Appraisal and coping with sport identity and associated threats: exploring Chinese fans reactions to ‘little fresh meat’ in NBA advertisements

Research question Contextualized in Chinese fans’ backlash of NBA advertisements’ featuring Xukun Cai, an effeminate idol belonging to the stigmatized ‘little fresh meat’ group, this study explored the occurrence of multiple identity threats of sport fans and coping strategies.Research methods 2289 comments were collected from the NBA fan forum for thematic content analysis.Results and findings This study identified two identities under threat. Fans appraised Cai as a threat to NBA identity due to his lack of basketball skills, NBA involvement and NBA-equivalent stardom, and a threat to their masculinity due to the idol's and his fan group’s lack of masculinity. Fans used outgroup derogation, ingroup criticism, social support and humour to cope with the threat.Implications This study was the first to explore a threat to multiple identities of sport fans, which may guide future studies on the interconnected nature of sport identity and other identities. This study revealed that sport identity plays a buffer role on sport entities in undesirable conditions. To minimize the occurrence of multiple identity threats to fans, marketers may need to get more involvement in fans community to know about how their brand is perceived when developing marketing communication.