AEE 2304: How to Use Sports Pride to Connect in English
19:38 Share

This is an All Ears English podcast, episode 2304. How to use sports pride to connect in English.

Welcome to the All Ears English podcast, downloaded more than 200 million times. Are you feeling stuck with your English? We'll show you how to become fearless and fluent by focusing on connection, not perfection. With your American hosts, Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer, and Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl, coming to you from Colorado.

Colorado, and New York City, USA. And to get your transcripts delivered by email every week, go to allearsenglish.com/subscribe. Do you have a favorite sports team? Today, find out how native English speakers use one key phrase to say just how much they love their team and learn how to respond and connect over team pride.

This podcast is sponsored by Indeed. When you're hiring, it feels amazing to finally close out a job search. But what if you could get rid of a search and just match? You can with Indeed.

In my experience, hiring isn't easy, but you can make your chances of success much higher if you have the right tool. Leveraging over 140 million qualifications and preferences every day, Indeed's matching engine is constantly learning from your preferences. So the more you use Indeed, the better it gets. Join more than 3.5 million businesses worldwide that use Indeed to hire great talent fast.

And listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at Indeed.com slash A-E-E. Just go to Indeed.com slash A-E-E right now and support our show by saying that you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com slash A-E-E. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? You need Indeed.

Hello, Michelle. How are you doing? I'm good. How are you, Lindsay? Absolutely fantastic. Michelle, do you know anyone who is a huge sports fan?

I know many people who are huge sports fans. I have friends who are huge sport fans. My nephew has turned into quite a huge sports fan. Is that right? Yes, he plays a lot. Number one, he plays sports. He's very athletic, which means that he's not from my family. But number two, he really, he knows a lot about sports. Yeah. Yeah, but I was actually...

Recently, have you ever had this experience where you're friends with someone who is a huge sports fan and you're spending time with them and they're keep on checking the game? Yeah, sure. Yes. Yeah. So I have friends who are like that, who they'll be sitting there watching the game and...

I have even done that once before. I remember last Mother's Day, there was a big Knicks game and I was just sitting watching the TV, but I'm normally not like that. Yeah, it can happen. And this is timely because we're in the middle of football season, which is the most like sports. I think there are just it's such a fanatic sport in America, in the United States of America. People are just so into their football.

And people just go crazy, especially if you went to a big university where you had a college team. You're going to be familiar with this term and we're going to get into it today. So I am excited to talk about what, Michelle, today? Well, we're going to talk about how to share that you're a huge fan of a team or a school, mostly those things. So this expression is going to be a...

This is a fun... It's kind of a gross sounding expression. It sounds a little disturbing, but it's not meant in this way. So the expression is, I bleed color and color, basically. Yeah.

So you're, you, when me and we are taught, we are basically saying I bleed these teams colors, this school's colors. And what does that mean? Lindsay? What, what does, when we say I bleed these colors, what does that mean? We'll just put it into context right away. So I think that my high school was actually sports were a bigger deal than my college. Cause I went to a small college in Virginia and, you know, but in high school we had the high school football games and we were orange and black.

Right. So we're the blackbirds. And you say I bleed orange and black. Right. With a grimacing look on your face like you're a big fan. Right. You fully feel your team. You believe in your team. You stand for your team. OK. Right. So there is so much so that it's in your blood. It's who you are. Yeah.

So yeah, if you were to get a cut, the idea is that those are the colors that would come out because it's so true to who you are. And what about you, Michelle? Knicks fan? What colors are the Knicks? Blue and orange? No. Blue and orange. Yep. Blue and orange.

And actually my high school was also blue and orange. So I always felt good about that. Um, so I could say I bleed orange and blue or I bleed blue and orange, but you can be a Denver Broncos fan too, because I'm pretty sure the Denver Broncos also do orange and blue. Yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. I mean,

So, Lindsay, but when would something like this come up? I mean, why? I mean, not out of nowhere. You're going to say, I bleed orange and blue. When would this come up? This is all about not being tone deaf, about knowing who you're around. Right. This is about when you're around, you're a fanatic, you're a big fan and you're around other big fans. This is when you would say this. Right. You might say, I bleed orange and blue and then flex your muscles and, you know,

And whatever, go tailgate with people. Right. So this is not about saying this in a crazy way at work on Monday. If people, other people don't feel the same way. This is about who you're around in the moment.

Right, right, right. Exactly. So, you know, it's just connecting with someone over sports. And you know what? It doesn't have to be professional sports. It could be college sports. It could also... College sports. Sorry, I was just gonna say, I think in the US, college sports are kind of people might prefer college football over...

pro football. A lot of people. It's just a little more interesting, I guess. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. So a lot of people really, really, really follow college sports. I mean, when I said my friend was watching the game the other day, he was watching his college's football game. Yes. So people really, really get into it over college sports. Absolutely. Or it could...

If it's not about sports necessarily, it could just be your school in general. Maybe all your family went to this one university. So it could be a place you're fond of, like your college, your university. It doesn't have to be about a sports team. It's more about showing pride for something.

