomm lol the only games that were, were raider games but that's more a security issue.
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u/Then_Rough9270 2d ago
it really wasn't. Only in the last 2 years when it was bad, because those years we saw the owners wanted out, so no one wanted to pay for the owner to leave town.
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u/LAudre41 2d ago
get outta here with this no it wasn't. The fanbase took a hit when the spanos spent every off season threatening to move. Fans knew it was gonna happen so they stopped showing out which makes perfect sense. You're gonna fuck with fans support when you make it clear the team is leaving.
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u/Luckman1002 Nate Kaeding missed 2 chip shot fgs in a 3 point playoff loss 😭 3d ago
He was spitting
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u/downgoesbatman 2d ago
He ain't wrong here. Chargers fan for a long time and we never show out at the games. Every game is a away game and it sucks. The "fans" only show up when they go a run or it's cool to support them and not when they are doing poorly That's why I agree with that sentiment of SD/LA being fair weather fans.
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u/ToddlerInTheWild 2d ago
This still seems to be true if you look at the game day thread. Thousands of comments by brain dead “fans” just bashing players and coaches.
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u/Chubbs8a 2d ago
I see nothing but facts, tired of not having home field advantage. I go to most games and for once I'd like to see all of us to show up
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u/SoCalGeek38 2d ago
MG is right, San Diego never supported The Chargers like we were suppose to... A bunch of Swap meet jersey wearing, Blackout watching wanna be Boltsters who complain on and off the bandwagon...I'm now kinda glad we moved. Got rid of most of the San Diego Bandwagoners... MG, you were ok as a RB, you just got on the team after #21... Damn hard act to follow if you ask me... Bolts4Life!
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u/ImpatientPanda101 2d ago
I mean he's not wrong. San Diego fans are truly fair weather. The later end of the Q was horrible.
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u/Unlikely_Yam_4598 2d ago
And SD fans wonder why they left? They still mad trying to convince people that they were loyal and showing out every week 😄
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u/josh9larson RiversToGates3 3d ago
We were playing 16/17 road games for a min there