Foreign fans share a love for black and purple around the world
At 6 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012, in Baltimore, it was 8 a.m. Monday in Melbourne, Australia. So when then-Ravens wide receiver Lee Evans dropped what would have been a go-ahead touchdown pass in the AFC championship game against the New England Patriots, Brendan Coghlan was already in media-blackout mode.
All Monday in Melbourne, Coghlan, in his first season of rooting for the Ravens, avoided anything that could spoil the outcome of the game. At 6 p.m., he left work and invited friends to eat chicken wings, drink beer and, he hoped, watch a recording of the Ravens advancing to the Super Bowl.
Those in Baltimore remember what happened next, and so does Coghlan, even halfway across the world: Billy Cundiff sprinting downfield toward the line of scrimmage and missing a kick, wide left.
“When it came to that Cundiff wide [left], it was just this weird moment where I was like, ‘I know this is my team,’ ” Coghlan said. “I was in it for life then.”
Coghlan has many memories from that first season following the team — the 35-7 rout of the Pittsburgh Steelers in Week 1, Joe Flacco’s two-minute drill to beat the
“Just seeing the way [the Ravens] played, we called that blue-collar football, good, honest football. … They played hard. They played tough. They didn’t take any [crap] from anyone.” Brendan Coghlan of Melbourne, Australia
Steelers eight weeks later, the Thanksgiving win over the San Francisco 49ers that Coghlan watched on tape Friday night — but the loss to the Patriots sticks out.
“It was the gut-wrenching feeling watching that ball sail wide on the Cundiff kick that really nailed it for me that I was a Ravens fan,” he later wrote in an email, “because you don’t get that sinking feeling if you’re only neutral.”
The joy and heartbreak of Ravens fans stretches across the world. As American football becomes more popular globally, a far-flung but tight-knit community cheers the team on.
Spreading their wings
For many international Ravens fans, passion for the team burns just as strongly as it does for those in Baltimore. Adam Gordon, who is from Windsor, Ontario, remembers all the details from his first game at M&T Bank Stadium. Kristjan Kallaste of Estonia remembers the first time he heard one of Ray Lewis’ speeches. Riley Pyette of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, remembers the date of the Ravens’ “Mile High Miracle” win over the Denver Broncos in 2013. It was Jan. 12 — his 28th birthday.
“So I just assumed, ‘Oh, I get to watch a Ravens game on my birthday. It’s probably going to be the last one’ ” of the season, Pyette said. “And then it turned out to be that game. Which was unbelievable.”
Many international fans meet online through social websites such as Reddit. One thread asks, “Ravens fans that have no connection to Baltimore, how did you become a fan of the team?” It has 116 comments.
Most responses share typical stories — inspired by Ray Lewis, or sparked by one of the team’s two Super Bowl runs — but others are unusual. One Canadian fan began rooting for the team after watching “The Wire.” Another supporter follows the Ravens because the local British soccer team has a feeder team in Baltimore.
On another Reddit thread, one fan arranged to meet another in England to borrow a highlight film from the “Mile High Miracle.” Facebook groups connect fans from the United Kingdom, Canada and even Sweden.
As American football becomes more popular around the world, its fan bases spread to other countries. The NFL has done its part to generate interest.
In 2007, the New York Giants beat the Miami Dolphins in London, the first regular-season NFL game outside North America. The league hosted one game in London each of the next five years, two in 2013 and three in each of the past two years. Three more trips are scheduled for this year, as well as the first matchup in Mexico.
The Ravens have not played outside the U.S. — William Brittain, a Ravens fan who lives in northern London, eagerly awaits an appearance — but their support is broad nonetheless. With the team’s success this century has come popularity in other countries.
Despite being in a smaller market and having less tradition than the Dallas Cowboys or the 49ers, the Ravens appeal to fans for a variety of reasons. A wave of supporters formed when the Ravens dominated the Giants in Super Bowl XXXV. Others came because they appreciated the team’s defensive-minded, hard-nosed style of play.
“Just seeing the way they played, we called that blue-collar football, good, honest football,” Coghlan, the Australian, recalled. “They played hard. They played tough. They didn’t take any [crap] from anyone.”
