Category Archives: Sports

Leave the Sports Fans Alone, Go Get the Protesters

In writing on Quebec’s heavy-handed crackdown on the continuing student protests (“Our Not So Friendly Northern Neighbor”, International Herald Tribune, May 23 2012), Laurence Bherer and Pascale Dufour note the generally well-behaved demeanor of the protesters:

Since the beginning of the student strike, leaders have told protesters to avoid violence. Protesters even condemned the small minority of troublemakers who had infiltrated the demonstrations. During the past four months of protests, there has never been the kind of rioting the city has seen when the local National Hockey League team, the Canadiens, wins or loses during the Stanley Cup playoffs. [link in original]

The invocation of the behavior of Canadiens fans is a particular instance of a familiar trope: the comparison between the law-and-order response to the behavior of sports fans–drunken or sober, celebrating or mourning–and that of another group, in this case, political protesters. (A classic instance, from a time long past, may be found in Deadheads’ pleas for tolerance as the Grateful Dead were banned in many cities from performing live. As Deadheads noted, Pittsburgh Police had suggested they would much rather work a Grateful Dead concert than a Steelers game; the latter event involved dealing with drunk fans, the former with stoned Deadheads; no prizes for guessing which group was better behaved.)

Now, presumably, when Canadiens fans rioted, the local police must have sought to restore order, perhaps by arresting drunken sports fans that might have damaged private property. But no amount of sports fan misbehavior will, I think, provoke the passage of legislation like Bill 78:

The bill threatens to impose steep fines of 25,000 to 125,000 Canadian dollars against student associations and unions…student associations will be found guilty if they do not stop their members from protesting within university and college grounds. During a street demonstration, the organization that plans the protest will be penalized if individual protesters stray from the police-approved route or exceed the time limit imposed by authorities. Student associations and unions are also liable for any damage caused by a third party during a demonstration….student organizations and unions will be held responsible for behavior they cannot possibly control.

The comparison above with the behavior of sports fans is significant because of a larger culture of  ’boys-will-be-boys’ tolerance of sports fans behavior. (Have the Canadiens been held liable for their fans’ behavior?)  The same folks who would be mildly irritated by sports fans pissing on their lawns after a big game would be positively apoplectic if they were mildly inconvenienced by a political rally, action or demonstration of any sort. (Campus towns seem pretty mellow about the wake of devastation left after a big college football game.)  And the police response to the rowdiness of drunken sports fans, spilling into the streets from sidewalks, is more often than not, far more tolerant than it would be of a small group of sober protesters, perhaps chanting the odd slogan or two. The likelihood of a violent encounter is far greater in the first instance but the heavy-handed crackdown always takes place in the latter.

The problem, of course, is that drunken sports fans rioting sends one kind of message, the protest sends another. The former lets us know the massive narcotizing effect of professional sports is, shall we say, ‘in full effect’; the latter lets us know the medication is wearing off. The clubs and batons are required, therefore, to knock those protesting back into submission. The former assure us they are drunk, in the thrall of corporate fantasy entertainment; the latter, that they are done changing channels and would like to take over the production facilities. Small wonder that the latter evokes alarm, while the former merely bemused worry that someone’s storefront or car might be damaged. The dollar value of the damage caused by the rioting sports fan might cause more damage than the political protester but the protester is likely to generate far more pernicious instability; sports fan riots leave broken windows and bleeding noses in their wake, the political rally invariably disrupts far more.

It’s a no-brainer, really, for those charged with ‘keeping the peace’: leave the sports fans alone, go get the protesters.

Crossfit and Strong Women

A singularly positive aspect about being in a Crossfit space–like the one at Crossfit South Brooklyn, which, in point of fact, is the only one I’ve ever spent any time in–is the many opportunities that arise to see strong women in action. Women can deadlift, squat, clean and jerk, run fast, do muscle-ups, pull-ups–you name it, they can do it. Many women lifters at my gym are among the most technically proficient in the major lifts; to watch them execute these lifts properly is a genuinely aesthetic and awe-inspiring experience. (I wonder if there is something interesting to be said here about the seemingly greater ability of women to internalize coaching cues about technical lifts. Do men, perhaps, resist coaching cues more, convinced that they can figure it out by themselves?)

