Only Losers Follow Professional Sports!

Each evening when I get home I sit at the kitchen table, readying myself for yet another wonderful home cooked meal.   I switch the television to one of the local stations to see what is going on in and around Houston, the country and world.  I enjoy the local news broadcast, up until they switch to sports.  “Sports is NOT news!” I’ll say in an elevated tone.  Hastily looking for the remote and changing the channel before I am subjected to a complete waste of my time.  I usually tune to a rerun of “The Simpsons”.

My wife explains to me, each time I complain, that some, albeit most people DO think sports is news.  My retort is always,  there are so many ways for people to receive news and information these days, can’t they get their SPORTS information elsewhere?!?!  Then I remember ESPN.   A channel dedicated to sports!  With the advent of HD TV local stations now have additional channels.  Can’t one of those extra channels be used for sports?   She doesn’t follow sports either and is quite happy I don’t.  I think she just likes fighting with me, but I digress.

I did follow sports, years ago, before reaching adulthood.  Not so much football or basketball, but baseball.  I played baseball and loved the game.  I watched the Astro’s and year after year I was bitterly disappointed by their lack luster performance.  It wasn’t until I saw a Jerry Seinfeld comedy routine on “The Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson (yes I’m that old) in which Mr. Seinfeld said something to the effect that you aren’t rooting for the players as much as you are rooting for the jerseys!  Players come and go, but the jerseys stay.  How silly to want a team of laundry to win over a competing team of shirts, pants and caps!

Perhaps I would have felt different if I was supporting a winning team, but I really think that over time I would have come to realize that following sports is nothing but a losing proposition.   I guess it depends on your definition of losing, and winning.  If you follow a team long enough they are bound to win.  Given the right set of circumstances they may even win the season.  Most of the time they lose.  They lose the game, they lose the series or they lose the season.  When you go to the sport arena that your tax dollars paid for (loss of tax dollars) you lose your money on over priced tickets to watch over priced players while eating an EXTREMELY over priced hot dogs and drinking an container of what should be fine wine or champagne!

As I see it there is no way to WIN following professional sports.  The very nature of sports says there are winners and losers.  What you may not have considered is just how much you have lost following professional sports.  Time, money, and perhaps, at times, your sanity.

In an effort to give full disclosure here, I do want to say I really don’t care if you follow sports.  We all have our things that make life interesting and exciting.  Some of the things I like I am sure you would find dull.  Where I can appreciate the effort and skill put forth in a winning catch, run, etc… I am just not willing to put forth the time and effort sitting through endless hours of sport “entertainment”.  I do not begrudge your vast knowledge of sports related information, nor your ability to spend hours and hours of discussions while swilling beer talking to your friends about what team is going to make it all the way this year.

I just wish I didn’t have to watch sports on the news.

“The Texans lost this weekend.  I was happy because now the news will shut the hell up about them for at least another nine months.”