[The original post was written on: Apr 25, 2012]

Much has been said these days on MHR about being or not a "true" Broncos fan.

If you’ve never been to a game, you ain’t a true Broncos fan…
If you like (liked) Tim Tebow, you ain’t a true Broncos fan…
If you do this or do that, you ain’t a true Broncos fan…

Well dudes, I’d like to tell you that it’s all pointless. If anyone loves our franchise, he/she is a true Bronco fan regardless of his/her opinions about what’s better or worse for the team. I decided to accept the idea from our friend BroncoPH to tell how it is to be a brazilian Broncos fan who lives so far and never even visited the USA.

I’ll tell my own story.

It began in the end of the ’97 season, when I watched a couple games on ESPN Brazil (they used to broadcast a low amount of games though). I was in High School and I was 14 at that point. I barely understood the rules of the sport and I also still didn’t understand how the conferences were divided into divisions. I remember we were the Wild Cards just after the Chiefs clinched the division that year and it messed with my pride. I thought the Broncos deserved to be the first place of "the group".

Then the playoffs began, and that Super Bowl made me so happy that it’s unexplainable. I was so pleased with our victory that I knew at that very moment that I was definitely a Bronco for life. Unfortunately, I had to wait several months for the next season and it upset me a lot. I didn’t know how was the schedule of the entire offseason so it was really tough to wait.

When the ’98 season began, I already knew the basic rules and goals of the sport, so I watched all the games I could on ESPN Brazil that year. They also didn’t broadcast a lot, but it was a spectacular season as well. The biggest frustration to me came when, after the Broncos made it to the Super Bowl, the ESPN Brazil didn’t broadcast the big game! I was very pissed off and I only watched the conquest of our second ring several weeks later... in reprise. Meh!

The toughest part faced about football was being born and raised in the 'country of soccer', so I never knew any other people who even knew what football was and it’s rules. I always had to be bored or thrilled quiet alone because of the games, since I never had anyone to talk about it. It was a really really tough time to yell or to complain all by myself and alone.

In my High School senior year (2000), a friend returned from his 1 year exchange program in Chatanooga as a Titans fan. We were very young (around 16 or 17 years old), so we still didn’t understand the game well enough to have any good or deep discussions about it. He was the closest person I had to talk about the NFL though. When I made it to College in 2001, there weren’t any other people there to talk about football also. So I kept watching the games all by myself until nearly the end of the ’09 season when I found MHR. It was amazing to read some news and comments from ‘true’ Broncos fans. I felt like a 5 years old child who earned from Santa exactly what he asked for Christmas.

I spent much time just lurking the site and struggling against my English to understand it properly. It lasted until the end of the ’10 season, when I got the courage to make an account and start making a comment here or there to interact with you folks. It was during that offseason that I started posting as well. Besides having somewhat improved my English skills and learned some priceless amount of knowledge about football, I made a very good friendship with some amazing guys here. Despite never having shaked the hand of any, I consider many MHR members as a good friend for life. That’s why I occasionally mention that MHR is my orange & blue family.

I don’t know if I am a true Broncos fan, a knee-jerk, or whatever you name me. What I do know is that I love the franchise more than I love any other team in any other sport in the world. And hey, I confess I really like soccer, besides being a good S.E.Palmeiras fan. This year I accomplished to realize the project of owning a Broncos blog in portuguese, to make sure that other possible brazilian fans don’t have to suffer quiet and vibrate alone how I had to do when I was a teenager. I want to provide them access to updated news in our native language, besides a space for them all to talk about the team. It's going pretty great.

I’m used to research some numbers or post some ideas here on MHR. This is a different kind of post, so thank you everybody for reading my story. This is how I became a Denver Bronco.

GO BRONCOS!!