I’ve had an epiphany thanks to the recently-completed World Cup soccer tournament.
I am actively repelled by professional sports.
That’s ironic, since whatever attractive characteristics I possess can be traced to my involvement with team sports. Childhood participation in baseball, football, and basketball kept me physically fit and helped me develop social skills.
In my 20’s I coached multiple high school teams, and later made a modest living doing radio play-by-play for minor league baseball and hockey clubs. On road trips I carried sneakers so I could play pickup basketball wherever I’d find a playground or a YMCA. My involvement with athletics kept me surrounded with positive, motivated, kind people, many of whom became lifelong friends.
So why the disenchantment with something which was for decades an integral part of my life?
Even experienced adolescents grow up sooner or later, and as I approached nominal maturity I began noticing that while actively participating or coaching I hated losing far more than I enjoyed winning. A second, far more significant realization: for me, playing any sport was far more enjoyable than watching others do so.
Sooner or later everyone’s athletic capabilities begin to decline. I was fortunate, because unlike many others I got that message without first tearing an Achilles tendon, blowing out a knee, or breaking any large bones.
But the more I watch contemporary professional sports, the less I find attractive. When I was young sluggers like Hank Aaron celebrated home runs by trotting around the bases head down, shaking hands with whoever was up next, and returning to the dugout. Jim Brown handed the ball to the referee after one of his many touchdowns, Bill Russell hustled back on defense following a made basket, and Gordie Howe skated to the bench or to center ice for the ensuing faceoff after scoring a goal. Back then overly-demonstrative self-promoting athletes were as common (and popular) as pork chops at a Bar Mitzvah.
Kids today are just doing the same thing we did: imitating their athletic idols. Only now they see preening, chest-pounding prima donnas point Heavenward as they Cadillac around the bases after home runs, diva wide receivers initiating choreographed celebrations with larger, equally attention-starved teammates after touchdowns, basketballers hanging on the rim and primal screaming after they’ve “posterized” (dunked on) an unfortunate opponent, and hockey players riding their sticks like Kentucky Derby jockeys after scoring.
But that’s small potatoes compared to soccer, where play stops for at least five minutes after a goal while the scorer’s teammates (and everyone in the stadium) react as though he’s just saved Tokyo from Godzilla. And don’t get me started on the players who feign being mortally wounded after an opponent has made contact with (or passed within three feet of) them during a match.
Sadly, I don’t see things improving. “Walk-up music” at Little League games, organized sports for pre-kindergartners, and increasing abuse of officials by irrational parents and coaches are just three signs of the ongoing sports apocalypse. And whoever decided nine-year-olds need names on the back of their jerseys should be sentenced to life without parole.
Contemporary pro sports are less about actual athletic competition than they are about generating additional revenue from corporate sponsors and wealthy patrons willing to pay the perpetually-rising costs of fandom.
My decreasing ardor isn’t coincidental; no successful business, except those selling remedies for erectile dysfunction, targets the 65-and-over demographic with their marketing efforts.
Over time my interest in professional sports has morphed from moderate to keen to obsessed to casual to disinterested to actively uninterested.
And the term for that, I believe, is evolution.
Andy YoungReturn to main page
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