Just about every year, no matter which team you root for or which sport you follow, you're going to end up a loser. Yet for all the media focus on winning championships, very little attention is given to the common experience of dealing with defeat. While the media casually cover professional athletes' reaction to losing, much of that pain is tempered to a great degree by their paychecks, which staunch the flow of their tears.
But what about the average fan, whose team is going to lose, and who will not gain any tangible compensation for this pain? This column isn't intended to answer the never-ending question of why we care so much about sports we don't play and probably don't even know anyone playing, but rather to just talk about loss. In the immortal words of Bill Clinton, I'm the columnist who wants to feel your pain.
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| The "towel draped across the face" walk of shame. (Getty Images) |
These losses left me utterly defeated ... and hating the town of Greensboro, N.C., with an irrational passion and misdirected blame. It also put me in the exact same position as the 269 fans whose teams never made the NCAA Tournament and the 49 other college basketball fanatics whose teams also lost before the Sweet 16. But as I lay on my hotel bed with the pillow covering my face, the absurdity of my loyalty to UT and GW were brought home by my wife, who said, "How in the world is your life going to be remotely different tomorrow?"
When a sports fan is in a sports-related funk, there is nothing worse than the cold hard slap of logic. But she was right, my life was really not going to be much different and this was a common refrain I've been hearing since I was old enough to care about my team losing games.
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As I wound my way across North Carolina through the Smokey Mountains, I stopped for lunch in Asheville and thought about all the ways I could have spent the weekend that wouldn't have left me so disappointed. For instance, I could have gone camping, watched Bring It On for the 321st time, fished in a cool mountain stream or even read nursery rhymes to orphaned children. I could have worked as a candy striper at a local hospital, given rides to hitchhikers and taught neighborhood kids how to shoot bottle rockets at one another. Instead, I watched two basketball teams (filled with players I don't personally know) lose and got upset. And now I'm in sports loss recovery.
Since I'm the columnist who's all about feeling your sports pain, I decided to craft a ClayNation road-map for sports loss misery. While I am certain that its stages will not be identical to the pain and misery felt by every sports fan, I think the overlap is significant enough that everyone will find themselves somewhere. Of course, there are always skip-aheads -- fans who are so optimistic that the moment their season ends, they've already sketched out the starting five for next season and are convinced only better things will arrive. If you're a fan of a sports team, chances are you know one of these people. They don't even have the decency to let you wallow in defeat at the end of a season. Well, those guys can skip the first 12 steps; they are far too healthy for you and me. Besides, this list is here primarily so fans everywhere can know you are not alone.
1. If ...: These are the two letters that have tortured and will torture sports fans for all eternity. I can actually pinpoint the exact time I realized that in thinking about ifs, I was not alone. It was while riding home after Vanderbilt had beaten UT in basketball and Doug Roth (UT's blind-in-one-eye power forward) had just missed some key free throws. I had been sitting silently while replaying the loss in my mind when out of nowhere, my dad said something about every sports fan driving themselves crazy if they played the "what-if game" for too long. I was only seven, but I remember being absolutely flabbergasted that everyone else did the same thing I did after games: Replay the game in search of a crucial moment that could have changed the outcome. I later grew up and became a lawyer, which means I only deal in ifs. Irony can be a cruel mistress.
2. The refs, oh man, the refs: They hate your team and my team, they really do. At night, they sit on their hotel bed in their striped pajamas and laugh themselves silly thinking that fans of Team X really believe they have a chance at winning in the morning. Oh, if they only knew what was planned for the next day, these referees will say, while gleefully rubbing their palms together. It's just so obvious to the clear-eyed fan that this cabal of umpires, linesmen, referees and time-keepers has been formed all for the very purpose of snatching victory from your team at the very moment when victory is theirs. How could those panty-waists with whistles be so biased and unfair?
3. The silent rage: This phase arrives when everyone else wants to talk about the game and you want to strangle the next person who says anything at all because you have absolutely nothing left to say. Personally, at this point, I want to go to a dark room and be left alone. I've known others who want to approach the head coach/starting running back/quarterback/point guard/third basemen and slap them until they admit they are fools and have personally wronged you with their errors. I've always loved the image of some bespectacled 45-year-old slapping a starting running back for his perceived transgressions. Is there any way more certain to court death?
4. Sick to your stomach and can't even bear the thought of the sport: I was feeling like this for most of the drive back from Greensboro. Even though NCAA Tournament games were going on all around me, I couldn't bear to hear anything about basketball. I was the same way Saturday night about every other game as well. Also, there must be rigorous avoidance of sports scores and highlights lest you be forced to relive the defeat. (Exceptions are allowed for reviewing of sports highlights when still gripped either by the stage 1 "what if's" or stage 2 "refs grief" process.)
5. Refusal to read the paper or watch television: For the record, I always read the paper because this brings the loss home. This is sort of like going out to the bar and seeing your ex-girlfriend with a new guy. I have to read every word plus review the box score. The worst part of the newspaper after a loss is those annoyingly catchy headlines. For instance, immediately after Wichita State beat UT, I was inwardly cringing at all of the Shocker puns that were going to be plastered all over the newspapers and the Internet. It's like even newspapers are talking trash about your fandom, making witty remarks at your expense. Don't they know your pain?