So Crossfit, whatever its merits as a fitness training program–and debates about that have provoked some wonderfully informative discussions–has at least ensured the creation of a space where stereotypes about women being weak go to die. Anyone that spends sufficient time at Crossfit South Brooklyn will see women indulge in feats of athletic ability that are wonderfully disruptive to any reductive,  long-held opinions about the athletic incompetence of women. But stereotypes of ‘women can’t lift’ are not just held by men, they are very frequently entertained by women themselves. So witnessing ‘Crossfit women’ may provide  a salutary lesson to women too that dominant, culturally transmitted and reinforced, conceptions of what you might be capable of are very often mistaken.

Here on the gym floor, the lifting platform, under the pull-up bar, too, are spaces thus, where men can learn valuable lessons in humility and in assessing how confident they may be about their  masculinity. After all, if women around you are faster, stronger, more limber than you, then what kind of man are you? Are you–to deploy a particularly ugly word sometimes thrown around by men in gyms–just a ‘pussy’? An educational moment for a male Crossfitter presents itself when he looks at the specifications–or prescription–for the assigned workout of the day, and realizes he can ‘only’ do a weight that is just above or sometimes even below the prescribed weight for women. I have had many moments like these, and it was a little galling, so well had I internalized the spoon-fed mantra of reassurance, “At least I’m stronger than any girl out there!” But often, that simply does not happen. There are women, constantly, around me, that, shall we say, kick my ass. And to have to deal with that is a wonderfully educative experience.

But there is an opportunity here to be seized, if one insists on making comparisons. As my friend Malcolm said to me as I agonized over what weight to choose for a workout, secretly not wanting to dip below the ‘ladies prescribed weight’: “Remember, if you can do what a strong woman does, you’re pretty damn fit!”

So there you have it, guys, this is what I really want to be: a strong woman.

Ozzie Guillen, the First Amendment in the Workplace, and Bromance

The Florida Marlins’ suspension of its manager Ozzie Guillen for his ‘pro-Castro’ remarks provides yet another teachable moment about the First Amendment and its relationship to the workplace. (Guillen has been suspended for five games.)  Guillen’s original remarks read:

 I love Fidel Castro. I respect Fidel Castro. You know why? A lot of people have wanted to kill Fidel Castro for the last 60 years, but that [expletive] is still here.

(As always with deleted expletives, I’m curious: What did he say? Anything worth reusing?)

After a storm of outrage from Miami’s Cuban community, the most ardent ‘anti-communists’ in the US (* see note below), and a quick suspension later, another familiar storm of outrage: How could this be possible in the US? Don’t we have free speech? What about the First Amendment, eh? Land of the free, Schmand of the Free!

In response to which: The Florida Marlins are private actors; they can abridge speech in their workplace as a condition of employment; and Guillen, if he doesn’t like it, is free to move to another employer more tolerant of his professed opinions. Employees have very few constitutional protections in the workplace; it is where we go to cease being citizens and start being minions. This confusion occurs most commonly with regards to the First and Fourth Amendments (“You mean my employer can search my stuff without a warrant?” Yes, they can). For some reason, most folks don’t think of Fifth Amendment protections in the workplace. Has anyone ever complained that he was forced to ‘testify’ to his boss? Has anyone ever tried taking the Fifth in a work meeting? Abandon all Constitutional Rights Ye Who Enter Here, indeed.

Of interest to me, too, was Guillen’s ‘defense,’ offered, in his own words, on his knees (can you back-pedal on your knees?):

This is the biggest mistake of my life…I’m on my knees. When you make a mistake this big, you can’t sleep. If I don’t learn from this I will call myself dumb. Today is the last day that this person talks about politics. Everyone in the world hates Fidel Castro, myself included, and I hate him for all the damage and all the hurt. I was surprised he’s still in power – that’s what I was trying to say.

