People prefer predictable adversaries
I would say more than that - people can come to "love" their adversaries.
I love boxing, and I love the history of boxing. You can watch a thousand interviews, with people like Ali, or Frazier, or Tyson - and you will notice this line.
They often talk about the nightmares they have, wherein their future opponent would dethrone them, humiliate them, or even kill them. Right before the bout, they are sitting in their locker rooms, and going through the worst type of existential dread. Their knees are shaking, their stomach is turning, and they want nothing more than to run out into the hallway, and then down the street - never to be found again.
Then there is the fight itself - where you leave every ounce of yourself on the mat.
-//-
Then, when it's someone's funeral many years down the line - everybody turns into a weeping woman, and can't recompose themselves as they recount how they "loved, loved, loved" the man that passed away.
If you listen to George Foreman, it's almost like he loved Ali more than his wife and children.
Your enemy fills your life with meaning. When he's gone, all that remains is a sucking void.
He brought out the best in you, and the best years of your life are forever associated with him.
Nothing is as meaningful, as when you taught him something, or he taught you something.
