What If Your Hand Was on the Plunger of All Sports?

3/30/2015

This was the kingdome. It was a dump. Courtesy ESPN.com

All my apocalyptic tendencies toward sport -- mostly from covering the NFL, but other stuff, too -- were sorely tested the other day.
An ambitious web site, medium.com, asked me to wax profoundly on the question of whether we -- we? -- should ban sports. They handed me the symbolic plunger of 500 words and said, go for it, big guy.
Then I had the vision of a nice May day, in the company of a few friends or relatives, sitting behind right field at New Shea, my hands clutching a hero from Mama's of Corona, watching Juan Lagares go back on a fly ball.
It was the moment of truth.
Seven philosophical souls got to express themselves on the subject of whether sports should be totally banned.
Readers are urged to give their opinions -- NOT HERE but on the site, after reading the contents in the link below:

https://medium.com/matter/should-we-ban-sports-201be54dd523

bruce

4/3/2015 03:41:58 am

George,

you nailed your piece on banning sports.

I know you only had 500 words but I was a bit surprised you skipped hockey since you seem to admire hockey players.

made me think of the comment I made to you once about enjoying your edgier writing since you, sort of, retired from the nyt.

all moot tho. ain't never going to be banned.

George Vecsey

4/3/2015 10:25:43 am

Bruce, you as a Canadahooskie noticed, Truth be told, I hardly watch hockey, but I didn't want to lump it in with NFL or NBA. I love my time covering the Islanders, and expect to do some reprises in their final days, weeks, in the Coliseum this spring, so I just stayed away. GV

bruce

4/3/2015 10:31:05 am

George,

we prefer canuckistani......

I recall you saying with a lot of fondness about how much you enjoyed the islanders as a team and as individuals.

I think there's an appreciation of--plus knowledge of their sport's past--that is different from the other major north American sports. baseball is similar that way, but you read stories of ball players who are clueless of baseball's storied past.

bruce

George Vecsey

4/3/2015 12:57:43 pm

Bruce, you got me. I wouldn't blow up hockey if I had my hand on the plunger., Pierre Larouche, one of my absolute favorites, once described playing pond hockey in the dark -- by the sound. Hockey makes the cut!!! GV

bruce

4/3/2015 01:25:07 pm

George,

I used to love playing hockey at hyslop's pond when I was a kid. all day on the weekends for a few years. I recall a story in, I think, sport magazine, quite a long time ago. maybe the 1970s. my memory is they talked to NHL players about their experience as kids. also, they were from the prairies. they talked about playing under the full moon. also during lulls, they could hear other players' skates cutting into the ice from a long, long distance away. perhaps their voices and sticks clacking against each other too. it cut a beautiful picture in my mind's eye. also, tho i'm sure American kids, Russian kids et al might've had the same experience it made me feel very Canadian...

Comments are closed.

QUOTES
Welcome to World Cup 2022, the most absurd thing that the routinely absurd world of sports has ever produced.
Those extreme descriptions were what virtually the entire world, save for those who had walked off with bags of cash from Qatar, called the awarding of soccer’s greatest event to the incredibly tiny, incredibly wealthy country back in 2010.
Twelve years ago, many were convinced this event couldn’t possibly happen: staging the world’s biggest sporting event in a country the size of Connecticut, one with zero soccer culture and even less soccer infrastructure? The tournament couldn’t possibly take place in 120-degree heat, and FIFA, the governing body of soccer, most certainly wouldn’t upend football leagues around the world to change the traditional summer schedule, could it?
And, for God’s sake, what about the beer?
Those were just the logistical concerns. The moral concerns are far more distressing. FIFA, so busy paying lip service to equality, couldn’t possibly expect the world to embrace a country where you could go to prison for being gay, where women’s rights are severely curtailed and female victims of sexual assault could go to prison, charged with engaging in extramarital sex. And all those questions came before the global realization that the World Cup was being built on the backs of migrant labor: modern-day slaves held in Qatar with virtually no rights, low wages and no ability to leave. Migrants make up 90% of Qatar’s stated population of 3 million. The country’s native-born equal about 300,000, or roughly the size of Anaheim.
---Ann Killion, columnist for The San Francisco Chronicle.

What If Your Hand Was on the Plunger of All Sports?

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