I find Guillen’s clarification of his remarks quite convincing. This is because Guillen like many men, likes to express his maverick, contrarian self, his individuality, as it were, by expressing a kind of grudging admiration for other men found ‘too hard’ by the soft, weak, masses: ‘You all say he is an asshole, and I agree, but let me tell you, he’s one tough asshole, you gotta give him that! Don’t get me wrong; I don’t like the guy. But you gotta admit, he’s a tough dude.’ Or something like that.

Note: Two anecdotes: First, many years ago, a Cuban friend of mine bought a Yugo (don’t ask). His mother refused to ride with him in the car; not because she thought it was unsafe, but because it was manufactured in a communist country. Second, another Cuban friend of mine threw out her Billy Joel records–a good move in general, I’d say–after he toured the USSR. If it isn’t obvious, these stories date back to the 1980s, when anti-communist sentiment among Miami Cubans was–if it can be imagined–even more visceral than it is today.

Dennis Bergkamp’s Goal and Fan Encounters in the Rainforest

The Wikipedia entry for Dennis Bergkamp–who graced the rosters of Ajax, Internazionale, Arsenal and the Dutch national team in a career lasting twenty years–includes the following notes:

Bergkamp scored three times in the 1998 FIFA World Cup, including a memorable winning goal in the final minute of the quarter-final against Argentina. Bergkamp took a leaping first touch to instantly control a long 60-yard aerial pass from Frank De Boer, brought the ball down through Argentine defender Roberto Ayala’s legs, and finally finished by firing a volley with the outside of his right foot past the keeper at a tight angle from the right.

When I am asked, “Where were you when Bergkamp scored against Argentina?,”  I reply: “At home.” In the summer of 1998, in my East Village apartment. (Indulgent in having ordered cable so I could watch the World Cup; till then, I had used my television for movies and disdained cable offerings; but the World Cup rolled around and my resolve weakened.) When Bergkamp scored, seemingly out of the blue, in a game that seemed headed for extra-time and perhaps penalties, I was as stunned as anyone else, transfixed by the soccer artistry on display. I knew I had paid witness to a masterpiece.

It remains one of those classic soccer moments that separates fans from non-fans. The long-time soccer-watcher instantly knows why the goal is a classic; the neophyte is puzzled: “Is that all there is?” Everything Bergkamp did was difficult. Using a “leaping first touch to instantly control a long 60-yard aerial pass” (launched cross-field)  is hard enough, but to then move on with the ball past a defender–the ball tapped through the legs!– and to finish with a deft volley “with the outside of his right foot past the keeper at a tight angle”, well-placed enough to score, boggles the mind. And all this, in the 90th minute of a World Cup quarter-final. Against Argentina.

Once a goal becomes “One of the best”, it is fodder for conversation in encounters with fellow soccer fans. Anywhere in the world.

Last year, on Christmas Eve, I found myself in the El Yunque rainforest in Puerto Rico. We drove there in the afternoon from San Juan, and after settling in and unloading luggage, headed out for an evening’s worth of beer drinking and sunset evaluation at Indian Rock. Later, at night, after dinner, we arrived back at our rather humble accommodations to find ourselves sharing them with a Dutch couple, busy polishing off a bottle of wine and a game of cards, as the rain came down in buckets outside. The young Dutchman and I struck up conversation, and then, perhaps inevitably, our talk drifted, first to soccer, and then, somehow, to Bergkamp (as an instance of Dutch artistry not visible in the grim 2010 World Cup final against Spain).

And then, perhaps even more inevitably, to “the goal.” At which point, overcome by beer-induced boldness, I decided to do my best impersonation of Jack Van Gelder’s memorable, Andres-Cantor-surpassing, shrieking call of Bergkamp’s goal, yelling out, “Dennis Bergkamp! Dennis Bergkamp! Dennis Bergkamp! Dennis Bergkamp! Dennis Bergkamp! ” My young friend giggled, his long-suffering girlfriend, apparently not a soccer fan, rolled her eyes–as did my wife–and I giggled right back. So we sat there, as the rain came down on the roof, against the windows, the sounds of the rainforest night all around us. And I thought, this is also what great goals are good for: years later, strangers can meet in the middle of a rainforest at night, and indulge in juvenile television commentator impersonations that try the patience of their loved ones.

