How hard should you take your team's loss? | Opinion

After the Kansas City Chiefs/Buffalo Bills NFL playoff game a couple of weeks ago the TV cameras captured a man who appeared to be in his 40s or 50s sobbing uncontrollably following the Bills’ loss.

This guy was presumably a member of the Buffalo fan base known as the “Bills Mafia.” I felt for him but kind of hoped the other “made” members of the family chastised him for breaking sports omerta. Fans shouldn’t cry after their team loses. Curse the refs, drink too many Labatt’s, put your fist through drywall, OK. But cry? It seems, well, unseemly.

For the record, the following Sunday, TV cameras also showed a woman in a Detroit Lions jersey suffering in an emotional squall after the San Francisco 49ers took her team out of Super Bowl contention. But that might have been more about her thinking she had to walk a block in downtown San Francisco to get to her hotel room.

And keep this gem in mind: In early January College Football Playoff officials contacted the FBI over threats to employees and the CFP selection committee when Florida State University was left out of the championship playoffs. Death threats? Really? I can only hope it was Ohio State fans testing the Fed’s threat response in fear of another Michigan national title.

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Weeping? Death threats? How did it come to this? There have always been devout and diehard sports fans who spend billions on hats and T-shirts and paint their faces like they’re extras in "Braveheart," but it seems we’re reaching new levels of extreme. As a nation, we’re all becoming Philadelphia Eagles fans.

More than a decade ago Psychology Today published a column using two phrases describing zealous sports fans. It appears to only have intensified.

There was BIRGing, that is “Basking in Reflected Glory.” Your team wins and you feel better because somehow as a fan you are partly responsible for the victory. Chiefs’ quarterback Patrick Mahomes didn’t act alone in his wins. You came off the bench assisted with your vibes. And you might as well be sitting between Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift on their weekly date following a Chiefs victory.

But a loss?

Well, that’s called CORFing. That stands for “Cut Off Reflected Failure." You curse that Mahomes guy for his dumb insurance commercials. And Kelce is dating Yoko Ono 2.0. “Swift” becomes a pejorative verb.

The article goes on to note “Needless to say, alcohol helps foster the disinhibition effect.” Yeah, duh.

There are other elements that have changed how many of us react to sports these days.

One is sports commentary. It’s 24/7, seven days a week, of opinionating on our TV, computers and our phones. There’s more analysis of games than there was for D-Day.

Mark Moses, a popular sports talk show host based in Melbourne and program director for Cumulus Media, wasted little time after San Francisco’s victory over Detroit with a live Facebook post.  “I don’t know why you’d be a Detroit Lions fan. I have no idea. It has been 32 years of ugly football.” Knowing Detroit folks, Mark probably isn’t getting a key to the Motor City anytime soon but might find one protruding from his body if he ever visits.

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But the biggest new sports wrinkle must be betting. It’s legal in more places these days and while it may make the game more interesting, it can have devasting impacts. Wagering a few bucks with your co-worker is one thing. Laying down $1,000 to $5,000 on a game could mean lapsing on your mortgage payment or buying your children’s shoes.

I asked the folks at Lifetime Counselor Center in Cocoa about the best way super fans can keep their emotions in check for the upcoming Super Bowl. Here were some of their tips:

• During the game, stay off phones and other devices, so as to not add fuel to the fire, so to speak.

• Remain mindful of your physiological responses to what is happening during the game (Is your blood pressure going up? Are you yelling? Is your heart pounding?).

• During halftime, take a break. Go for a walk. Physical activity can help to ground you and calm you.

Here’s probably the most important tip from the center: Know that losing activates the same region of the brain that physical pain does. Monitor your stress level. Be aware of changes and elevation of your stress level. Know where your “breaking point” is and before reaching this point, use a healthy behavior to combat getting to that point.

Yes. It’s only a game and if your team loses, consider what’s happening in other parts of the world. Really, is an overreaction worth a call to your handyman to repair the drywall in your kitchen, or having to replace the screen on your plasma TV?

Wayne T. Price is director of communications at the Space Coast Health Foundation and a former staffer at FLORIDA TODAY.

This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Tips on staying mentally healthy during Super Bowl