Totally. That's a really good point. And in that case, maybe it's other things you might say, like go Blackbirds or for my high school, or I know for people that went to Notre Dame, they say like Irish or something like that. Right. I don't know exactly what they say, but anyways, there are certain code words, expressions that you might say to other fans. And especially if you're, if your, your family is kind of a legacy at that school, it's going to be a big deal in your family. If that's the kind of setup that,

for education. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah, absolutely. So guys, we also want to take this time to thank those of you who have reviewed us because we appreciate you so much. So Lindsay wants to give a shout out to some listeners here today. I do. I would love to, I want to say thank you to Tunke Gumas from Turkey who left us a five star review.

And Ivana HC from the US also left us a five-star review. And Ivana says, I have to say the new approach of releasing series on specific topics like the Olympics and politics is awesome. I love these topics and they've helped me connect more deeply. Oh,

Oh, that's great. Love that. That's great. Yeah. So special thank you to Tunke and Ivana. And if you want to hear your name announced on the show, guys, go and leave us a review wherever you listen, whether it's in the podcast, Spotify, Apple, or in the iOS Android app. Leave us a review. Yeah. Yes.

Absolutely. Yes. Thank you so much. I'm so glad you like these those series. And speaking of this isn't a series, but we have been just a couple episodes, episode 2301. We answered a listener question who was asking more for sports content.

questions to talk about sports in English. So we did episode 2301, Rookie Mistakes in English, and it's not necessarily a series, but we wanted to do another sports type episode today. So you'll start to notice we're going to potentially be doing a little bit more sports related topics just because to help this listener out, we're going to, and this is such a good connection topic. So listen to that episode if you haven't yet.

I love it. I'm so glad that our listeners are loving the show. So, Michelle, let's dive into some examples because that's how we show that real English. Yeah. OK, here we go. I can't miss the game. It's my alma mater. I bleed red and yellow. I'm so glad you like the sweatshirt. I got you. I know you bleed purple and yellow, so I couldn't resist. Sorry, that's not a role play. It was two separate. Oh, I'm clearly not listening to you.

You bleed red and yellow, not purple and yellow. Yeah, exactly. So yeah, and the first one I'm saying it's so what is an alma mater? Lindsay is all the modern today. Important keyword. So this just means where you got your university degree. I'd say your bachelor's degree. I don't think you would say that about your master's, right? Not really. Or would you? I

I don't know. I think so. I mean, you could say it about both then. Yeah, I think so. I mean, I have. So, okay, sure. Why not? Yeah. So wherever you studied, where you went to school. Okay. Yeah. Yep. Exactly. And then in the second example, you said, I'm so glad you got like the sweatshirt. I know you bleed purple and yellow, so I couldn't resist. So what does that mean? And that's a

fun episode idea when somebody says, oh, I couldn't resist. It's a good one. Yeah. So again, guys, the mistake I made here, I thought this was a connected conversation. These are just two separate comments, right? So what I said, I'm so glad you like the sweatshirt. I know you believe purple and yellow. So basically, I probably just got you

a logo sweatshirt of your school, which is a different school, different logo colors, right? Purple and yellow. - Yep, exactly. I mean, Lindsay, do you ever wear gear supporting sports teams or your alma mater? Do you have any of that? - I guess when I went to school, I had like my school t-shirt,

Not a ton of that, actually, unless I'm gifted something and it's a free t-shirt. I never turn down free t-shirts. Of course. But no, I don't wear a lot of sports stuff. What about you? Knicks all the way? Yeah, I do have Knicks stuff. And now that we've moved a little bit, we're starting to get into some Eagles sports gear. Philadelphia Eagles?

Also, just yesterday I picked up, well, we got it delivered. It was because now my son is in elementary school and they had a fundraiser selling gear for the school. So I got a hoodie for this, you know, supporting the school. So it can even be, I mean, I don't know that I would say about my son's elementary school that I bleed those colors. Yeah.

Yeah, that's strong. Yeah. Right. But you know, just a way to, yeah, no, not that quite strong. I think it's nice.

But yeah, just getting this gear can be fun. And I have Nick's stuff. Dan actually just got shoes with Nick's colors. So it was just fun to get in the spirit. Well, I think there is something there. Like humans want to show that they're part of it. It's an identity. We want to show our identity. So there is a Nick's fan, which says a lot about you. You're from New York.

Right. You're passionate, maybe. Or any school organization, we want to show that identity sometimes. Right. Not all the time, because sometimes we want to differentiate and not show it. Right. But yeah. So super interesting the way humans think. Yes, definitely.

When it comes to your English conversation skills, do you feel like you have the basics of grammar and vocabulary, but you're not sure how to express nuance or abstract concepts? These are core pieces of human connection and essential to your English success in business and life.

And these are only part of what you learn in our new C1 English fluency course. Be one of the very first to join the course. It's open now. Save up to $100 off the normal price and get our bonus course, Advanced Listening with Multiple Speakers, a $99 value for free this week only. Go to allearsenglish.com slash C1.