Roger Cohen, the “Two Footballs”, and False Dichotomies

Over at the New York Times, Roger Cohen has an Op-Ed contrasting football and football. I mean, Association football and American football. Or, rather, soccer and football. Roughly Cohen’s thesis is: soccer is all skill and art, football is all violent force and anti-finesse; America reveals its plebeian failure to appreciate soccer artistry by its obsession for football; no matter how much soccer is promoted or played, it is doomed in America. Roughly.

I’m inclined to think Cohen’s article is a classic piece of trollery, looking for hits in a slow news week (But is it really? The Palestinians and Israelis are talking about a new peace deal; fighting rages in Syria; Greek workers are striking; the ISI faces possible legal trouble in Pakistan; plenty of material for Cohen to turn his cool analytical lens on, so this bit of dabbling in sport is rather mysterious.) Cohen will, rather predictably, get taken to task in the Letters section. But I might as well start the party here.

Cohen commits a classic fallacy, common among a particular breed of sports fan, who might justifiably be accused of having missed the point: a superficial similarity between two sports does not entail a coherent comparison between the two. Should I, for instance, compare tennis to golf, because in both games there is a ball and an implement with which to strike the ball? So too, with football and soccer: yes, a ball is moved across the length of a field by a bunch of players, but that’s where the comparison should end. To continue further risks too much strawman construction and demolition.

The facile comparison of two radically dissimilar sports, which is bound to generate ludicrous generalizations, reveals nothing as much as ignorance of one of the sports being compared. I am used, for instance, to the pointless and endless comparisons between cricket and baseball, both of which I enjoy and take pleasure in. Those cricket and baseball fans that like both sports–and there are many, I assure you–watch on in bemusement as cudgels are taken up on behalf of sports which need neither defense or aggrandizement at the cost of the other.

Cohen, similarly, fires off well-worn cliches about football, imagining that in doing so, he is glorifying soccer by contrast; he does no such thing (ironically, the kind of jabs he directs at football have their counterpart in the ignorant rants made about soccer by the ignorant American fans Cohen derides.) More problematically, Cohen imagines that he is a harbinger of a greater cosmopolitanism to the hopelessly low-brow American sports landscape, bringing us news of sports played in distant lands that we would do well to focus our attention on, if only we could be bothered raising our knuckles off the ground.

But Cohen should know better: he started his article by telling us that Fox (FOX!) broadcast the Chelsea-Manchester United game live on Sunday.  The mavens at Fox, who have their fingers on America’s pulse, know something that Cohen doesn’t seem to: soccer is a big deal in the US. Not as big a deal as football, and it probably won’t ever be, but big enough to make silly any use of it as a rhetorical device in complaining about American insularity.

To do that, there is plenty of ammunition to be found elsewhere. A good journalist should be able to track it down.

Asif Kapadia’s Senna Takes Pole Position

Asif Kapadia’s Senna, based on the life of the late Ayrton Senna, succeeds as documentary, a sports movie, and a movie. It works as biography, as a morally-instructive fairy-tale about an improbably good-looking, intelligent, sensitive, and articulate sportsman (in a sport made singular by its technologically-enforced impersonal distance from its spectators), and finally, as a tragedy, because Senna is no longer with us. It captures the most salient aspects of Senna’s all-too-brief life, and situates them within the broader context of the sport of car racing; it works as documentary in the best way possible because it makes the non-fictional dramatic and compelling; and lastly, it works as a sports film because it makes the central contests of the sport it documents enthralling human encounters (it helps that Senna highlights the long-running and at times, bitter, rivalry between Alain Prost and Senna).

