COLUMN: It’s not crazy, it’s sports
It is a question I’ve been asked throughout my life. “Why do you care about sports? You’re a girl.”
There are a couple of reasons why it is a most difficult question. For one, it’s like asking someone why they like a specific food. At some point you have to say “I just do.” The second reason is: the list keeps growing; with each game I add something new to the list.
Call me competitive, but I love when there is an opportunity to win — card games, job interviews and most of all sports. I hate to lose, and I hate when my teams lose. I love the thrill of the victory and even the agony of defeat. Both are such raw emotions.
I love baseball. I love how a player can be so hot one year and the next fall is moved to the back burner. Cleveland Indians pitcher Ubaldo Jimenez was a Cy Young front-runner for much of the 2010 season with the Colorado Rockies. He had a 19-8 record last season but this year fell to a 6-9 and was traded halfway through the season.
This rule goes the other way as well. It is not uncommon for an unknown player to blossom into a star. In 1998, the University of Michigan started a quarterback that was No. 7 on their depth chart the year before. The quarterback went on to win three out of four Super Bowls he played in for the New England Patriots.
Yes, Tom Brady was No. 7 on the depth chart during his sophomore year of college. He now has the fifth-highest career passing rating of all time. Good choice Michigan.
Sports are the Gorilla Glue of life. What else did as much to bring a devastated New Orleans back to life as the 2010 New Orleans Saints Super Bowl victory? People may still be without shelter, but they danced in the streets with the rest of the world when the Saints defeated the Indianapolis Colts.
So what if no one believed the underdog Saints didn’t appear to stand a chance against Peyton Manning’s powerhouse? I think even Colts fans secretly wanted New Orleans to win.
Sports make people feel better. Like the people of New Orleans desperate for good news, no matter how big or small our problems are, everything disappears come game time.
The technical term for this is “basking in reflected glory.” This means people feel successful by association, like when your dad was always just as happy as you were when you hit that homer in Little League.
Whether it’s a coincidence or not, it is a fact that on Feb. 22, 1980, the day United States hockey beat Russia (think “Miracle”), the suicide rate was lower than all other February 22’s from 1972 to 1989.
It’s this kind of shared identity that makes sports fans so avid, and the rivalries so heated. It’s also important to note that success isn’t necessarily a prerequisite for sports fandom. Most fans will claim they are die-hards, but I’m willing to argue that no one is more die-hard than a Chicago Cubs fan.
The Cubs are far from successful but their fans are the most loyal in all of Major League Baseball. I had a friend reveal to me once how the Cubs gave him hope in the most difficult year of his life. He admits they aren’t the best team in the league, but during that year he threw himself into the franchise and became one of the team’s biggest fans. The team was his outlet. Being a fan was more important than winning.
Then there’s the inspiration factor surrounding sports. Fans inspire athletes to success, and athletes inspire fans in everyday life.
I’ll never forget the Western Oregon University softball player who hit a 3-run homer for the win, but tore her ACL rounding first base. She was given a choice — give up her homerun for a single and a pinch runner, or have her teammates help her off the field and be called out.
Instead, members of the opposing team picked her up and carried her around the bases gently touching her foot to each bag. It didn’t matter how the act resulted in an elimination loss because the players did the right thing.
Stories like this are so common in sports and, all too often, get overshadowed by bad things. They keep me going. They are the reasons why I love sports.
— Meredith Kinney is a junior majoring in broadcast journalism. She loves hockey and lacrosse. Her goal is to be a big-shot sideline reporter.