Someone Actually Spent Thousands On eBay To Get A Disgruntled Knicks Fan To Root For The Lakers

If you’re a serious sports fan, then you understand one of your key duties as a parent is to indoctrinate your child to like your team(s) of choice from an early age.

In doing so, you ensure there’s something that you and your kid can bond over a shared interest at a fairly young age and (more importantly) make sure you don’t have to deal with sharing a house with someone who roots for a team 1,000 miles away because they decided they had cool looking jerseys as a four-year-old.

Forcing your kid to like the same team as you allows the sporting world to function as intended, as I’d have a hard time believing anyone would willingly root for the teams that allow North America’s paper bag industry to thrive.

Last week, we learned about the sad, sad case of Evan Perlmutter, a lifelong New York Knicks fan who recently decided to put his fandom on eBay after realizing the team had caused him too much mental anguish over the first 33 years of his life.

As a result, Perlmutter decided it was time to auction off his loyalty to a more deserving team.

In the listing, he said he would put any money he received to good use by using it to buy jerseys, go to games, pay to stream them, and put some cash on the line at a sportsbook to prove how invested he is.

When I came across the auction last week, the top bid was $2,750, which I figured had to be a joke.

However, it turns out at least one person was very serious, and when the bidding closed, the Los Angeles Lakers found themselves one fan richer thanks to a guy who was willing to spend $3,500 to add another supporter to the fanbase.

According to Bleacher Report, the winning bid was placed by James Riedel, a 23-year-old who apparently makes enough money on YouTube to drop $3,500 on something like this.

He explained his reasoning, saying:

“I am a lifelong LeBron James fan, and a Lakers fan of a month and a half. I originally thought about turning Evan into a Nets fan for the torment, but I feel like he should be able to root for the King before he retires.”

He said he plans to accompany Perlmutter to games and document the experience, which will hopefully include the St. Patrick’s Day matchup between the Lakers and the Knicks after the abandoned organization released a statement of its own:

“We’re sure our millions of loyal Knicks fans won’t mind losing this attention-grabbing gentleman,” a statement given to Bleacher Report by a team spokesperson read. “We remain focused on the upcoming season—with a hard-working team that is proud to represent New York and its dedicated fans.”

This should be fun.