Truth and Beauty
As we are in the United States, I am pretty sure most of you are unaware that there is the largest spectacle in all the world getting set to kick off in Germany this week, the 2006 FIFA World Cup. In terms of sheer audience, fervor and interest it makes the Olympics, the World Series and the Super Bowl combined look like a mere hors d'oeuvre. Much is made of the 'beautiful game' and that is precisely what it can be,... in the right hands. Too often though, there have been managers and higher-ups who have sought to quash the glorious extemporaneousnes that "beautiful football" engages. Anyone who has watched Germany or England's World Cup history and cares to argue that their teams weren't designed to play mechanically or machine-like are nationalistically deluded. Which is why, I believe, teams like Brazil and Argentina are so captivating (not to mention that these are the two squads that are overwhelming odds-on favorites to take the title). The great Eduardo Galeano has said, "Nowadays it's not only a source of prestige, but also big business in futbol -- soccer, as you call it here in the States. But I don't know why the miracle exists, and soccer is always able to give you a feast, a feast to the eyes watching it when it's very, very well played and a feast to the legs when you're playing it. And there are, there still are. I don't know how, but there they are. Ronaldinho, for instance. Players able to play for the joy, the pleasure of playing, instead of playing just because they are obliged to do it, professionally obliged to do it. It's like an election. We are all making each day, being as we are, obliged to live life as a duty, but secretly willing to live it as a feast." What Galeano so sagely describes is the conquest and the joy, the panache that humankind finds not only in sports, but a panache for life. When we watch, we wish to capture the timeless and the immortal, and peering out at a vast landscape of dreariness in sport, I wish to see the off-the-cuff, unadulterated joy that comes with doing something with one's feet that seem impossible to one's eyes or imagination. And despite the onerous shackles that have been placed on the sport by marketing and over-structured coaching there are still those timeless moments. Would you prefer to have seen Pele and his bicycle kick or some of those painfully depressing West German outfits that operated with all the soul of a Xerox machine?
Sports is not that important (ESPN's Bill Simmons recently opined that sports ranged in importance somewhere between the polio vaccine and Mr. Skin's website), save for one regard: it invites man to test himself against others and show you what's possible when the odds become long. And when there's joy in that it can make for a beautiful spectacle, and when its been clipped and forced into a box and demanded a strict discipline it becomes nothing more than a hollow game, devoid of life or of the truth and beauty, the spectacle, that has made it the manna for millions.
another tale spun by Miss Daisy @ 3:39 PM
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I will be watching the World Cup as well. I think the Brazilians will take it home again, because frankly, the European teams suck. Most of the best players from the English and Spanish league teams are made up of South Americans or Africans, and it's unlikely we'll see Germany, England or Spain take the cup home. I would love to see England win because of all the rioting fans in London afterwards (or Spain for that matter, but I doubt they'd hoist a statue of Franco or St. James the Moor Slayer to celebrate the occasion any time soon).
On another note, I have a theory regarding the popularity of football (aka soccer) in this country. As football becomes more popular, the more America will become a third world country. What this means is the more our taxes will increase, the fewer property rights we'll have (more regulations, gun ownership outlawed, etc.) and the harder black people like Coletrain will have to work to make a honest living in this country.
Well, Daisy likes soccer it seems.
After years of passing out by the 3rd inning, I am starting to feel the same way about baseball. It really is a beautiful game - especially since it is untimed and free (it ain't over till its over).
The game starts in childhood as a game of catch or throwing any small object in the air and swinging at it. This evolves into little league, PE practices, and pickup games until after a couple decades - the best make it to the major leagues.
It is truly an international game (especially if you lump in its cousin cricket) - and I was proud to watch Japan beat Cuba in the World Baseball Classic, even though both teams had the fewest number of MLB players.
Plus, no father in America would weep if his son said, "But Dad, I hate soccer, why can't I play baseball?"
Thank you for your jingoism, Mr. Cole. Evidence again why the US won't make it out of the opening round.
Soccer is a beautiful game...but it's also a painfully boring game. Kick, kick, kick, without even the definite promise of a single goal. The ridiculously arcane rules of baseball and football (I mean the real football) always means something interesting is going on. Those two sports are also beautiful games, but in different ways: soccer in the art of human motion, football in the epic struggle, and baseball in the interminable suspense of instances.
Basketball, on the other hand, is just plain ugly. Sweaty freaks of nature climbing over themselves, where getting a penalty on yourself is frequently good strategy. Being good in the first 3 sports requires skill, talent, hard work, and 4 limbs, whereas the primary measure of success in basketball is something uncontrolled: height. Anyone who doesn't believe in the triumph of genetics over skill in basketball need look no further than Shaq.
Oh, and Coletrain, you're wrong: sports IS important, and not simply in its art or cultural meaning, but in a utilitarian sense: it is the easiest and most important method of socializing boys (I mean the good kind of socializing, Rapp). With PE on the decline and being stripped of competition, it's no surprise boys today are taking longer to mature, and are fat, lazy, disconnected, and otherwise useless.
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