I just don’t get it. People spend so much time and money on team sports. I mean they really get into it. They spend thousands of dollars on season tickets. They buy sports junk like tshirts of their favorite players and little footballs all kinds of junk. Now, I can see why team sports are a little more important for schools but pros I just don’t get why people get into it. I mean who cares what team wins. Next year they will just play again and someone else will win the championship. Big Deal. Will it make “the fan” any money - no. Will “the fan” learn any new s I mean then you have the total wackos that memorize stats this is totally useless other than winning at trivia pursuit.
Anyway all this is making these sports people entirely rich because “the fans” that watch it. I know this post is probably going to piss some people off. But seriously y’all need to get a life. I mean why don’t you get off the couch and go work out or something get a hobby instead watching these people play “ball” every Sunday. What’s the point?
I mean if you are going to watch sports why not watch Supercross or surfing or movies for that matter inotherwords something entertaining.
Some people like following team sports for the same reason that people like attending concerts or the opera, or going to the movies, or reading, or dog shows, or bowling. Team sports are just another form of entertainment. The fact that you, Wildest Bill, don’t find team sports at all entertaining is relatively unimportant. I say “relatively” because if enough people share Wildest Bill’s opinion that team sports are silly then team sports will go bankrupt. But until then, for so long as enough of us find team sports entertaining and amusing, they will continue to exist, WildestBill’s opinion to the contrary notwithstanding.
Getting off the couch is certainly a good idea in any event.
At any rate, following sports isn’t a moral issue. It isn’t better to be a sports fan than not to be a sports fan. It is just a question of different strokes for different folks. It’s not wrong, it’s just different.
Nice rant, but that’s about it. And it’s probably not going to piss anyone off. Why should it? As far as goring that ox, the question pretty much bounced off that sucker’s hide.
“Watching team sports doesn’t net the watcher any money?” Neither does going to the symphony. It’s a silly argument. Most people don’t watch sports or movies or opera or anything of the sort to make money or (with the exception of some movies and books) even learn anything new. They do it for the entertainment value. But that just begs your original question. Some people find sports entertaining because of the uncertainty factor. Others, sad to say, do it out of a desire to “belong” or associate with others. And, yes, some are looking for an excuse to stay planted in the sofa. Who cares? It’s their butts.
“Sports people get rich off fans?” So do people like Harrison Ford and Michael Jackson and Stephen King. People who provide entertainment value to enough people tend to get showered with money, pretty much whatever the field.
You seem to have a peculiar (and strangely selective) axe to grind. Why? Did you get your lunch money taken by a big bad football or baseball player?
And why is an individual sport like surfing or motocross any more intrinsically exciting or interesting than a team sport? Why is watching an individual sport any less a waste than watching a team sport?
I’m not against individual sports (I wrestled in high school and college). I just figure, to each his own.
I’m not sure why you even bothered posting that, Wildest Bill. It doesn’t seem like anything we might say could make a difference… that is, if we even felt like trying to change your mind after reading that.
I happen to like team sports. You don’t. Why let it bug you? For that matter, why are you letting something you don’t care about bug you enough that you feel compelled to post about it, and as you said, potentially piss some people off? Now, that, I don’t get.
Don’t mean to be bitchy, just posting my humble opinion.
I guess you could boil this down first to “why are sports entertaining?” I think the answer to this is that humans are inherently awed by the person who can take a merely human task (hitting or throwing a ball, knocking down bowling pins, spinning around the uneven bars, etc.) and perfecting it to a seemingly super-human extent.
I can hit a ball, but I can’t hit it that far. I can throw a ball, but I can’t throw it that fast. I can kick a ball, but I can’t kick it with such precision. I can wicket a sticky but I can’t sticky it so wickedly (or whatever the appropriate cricket phrase would be).
So why sports is answered. Why team sports? I think it is because it is a reinforcement of the ideas of civil society. If everybody can work together perfectly amazing things can happen. Also, there is the drama of knowing that no matter how good any individual is, they still need support.
This, I think, is why individual sports (supercross, golf, diving, etc.) are not the great spectator sports. Tiger Woods complete domination of his own mind in a solitary sport is, more than anything else, kind of scary. Who wants to be in the position of such solitude, knowing the only way you can fail is through your own fault?
What is the value of this entertainment? Shared community. Just like the final episode of Seinfeld or Survivor or Christmas. Sports becomes such an important event because it is experienced, simultaneously by so many others. When I was at the A’s game (WHOOOOOOOOOOOOO) yesterday I didn’t talk to another person there, but it was still exciting to know that 45,000 other people (plus 100,000s on TV) were living through the exact same experience.
1)Spring Training. It tells me winter is over and the new season is alive with possibilties.
2)The beauty of the grass, the infield, the uniforms (well, most of them.)
3)The athleticism. I enjoy watching a difficult physical feat done gracefully.
4)The excitement. There is something magical about being at the park and hearing the roar of the crowd and watching the clubs battle it out.
5) The tradition. Although the names change, it’s the same game my father loved, and his father, and so on. It’s something my whole family shares. A long history that we feel a connection to.
6)Basking in the refelected glory. Or in the case of us Los Angelinos, the shared disappointment of our Dodgers and Angels. (We’ll get 'em next year!) I appreciate, and even like some of the other teams, but these guys represent us. When you’re a fan, you live and die with your team.
I know some people don’t like baseball. I feel sorry them. They’re missing out.
I guess the simplest answer for Wildest Bill’s query is
a proverb: if you have to ask why we are dancing, it’s because you don’t hear the music. Or, as the French say,
“a chacun son goute”.
