Overeducated sports writers log

version

Well-known member
Another famous bit of (kinda) sports writing is the one with Delillo at the start of Underworld (I think it is) when the first hundred pages are about that baseball game with the "Shot that was heard around the world (except in all the countries that don't give a fuck about baseball (which is most of them))"

luka knows that one off by heart. He loves it.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
and Michael Jordan, tbc, is a terrible human being in most regards from everything I've ever read or observed about him

it's his particular tragic flaw - the very factor (beyond vast physical talent) that made him so great - an insane, obsessive, relentless focus on winning - makes him terrible in every other situation

when I say heroic I mean Iliad heroism, the heroism of feats, not the heroism of sacrifice, of course

that's what I like about watching sports - to see the best people on earth at a thing do that thing

so it's unsurprising to me that writers stray easily into the mythopoetic, albeit usually without the writing ability to pull it off

I do find the psychology of sport fascinating, particularly when it comes to the hugely successful athletes like Jordan who are worshipped as demigods.

On that note, I recommend the recently released documentary Maradona, which attributes his slide into cocaine addiction as being a sort of traumatised withdrawal in the face of insane fan worship in Naples.


 

padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
it combines an intensified version of the typical (cliche) pressures of being a celebrity with "runners whom the race outran" poignancy

of course it's extremely difficult to feel too bad for anyone who showered in galaxies of money and adulation for playing a game

but empathy is always possible

I'm sure I'm belaboring the comparison, but I do think of Achilles making the choice between life and eternal glory

Tom Simpson literally riding himself to death on Mont Ventoux

not to romanticize such things, especially when they are easily preventable, but still

what motivates these people to do these things, to make this sacrifices, for awards that are intrinsically valueless?
 

padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
and as far as sportswriting, there's always the Teddy Roosevelt "the man who is actually in the arena" view

but then Achilles had Homer (or whatever Homer represents)

it seems clear that humans have been seeking for the right words to celebrate their heroes almost as long as they've been making up gods to explain the unknowable
 

padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
speaking of Charles Barkley, who I've always been a fan of both on and off the court

he was famously against the idea that athletes should be role models for anyone, especially children, just for the fact of their athletic prowess

which I agree 100% with, even as a child the idea seemed hokey and ludicrous to me, but many adults seem to take it quite seriously
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
I think Foster Wallace might have written this too but with sports stars they are actually INDISPUTABLY geniuses (if they are geniuses), because the scoreboard proves it. Artistic genius is much more debatable - there are people who will (and can) maintain that Picasso was shit. You can't debate how good Roger Federer is at tennis though. (Notwithstanding more intricate debates around who would have beat who when - obviously sport IS debatable but)... I suppose the debate might be over how important that talent actually is, on a big picture level.

Maradona says in that documentary that when he was playing football all his problems would disappear. He would become completely consumed by the game. That's not dissimilar to how artists feel about painting or writing, or whatever. It's self transcendence. I suppose there's a similar thing going on with spectators too.
 
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Corpsey

bandz ahoy
But surely that's only half the story? Cos none of it would happen without all the less superhuman people turning up week in week out in the lower leagues - and there are loads of people who like watching Notts County hack out a terrible scoreless draw with some other no-hopers on a wet Wednesday evening. I

Aside from tribalism I think that people love watching competitions of all kinds (though tastes differ). It's a fascinating thing to watch from a *neutral* perspective, which actually I would question the existence of, given that most times you'll root for somebody despite yourself.

I will happily watch two of my friends play street fighter e.g. as much as watching two pro players, despite the gulf in skill.

But tribalism also plays a huge part, which I suppose is just the extension of that feeling of taking part in what you watch, somehow.
 

padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
But surely that's only half the story?
sure

we're dealing with the mythopoetic realm tho, eternal glory - that which is celebrated by purple prose

it's not exclusively the province of Jordans, Peles, etc but it takes place most powerfully at the highest levels, with the highest stakes

it's not a value argument about one thing being "better" than another, tho I do push back against the idea that lower level sport is somehow more (or less) authentic

to flip your point around, one could say those no-hoper wet Wednesdays are all shadows of that highest level, all the way down to a pickup game with friends
 
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padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
and as far as tribalism, there's the obvious conception of sport as proxy warfare, "war minus the shooting" as Orwell put it
 
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IdleRich

IdleRich
it's not a value argument about one thing being "better" than another, tho I do push back against the idea that lower level sport is somehow more (or less) authentic
Oh sure, it's not what I think, it's just an idea that you hear a lot.

and as far as tribalism, there's the obvious conception of sport as proxy warfare, "war minus the shooting" as Orwell put it
When I was a kid I won this book in a competition

SoccerTribe.jpg
Basically an anthropological approach to football fandom; players as warriors, heroic hunters etc etc was all new to me cos I was about seven years old I guess.
 
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Corpsey

bandz ahoy
"For two years he didn’t go when he could have done. But the collapse continued, the deterioration of the club, the dark nights: Rome, Liverpool, Lisbon. The divide widened. If they tried to make him happy, they failed. “We give the [fans] nothing,” Messi lamented. He wasn’t blameless but he watched his peak years pass without a European Cup. He saw teammates leave. He saw others come and fail. It was time to pull the cord. The sword of Damocles fell."

😂
 

catalog

Well-known member
I remember years ago, when it was the world Cup in Brazil, I got on the train and someone had left the telegraph sports section on the seat, so I read the write up of the previous night's match, the one where Germany had annihilated Brazil. The writing was incredible, I think I was reading the mahabharata at the time, and it was basically the same epic style, the way players were physically described and the slow motion description of some of the actions. Not sure if it was 'good', but it was enjoyable cos I was so surprised.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Just occurred to me that the first two quotes I pulled up here and the quote I just came across are all about Messi and Ronaldo.

Maybe people idolise them so much that there's an urge to use this grandiose language and heroic allusions to Ulysses, Damocles, etc.

There's an element of revelling, not just in their sublime, Olympian skill, but of revelling *in the revelling*.
 

version

Well-known member
"For two years he didn’t go when he could have done. But the collapse continued, the deterioration of the club, the dark nights: Rome, Liverpool, Lisbon. The divide widened. If they tried to make him happy, they failed. “We give the [fans] nothing,” Messi lamented. He wasn’t blameless but he watched his peak years pass without a European Cup. He saw teammates leave. He saw others come and fail. It was time to pull the cord. The sword of Damocles fell."

😂
I quite like Sid Lowe.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
"This is war, the hostility open. And in the middle, the club. What’s left of it. Now even the most significant symbol they have is sullied. Nothing can ever be erased but it can be seen through different eyes. The conflict now is eternal, sides will be taken. There is no way back from this – even if, somehow, he can be convinced to stay. But it can never be the same again."
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
"It’s not about next year; it is about every year. This moment will always be there, part of a legacy lost, resentment lingering. A symbol of the collapse, of a failure astonishingly abject, of a crisis that in the end took everything with it, even him."
 

sus

Well-known member
Reminds me of a thread I was going to do about Apollo and Dionysus and how that might relate to music.

Overeducated forum poster.

do this, I made an attempt once in undergrad and found it difficult, but am always tempted to revisit the paradigm
 
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