sports, technically

Oct 8, 2020

In late April, I was in withdrawals without sports.  They were gone with no clear idea when they might return.  Their sudden absence and subsequent mystery of their return threw my understanding of time, relative to the seasons, into chaos.  Sure, existing in a reduced sphere of influence while the world was in pandemic isolation likely contributed.  Days, a full week, would pass before my squinted eyes might gaze upon the sun.  But the changing of seasons are directly tied to the introduction or completion of sport, for many.  I soon found myself watching prime time game shows (and really enjoying them) in order for a competitive fix.  Alec Baldwin hosting Match Game was “can’t miss” television.  Fortunately, unlike most of you, there were a number of milestones occurring for my new wife and I over the summer to keep my mind busy.  But spring never seemed to begin without baseball’s Opening Day.  Summer too, appeared without merriment as the NBA Finals hadn’t come to a close in the usual window of muggy nights with melting ice cream.  Eventually, plans for each sport’s return to action began to drip out and excitement for athletics, regardless of its packaging, began to swell again.  The NBA constructed a brilliantly successful “bubble”.  MLB put cardboard cutouts in the stands as some kind of odd acknowledgment of the glazed eye gaze casual fans usually demonstrate by the third inning.  And football, both college and pro, decided they’d let some fans in, but not all.  It’s football and we’re in America.  The only authority wears stripes.

Now, since we’ve had a chance to experience everything from a strict bubble to fewer fans in stands, I’m dissatisfied with all of it (with varying degrees of severity). Thankfully, college football started relatively close to its usual schedule, allowing me to begin the adulation of autumn...but something is missing, as it is from all sports that have since restarted or begun their seasons.  Despite efforts to supplement the absence of attending fans, the games are hollow.

It’s okay to acknowledge it.  Go ahead.  You’re not being greedy or taking the Sport Lord’s name in vain.  Fans matter.  They’re the difference between a football game and a scrimmage.  They’re the choir to our sports worship, a queue for heightening drama.  For the attending enthusiast, it’s the feeling of being someplace sacred in the masses of those whose passion you share.  The moment you walk through the gates, you’re embraced by history and the anticipation of seeing something historical.  You become a part of the team’s fibrous tissue, upon which every player and fan before you is built.  For the majority of fans watching on TV, crowd applause or disdain is an extension of the players’ emotions exhibited before us.  The crowd’s voices scream in celebration or wail at the overwhelmingly objective injustices.  For the viewer at home, the stands are a part of the show.  They are this night’s, week’s, season’s judges and jury.  Their verdict is absolute, as they are us (would that we could only afford the fucking tickets).

Credit where credit’s due, all major sports have done a pretty great job of filtering in fake crowd noise and timing it in such a way that gives the illusion of a fully packed stadium.  But in the big moments, a homer stealing grab by a center fielder or a last second touchdown, the absence of the local masses is as noticeable as an asshole on your eyelid.  Professional highlights are reduced to the late night accountant finally making that shot into the trash can in a darkened office.  The security cameras technically caught it.  But was anyone watching?

Is all this preferable to the absolute absence of sports?  Of course, but think a little deeper.  Something’s missing in all of it.  The Finals don’t feel like the Finals, nor do the baseball playoffs or Saturdays in Gainesville.  And it’s ok to admit that and not sound ungrateful.  Every one of us is looking for something that looks somewhat similar to February of this year.  Every single one of us wants this pandemic to be over and, some of us, decided that it is in fact “over” because they’re bored with it.  The stubbornness and impatience of our collective culture perpetuates this waking nightmare and nothing short of a vaccine delivered with the fluoride in our water will stop it.  Dan LeBatard has said, in regards to sports, that we’re a country who “got its dessert without having to finish its dinner”.  In that, we didn’t practice the measures required to bring back sports safely but we got them anyway, and he’s right.  But it’s also understandable to look upon this dessert, with its saccharine sugar replacement and keto friendly crust, with disappointment and ask to finish the entree.

Shipp