That's allairsenglish.com slash letter C number one. And this offer ends November 17th at midnight. All right, Michelle. So there are other ways that we can say that we have pride for a team, a place, a school, a club, right? For example, yeah, I'm a lifelong something fan. Like I'm a lifelong Yankees fan. Right.

Right. Yeah. Or you could be more just descriptive. I've been a blank fan since blank. So I've been a fan of the Knicks since I was a little kid. Right. And often these teams do go back to childhood for us, right? Yeah. It associates it with going to games with our parents and things. So it's a big deal. It's a big part of our identity. I have a ton of X pride. I have a ton of Eagles pride. And of course,

course i can imagine our listeners will apply this to their own sports i'm imagining soccer big deal globally much bigger deal globally than it is here in the us right so you could talk about your soccer team this way using these expressions yeah absolutely absolutely so this is huge for connection it is about your identity and especially

like let's say your team is doing well or there's a big game coming up, you might even see if you live in the area where that team plays, you're going to see other people wearing their sports gear that shows their pride for that team. And so it can be a source of connection there as well. And then, you know, oh, oh, my gosh, did you watch the game last night? Or people might even just say if they see what you're wearing. I mean, I mean, sometimes if I see somebody with a Knicks shirt, I might just go to go Knicks. Right.

And you feel that connection. So it's just fun. Or even college, you know, I, I living in Denver, I hear a lot of go buffs and buffs are the mascot of Colorado university, like Boulder, you know, university of Colorado Boulder, who, by the way, right now, Dion Sanders is their coach, you know, Dion Sanders, the football player. I do know that.

Yeah. So they brought in a pro player, which has been interesting. So go Buffs, right? I hear people saying that even now, people in their 40s saying that to each other who may have both gone to Colorado University. So yeah, interesting. Yeah. Sports can really connect people together. Absolutely. So...

Not a bad thing to learn about sports, know about it, even if it's not necessarily your thing. You know, you don't need to become a huge sports fan, but it's good to know about these things. Yeah, it's kind of nice when you can talk about anything with anyone. Honestly, just have a little bit of basic knowledge of most things. It can go a long way for connection.

Okay. Absolutely. Yes. Let's do a role play. All right. So we are strangers and we're sitting next to each other at a Knicks game, of course. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. Here we go. Oh, your jersey is so awesome. That's really vintage.

Oh, thanks. I bleed blue and orange, so I have so much gear. Oh, same. I've been a Knicks fan since the 90s. Oh, that's the best. I'm a lifelong fan for sure. I have a ton of Knicks pride. Let's get that championship. For sure. Okay.

All right. So here you use the key phrase of the episode. I bleed blue and orange. Again, you're saying you're just a big Knicks fan, right? And then you're being very descriptive. I have been a Knicks fan since the 90s. And then I said, I'm a lifelong fan. You said, I'm a lifelong fan for sure. Yes.

Yeah. And then you said I have a ton of Knicks pride. Nice. Nice. Yeah. I guess if I were going to be a fan of any team, it would probably be Boston Red Sox, but I just like to go for the beer and the hot dogs. That's okay. I don't care about the game. That's okay. But that's good. I mean, you can still, I don't think

don't think you have to be a huge huge fan of the sport to care about the team or to like the experience it's not that you need to know sometimes Dan will make fun of me if I'm trying to say I'm a fan of a team and he'll say name three players on that team he can't either like but yeah and and we or we'll make up names or something right yeah for sure

But it's just fun to, it's just fun, especially, you know, if that team is in the playoffs or has a big game, it can be kind of fun to, to just be a part of the, the team spirit. Yeah. And I think I would encourage our listeners guys go to these games. If you can, if you can get tickets, because there's nothing like that feeling in the summer when you're in a baseball stadium and someone cracks the bat, that sound of the bat cracking and you get an out goes into the stand and

And like the momentum, everyone stands up. It's the coolest feeling. It's almost like you get like a wave of energy up your whole body. It's very cool. It's very cool. So have those experiences as much as you can and connect at home when you're watching these games to talk about it the next day at a party. Right. This is a connection right here. Yes, absolutely. And guys, we did do speaking of series, we did do a whole series on basketball. So definitely head on over. And I'm not listening to them all out.

But part one is basketball in English part one, vocabulary for the game. So lots of stuff for you guys to learn about sports here, basketball,

basketball, talking about being a big fan and yeah. Anything else you want to add, Lindsay? Yeah. I mean, the stuff of connection is right here in front of us, right? We don't need to think of these brilliant ideas to connect. All we have to do is think about who's in front of us. What do they care about? Be able to talk about it and genuinely be interested. That's connection right there. Right. Absolutely. Okay. Thank you so much, Lindsay, for talking about this with me today and guys have a good day.

All right. Take care, Michelle. Bye. Bye. Thanks for listening to All Ears English. Would you like to know your English level? Take our two-minute quiz. Go to allearsenglish.com forward slash fluency score. And if you believe in connection, not perfection, then hit subscribe now to make sure you don't miss anything. See you next time.

Full plates, full hearts.

Only at Raley's and Nob Hill.