&gt; thinking that something is capable of supernatural feats is not required for something to become a religion.<p>I basically agree, but I think the concept of &quot;religion&quot; invokes a lot of correlated things, and belief in the supernatural is one of the main ones. I expect most religions to differ from the &#x27;prototypical&#x27; religion in a few ways, but I think sports differs in lots of ways.<p>(edit: or perhaps better, &quot;beliefs about the supernatural&quot;. Religions say something specific. Atheists believe something specific. Sports teams make no claims one way or the other.)<p>&gt; non-believers that believe so strongly in the non-existence of anything they haven&#x27;t personally seen that they will hijack any thread that is remotely near using any religious word.<p>This seems like another example. I&#x27;ve seen that behavior from atheists and from religious people. I haven&#x27;t seen it from sports fans.<p>People who dislike sports, on the other hand...