This man needs your help. Rocket?

I am so sick of watching Minnesota sports. I am sick of the constant disappointment and heartache. It just plain hurts and I’m not sure I want to do it anymore.

The easy analogy is to that of a jilted lover. Minnesota sports fans keep loving and coming back to something that doesn’t love them and keeps disappointing. But I don’t think that the jilted lover analogy fully encapsulates the stupidity of the situation. I now think that being a Minnesota sports fan is like being a scrawny guy who gets drunk every weekend, gets heady with liquid courage, picks a fight, and gets the [redacted] kicked out of him every time. Or maybe it’s like being a smoker who, having suffered a coughing and wheezing fit after climbing one solitary set of stairs, then reaches for a cigarette to calm her/his breathing. Either way, the end result is expensive, painful, the product of addictive behavior, and just plain bad for the soul. I’m not sure I can do it anymore.

That being noted, it seems like there are only two alternatives to no longer being a Minnesota sports fan. Frankly, I can’t decide which I prefer; or perhaps more accurately, I can’t decide which would be the lesser of two evils.

I could decide to no longer watch sports. Undoubtedly, it would be tough to quit cold turkey at first. After all, it’s not just that I like sports, it’s also both that they’ve been a part of my identity for as long as I can remember and they’re such a cultural touchstone. It would be like giving up both a part of me and an easy method of getting to know others. But it can be done. And if I did it I would have a heck of a lot more time
for actually bettering my own life. And maybe I’d spend more time actually playing sports instead of sitting on a couch getting fat while watching others exercise. Not watching sports could open up a whole new world of experiences and self-improvement.

I could also decide to become a bandwagon jumper and root for the most successful teams of the day. My first reaction to this is to recoil in horror, as I constantly feel compelled to punch the folks here in the upper Midwest in the face every time I see one of them wearing a Yankees or a Red Sox hat. Undoubtedly, it would feel dirty to cheer for the flavor of the
month. But maybe whatever contempt I felt for myself would scab over and be soothed with the constant joy of winning. Maybe regularly seeing “your” team celebrating championships is the only sane way of watching sports. After all, the bandwagon jumper’s affections for her/his rooting interest of the moment isn’t any more shallow or disinterested than that team’s affection for the fan. It’s the perfect one night/season/playoff run stand.

So, what do you think, RandBallaholics? In the disappointment of yet another Minnesota defeat do you find yourself more compelled to give up on sports or to jump on the bandwagon?

This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 1st, 2008 at 3:03 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.