I'm a fan. Sue me.

If you've ever spent a lot of time at the Missourian sports desk, you know there are a few rules drilled into a writer's head.

Most of them are fairly simple and easy to follow, rules like "Team is an it" or "No hugging at the sports desk". There is one rule, however, which I have trouble following, one I have voiced by displeasure about.

No fans at the sports desk.

Yeah, I know that sports writers are supposed to be objective and not let their rooting biases get in the way of coverage. I understand and agree with that. When I cover events, I don't cheer for a team to win, I cheer for the best story. That objectivity is what makes our coverage worth paying for and differentiates us from bloggers and Bill Simmons. But when Greg Bowers tells us that we shouldn't be fans of any sports team, whether we cover it or not...

I can't help but disagree.

If I were a fan of MU sports, that would obviously be a problem. When the basketball Tigers won games this year, I interviewed them with a bland disposition. And when they lost, I used the exact same disposition. If they, or anyone around them, cared to notice, I would hope they would say Sam and I covered the team objectively. I rarely wore any black or gold. Heck, my collection of MU shirts has been relegated to undershirt or "Oh my God it's laundry day and I have nothing else to wear" status.

I would hope that nobody, especially my editor, would think I am a fan of MU basketball. Any and all pro-MU leanings I may have had were muted this past season. Partly because of some of the stress caused by covering the team, but mostly because I made sure to act professionally and objectively at all times.

However, I don't see what the problem is if I openly cheer for the Chicago Cubs to win. They aren't one of the teams the Missourian covers, nor are they even in a league the paper covers. The same thing goes for the Bears, Bulls and to a lesser-degree the Blackhawks. It's not as if my coverage of the MU men's basketball team was ever compromised by my love of the Cubs. (That's not exactly true. When I got a text message during a November MU game that Alfonso Soriano signed with the Cubs, I think I blacked out for at least five minutes.) If anything, talking sports with some of the players was a good way to get to know them better, and for them to see me in a way other than a guy with a recorder and notebook.

But more importantly, it's the passion of being a fan that made me want to be a sports writer. I love being a part of a good debate with somebody who knows as much as I do and can defend their points. Every day it seems I get into some Cubs-Cardinals debate with my writing partner Sam. We both know a ton about both teams and love ripping each other on rather minor statements. Yes, when I said Alfonso Soriano could be a five-tool player this season I deserved to get made fun of. But when Sam said on Wednesday that Tony La Russa was the smartest manager in baseball I let him have it. And, by the way, I think the events of the last couple days have probably proved Sam wrong about La Russa's intelligence.

It's that love of sports that continues to drive me to work as hard as I occasionally do. I like hearing a player explain why he didn't call that time-out or why his coach put him in that position to fail. And it's a curiosity that I don't think some robot could have. Sports aren't like politics or anything "serious" where every person holds a stake in what is going on. I know that in some way, the things Matt Harris or my cousin Marc currently report on have an affect on me. But those same things are drier and more academic, things that aren't nearly as exciting as a buzzer-beating 3-pointer by Gilbert Arenas or a perfectly-executed free kick by Cristiano Ronaldo.

If I am forced to stop being a fan of my teams, I will gradually lose that passion for the rest of sports. See, it's my love of the Cubs that inspired me to become more of a fan of baseball. Because of them, I like knowing what is going on in the rest of the National League. Same goes for all the other teams I mentioned and their respective leagues.

Sportswriting is a tough business, one that a lot of people would like to get into. But many of them don't really know what it truly takes to be professional. Many of those charlatans find a way to get into the lower rungs of the business, but realize their skills aren't adequate to stay in it. At this point I think my skills are more than adequate. One of those skills is the ability to turn off that fandom, so to speak. I have seen reporters and other people in press boxes cheer. It makes me nauseous and makes their newspaper look amateurish.

Any good sportswriter, at heart, is a fan. But that same sportswriter also knows they have to turn that side of themselves off and view the games they cover objectively. Telling a sportswriter not to be a fan is not trusting their professionalism. More importantly, it's taking away the reason they got into the business.