The brilliant Senna, three-time World champion, and the last Formula One driver to die at the wheels of his car, always stood out during his brief decade-long career, and not just because he was dazzlingly fast and skillful on racing courses, whether dry or wet. He was politically and socially sensitive and informed; he did not shy away from confrontation with the managers of his sport; he was concerned about keeping driving safe; and he was also not shy about exposing his moments of introspection, self-doubt and fears.

The archival footage Senna draws upon is astonishing in its detail, richness, intimacy and dynamism; Kapadia’s especial skill, in making this movie, lies in having put together a story, which at its tragic and inevitable conclusion, leaves us richer in knowledge about Senna, the driver and the human being, and feeling considerably poorer as we absorb the facts of his premature and tragic death in the 1994 San Marino Grand Prix. This last section of the movie is among the most wrenching segments of cinema that I’ve experienced in recent times; the sense of tragedy foretold, hovering gloomily over the heads of its protagonists, is almost unbearable at times.

The car-mounted camera stock footage we are privileged to witness in Senna makes clear Ayrton’s dazzling driving skills (to truly comprehend the frightening speeds and turns of F1 racing, the car-mounted camera is essential), but for my money, the best parts of Senna are the personal, intimate glimpses. And among all of those, one stands out in particular: a little segment in which Senna suggests that growth as a human being is harder than proficiency at Formula One driving. Senna notes that his skills as a driver have grown and reached a level which have made him possible to win a world championship; but he has many more years to live as a man, and there are, he feels, many more truths he needs to discover about himself and the world before his personal growth will be complete. It is a startling moment of frankness and wisdom from a sportsman who has not made the cardinal mistake of conflating a very particular talent with a broader, richer intelligence.

Senna’s death was a loss for his family, his country, and car racing fans; as this documentary shows, it was a loss for all of us who seek, in sports and sportsmen, answers to broader questions about our relationship to human striving and capacities.

Pick-up Games, Participation, and Basketball

As is evident from a glance at my “About” page, I blog on cricket. Which would seem to indicate I’m obsessed about the game to some extent. But when it comes to actually playing a game, cricket is not my favorite sport. And the reason for that is simple: cricket too often permits non-participation by players (this can all too easily be induced by one’s teammates, a fact I bemoan in my latest post over at The Pitch on ESPN-Cricinfo). For that reason, and sometimes, I suspect, for that reason alone, my favorite game to play is pick-up basketball, whether three-on-three in a half-court, or five-on-five in a full-court.

On a basketball court, during a game, no matter how poor a dribbler or shooter you are, you can contribute somehow. And the best way to do that is to play solid, vigorous defense: keep close man-to-man markings, set picks, go up for defensive rebounds; in short, put on a good old non-stop hustle. Similarly, when it comes to offense: run hard, keep your marker guessing, and get in position to receive a pass from the more talented shooters and playmakers. I never mastered a lay-up, and never had any fancy offensive moves. But I was capable of at least attempting a shot if I was not under pressure, and always managed to keep moving in an attempt to shake off my defender so that I could get the space and time required. I was not a very talented shooter either, so I need more time and space than most. But I did manage to sink a few and those went up on the scoreboard like anyone else’s baskets. Even when I played with the most selfish of players on my teams (a terrible fate for anyone playing a pick-up game), I managed to at least shutdown the one player I was in charge of marking. I contributed, somehow, in every single game I played.

Playing a basketball game involved me more completely than any other pick-up game I’ve played (even soccer, where again, players can be marginalized, frustrated and shut-out). In basketball, I was able to always make myself participate and force a presence for myself in the game. That is the particular genius of this game of nets; it manages to draw us all in, making space for competent and incompetent alike, accommodating our weaknesses and strengths, ensnaring us in its charms and challenges as it does so. In doing so, basketball accomplishes what many social orderings are unable to do: provide an egalitarian space for human endeavor, one that rewards our honest toil, and leaves us all in the end, satisfied and sweaty, with elevated heart-rates and lowered LDL counts.