It’s official: I’m pretty sure I am a typical, grownup male.
Why, you ask? Why now do I draw this conclusion at the tender age of thirty-one? Why on earth would a man choose such an arbitrary benchmark to make such a declaration? Do I feel infirmed? Is it because of my divorce? Is it the gray hair? Is it that my testicles are sagging down to my knees like two slimy, savory wontons glued together? Is that really happening or did I just say that to gross you out? If it is real, shouldn’t I see a physician about the slime thing? Why, yes; probably, but I’m very busy and it’s kind of fun to put on dolphin shorts and go to “hot yoga” classes, and I don’t want to lose that because I thrive on the screams of mortal terror of emaciated vegetarian females? Why was there a question mark on that last sentence? Was it even a question?
Why am I getting so off track here?
I can explain the grownup thing.
It seems to be widely understood that I am not a sports fan. As I work around a bunch of dudes, people tend to ask me questions about sports or bring it up in conversation, and I can rarely – if ever – answer them or keep up. My favorite baseball players are the ones I knew as a kid, and most of them are either dead or in prison by now. I still don’t think I know the infield fly rule. I am not positive if it’s even called that. I don’t know what it is when someone is off-sides in hockey. I cannot for the life of me keep score in tennis. If a safety happens in a game of football, I assume that somebody put on more pads. Basketballs are made of pigskin, right? I could go on, but I think you get the general idea.
Then, the World Cup happened, like it does every four years. And, suddenly, I remembered something: I know how to play soccer. I played for years as a kid. And I might not have been the most talented player out there, but I ran around like a savage and had lots of fun. I was generally a half-back, I seem to recall. I gave it my all every season, and always got a trophy. Then there were orange slices and pizza parties. My mom has pictures of me in my little uniforms looking all cute and such. I’ll try to dig some out for ya’ll – or just so some creep can photoshop himself touching me inappropriately and eventually be arrested by the FBI for it but found not guilty because the image is simulated.
Back on the track we go, again…
Wouldn’t you know it? I wanted to watch the World Cup this year. And I did. I even got in the office pool, and secretly hoped that I’d wind up with team USA. (I got Mexico. Close enough, geographically I guess. Maybe all their players will go to the US team? Heh.)
I figured that I would be mildly amused by the games, mostly from a nostalgic point of view. But a funny thing happened when watching the US come from behind to tie it up and advance to the quarterfinals: I yelled, “YEAAAAAAHHHHHH” at the tying goal, jumped out of my seat, and gave Danny Manning a high-five.
You read that right. I, Dan Silver, gave a high-five about a sporting event to another person. In public.
Frankly, I was totally riveted watching the US team defy many naysayers and do as well as they did. They showed potential and talent, and it’s clear to me that as a nation, we can only get better at the world’s favorite sport (except for that one with the goat carcass and the horses; I think that’s slightly more popular ).
The whole experience got me thinking back on my adult life as it relates to sports. I’ve always been athletic. I’ve long enjoyed playing sports, and been pretty good at the ones involving boards or choking people. I’ve avidly partaken in several sports for years – just not ones involving a team. Perhaps my increase in team sports is in direct correlation to my decrease in general social anxiety?
I’m talkin’ all queer and stuff, huh? I’ll stop then, Jethro. Jeez.
But, now that I really, REALLY think about it, I’ve on more than one occasion turned on a baseball game or watched the World Series, even when a local team wasn’t playing in it. I’ve also watched, and enjoyed doing so, basketball, hockey, tennis, golf, rugby, that thing with the goats and the horses I mentioned earlier, bullfighting, American Gladiators, paintball, kickball, kickballS, kickboob, kickdick and American Bull Dick Kick Fighting Ball.
My introspection on the matter has guided me to a breakthrough, one I never really knew how to describe to people before: I DO NOT hate sports. I, in fact, like sports.
I just hate football, football players, football fans, and anything remotely related to football.
Football is, without a doubt, the most boring thing one can watch that does not involve community college credits. As a matter of fact, football is so boring, that I would rather tune in to three hours of the 700 Club with a picture-in-picture of that dude with the southern accent on QVC selling the giant knife set (you know the one; don’t lie).
I can already hear you rushing to defend football. So let me display to you all the reasons why you are so very wrong for doing so.
1. Football is slow. For every second of game time, there are about fifteen minutes of standing around, or time-outs, or disputed calls by the officials, or drunken brawls in the stands, etc. Though a football game is supposed to take an hour, it actually takes four days.
2. Football fans are directly inverse in athleticism to the athletes that they are watching.
3. Football players are directly inverse in intelligence to the people who manage their outrageously inflated and ridiculous salaries.
4. Football is incredibly, incredibly gay. While there is nothing wrong with this, I don’t really want to look at the “tight end.”
5. Football is overly padded. Bigger and bigger steroid-addled players have led to bigger and bigger pads over the years. If I wanted to watch a bunch of guys in suits of armor do battle, I’d go watch some of the SCA nerds who practice on Thursday nights at the BART station on College in Oakland.
6. Football is merely a vehicle for commercials. This can be no simpler proven than by the fact that people, in all seriousness, often look forward to the “Super Bowl” to see what new ads will be aired.
7. Football is played by total tools. I met Jerome Bettis. He was a cock. Then there’s Michael Vick. Again, cock. This is indisputable.
Some of you may still not believe that I am a sports fan. But the evidence speaks for itself. I have the A’s game on in the background as I write this, even though I’m a San Franciscan. So, as it turns out, you really have to just consider the possibility that it’s not that I wasn’t a sports fan before…
Maybe your team just sucks?
This picture has nothing to do with sports, but it cracks me up.