Sport issues checks and balances, prevent chaos

True competitiveness is within us all. It lies in wait, like a caged animal, until some asshole wanders by and pokes it with a stick. That provocation is how champions are made.

I, like most Midwest-American men, have a love affair with sports. Baseball is so ingrained in my genetic code, my DNA might as well have double helix polymers made of red stitching. I don’t limit myself to baseball, however, because if there is a winner and loser involved, chances are it’ll pique my interest.

The sheer desire to witness the rise and fall of two separate parties is an interesting case. It isn’t restricted to human beings, or even animals for that matter. Competition is the most primal of instincts derived from the will to survive. When an invasive weed grows too close to a rose bush, what does that thorny bush do? Spears the weed right in the jugular, that’s what.

Sports were created to alleviate that natural aggression. A combative outlet essentially prevents strangers from beating one another in the streets with car antennas and traffic cones. Have you watched “The Kingsmen”? Yeah, hostility would ultimately reduce the world’s population to a tribal colony of bloodthirsty sociopaths.

While amusement can be had from taking in the World Bowling Tour, some would find it much more gratifying to watch one human being mount another (keep your mind out of the gutter, you filthy animal) and deliver merciless hammerfists to the side of his or her opponent’s temple. Mixed Martial Arts is the appropriate outlet here, where the athletes are remastered Roman gladiators from the early anno domini years, and the octagon their Colosseum, minus a tiger or two. If teams sports are more your thing (and with the NFL becoming the nation’s most watched tickle fight) hockey would be your nonstop-shop for action. Those with a penchant for violence can always get their fix with a good ol’ brawl on the ice. Nothing can put you on the edge of your seat like seeing a head coach look toward his bench, his team down 3-0 in the first period, and simply give a nod to his enforcer, as if to say, “Go time.” Goons are rostered for the sole reason of changing the tempo of the game in the strategic manner of dropping gloves and whooping ass.

You know who also whooped ass? “Old Blood and Guts” himself, the fine General George S. Patton. This American hero was known for his military leadership and incredibly vulgar speeches. He was not about the bullshit, like when he said, “Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best; it removes all that is base. All men are afraid in battle. The coward is the one who lets his fear overcome his sense of duty. Duty is the essence of manhood.” Eat that, prissy pants. Now go put on your war paint, thump your chest and get back to your roots… or simply indulge yourself in sport and get your pugnacity out in a more culturally acceptable way.

Advocate Staff