More jumped onboard because of chance encounters with the team. Quentin de Groof, who lives in Belgium, happened to watch replays of the NFL’s two conference championship games in 2009. Of the Ravens, Pittsburgh Steelers, Arizona Cardinals and Philadelphia Eagles, the Ravens’ style appealed most to him. Though international fans concede that big-market teams draw the most support where they live, the Ravens are picking up support among new followers of the game.
“[I] stumbled upon one of those big-hits compilations [online] … and the main voice that was speaking was Ray,” Kallaste said of Lewis, the team’s former star linebacker. “I guess I just sort of connected his voice to the game.”
“Ray,” as most of the fan base calls him, drew another group of supporters. In Canada, Gordon had just started playing football and sought to model his game after Lewis’.
“He was inspiring,” Gordon said. “Especially me being a younger player and wanting to play, he was different off the field than when he was on the field. He was a monster on the field. I took his energy and put it in my own game.”
Across the Atlantic Ocean, Kallaste, 20, also has started to play American football. He plays on the only team in Estonia, in the Finnish League.
Keeping up
With the internet, finding Ravens games is a nonissue for most fans. They can stream the games on NFL Game Pass wherever they are.
But for some, following the Ravens presents logistical problems because of the time difference. For example, the 1 p.m. Sunday games in the U.S. start at 5 a.m. on Mondays in Australia, making it difficult for Coghlan to watch live. He and his friends avoid all media every Monday, then gather to watch the recorded games in the evening.
Sometimes, though, you just have to watch live. The Super Bowl is broadcast on national TV in Australia, and many bars show the game. Fans throughout the country take the day off and watch the game at the bar — at 10:30 on Monday morning.
In Estonia, Kallaste is just seven hours ahead, so the 1 p.m. games aren’t a bother for him. When the Ravens play in prime time, it pushes his bedtime back — but not by enough to keep him from watching.
Of course, in Estonia, Kallaste is part of a small minority of people who follow, like or even pay attention to football. Barely any of his friends outside his club football team know much about the sport.
Meanwhile, in Saskatchewan, conversations about the NHL’s Toronto Maple Leafs or the Canadian Football League’s hometown Roughriders are more common. Pyette finds outlets for his NFL interest: He follows the Philadelphia Eagles just so he can talk football with his cousin, an Eagles fan.
Beyond that, many fans turn to the internet to discuss the team with others like them. Gordon, in Ontario, established the Facebook group Ravens Nation North, which has picked up 104 members in 16 months.
“It gives you more passion for the team,” Gordon said.
Gordon thought of the idea last year. He used to work at the New Era headware store in Toronto, the province’s capital, and tried to convert customers to football fans. Back then, the biggest fan club in Toronto was the Cleveland Browns Backers’ Facebook group, so Gordon started his group to create a rivalry.
The community has grown in the past year. Gordon advertises it on other internet forums, and last season, when he came to Baltimore for a game, he met a fan from Newfoundland who recruited more.
The Facebook page displays almost constant discussion about the team.
“Most people in the group, I haven’t even met, though we talk like we’re family,” Gordon said. “It’s so strange.”
Baltimore-bound
Like many diehards in Baltimore, the international fans reached for this story have watched just about every Ravens game of the past 10 years. But nothing, in Gordon’s mind, compares to watching at M&T Bank Stadium. He has been to at least one game each of the past three seasons.
“The people in Baltimore, when I traveled to Baltimore for my first time ever, I feel like the people in Maryland made me even more of a fan of the Baltimore Ravens, because everyone was so welcoming,” Gordon said. “I have never had an experience like that going over to the States.”
He walks around with a Canadian flag, and fans ask him to join their tailgates.
He’ll return in October for the game against the Oakland Raiders, but this time, it’ll be a bigger party. Gordon has recruited at least 10 members from the Facebook group to fly down to Baltimore for the game. They plan to stay together at the Baltimore Marriott Inner Harbor by Camden Yards.
Gordon never has met some of his future companions. They’ll reunite with other fans they haven’t seen in a year, savoring an experience they can’t find at home.
For other fans outside the country, making the trip remains a pipe dream. It’s too far from Coghlan in Australia, too expensive from the middle of Canada for Pyette.
They don’t know when, or whether, they’ll ever make the trek to Baltimore for a Ravens game. If they do, it’ll be another memory worth keeping.