Real sports folks can appreciate the skills of most any sport. One can be as passionate about NFL as it is about Soccer, Rugby, Basketball, Surfing, or any other sport.
Yeah the good part about athletic displays of prowess are that you really don't need to know anything about the sport surrounding the display to be able to say "damn that was impressive". Which is what keeps me watching sports I generally don't like, cause you never know when something amazing is going to happen.