A group of seven students at a local university are seated at various locations across a dimly lit dorm room with the sights and sounds of Monday Night Football filling the room. The four football fans in the room are all fixated on the screen; hyper focused on the offensive players shifting in motion while the defensive players attempt to adjust their coverage. Soon after the adjustments, the ball is snapped, a pass is thrown, and the offensive team goes ten yards for a first down.
The play gets a rise out of four students in the room and the conversation quickly shifts to certain plays that are superior in certain situations. The other three viewers see the same play unfold, but they elect not to join in the conversation the rest of the room is having. As the discussion carries on, one of the three students asks a question that catches everyone in the room off guard.
"How can you guys talk about football so much?"
The question is dismissed at first blush by the viewing audience in the room, but that one question raises several others; not only about football, but about all sports in general.
What is it about sports that is so compelling that cause people to tun in time and time again? How come people can talk about sports for hours on end? What is it about these games that cause everyday working people to riot in the streets, flip cars, and set objects on fire? And perhaps the most important question of them all: Why do people even care about sports? There are several different aspects of life that can receive the undivided attention of people, but why do so many people pay so much attention to sports?
The answers to these questions reside within several factors that the world of sports provides to its viewing audience.
The first factor in why people care so much about sports is because of how many people can relate to sports.
Watching sports is one of the few aspects of global culture that does not discriminate against race, sex, or age. Whenever somebody enters a stadium, there appears a melting pot of fathers, mothers, grandparents, daughters, sons, in laws, friends, and couples of all shapes and sizes can be seen wearing their team's apparel. Whether it be batter in the bottom of the ninth, a basketball player taking the last shot, a Hail Mary pass in the NFL, or a shootout on the ice, a team's fans all share the same hope that their player will come through. And the most frequent type of discrimination that occurs in sport happens when two different people are fans of different teams. Sure insults go back and forth between fans, but solace can be taken in the fact that these jeers of disapproval are done to put down a rival team as opposed to directly attacking the person his or herself.
On a similar note, some people choose to enter the world of sports because their families and friends are so passionate about it. There are countless images of families at sporting events and seeing a young boy or girl holding up a "it's my first game" sign. These children gain an interest in the sport because they grow up with sports being around them all of the time.
But the bonds of sports fans go beyond individuals rooting for their favorite teams. Everybody likes to hear stories of people who overcome adversity; and professional sports are filled with players who come from broken homes and bad circumstances only to be saved by the sport that they play. You may recall the film The Blind Side with Sandra Bullock regarding offensive tackle Michael Oher. The story of a young man with a great deal of strength who tries to escape the rough neighborhood he grew up in. In fact, every aspect of Oher's story is true and he is currently playing for the Baltimore Ravens. Or the story of Invictus which the South African Rugby team's run to the World cup of Rugby brought an entire nation together. People love to see individuals overcome all odds, and the world of sports gives fans a areal view of the lives these athletes lead.
But it is not just the lives of the athletes that get people to watch sports, it is also the dazzling plays that athletes make that captivate fans across the sport. Whether it be Prince Fielder of the Milwaukee Brewers hitting moonshot home runs, LeBron James bulldozing defenders before throwing down slam dunks that get audiences all rilled up, Calvin Johnson making spectacular catches in the back corners of end zones, or Henrik Lundqvist standing on his head to make saves, there are so many athletic plays in sports that capture the imaginations of sports viewers. We are all captivated by things that we cannot do ourselves, and these athletes making great plays are something that everyone can be impressed by.
And when these athletes make great plays, there are individuals who take these great moments and generate them into statistics in which everyone can keep track of. Keeping track of sports statistics is the water cooler effect of sports in action. How common is it to see a group of five or so employees at work talking about the number of touchdown passes Aaron Rogers has compared to Tom Brady's while in the office? We see it daily, regardless of what sport tickles your fancy. There are so many different kinds of statistics that you would need several computers to keep track of them all. Knowing statistics is a appeal to a person's thirst for knowledge in a field that they are compelled by for any of the reasons given above.
Despite this case there may be some individuals who will not be compelled to suddenly follow everything that is going on in the wide world of sports.
And that is perfectly fine.
There are so many different aspects of life that are just as beautiful and captivating as sports for different reasons. Some people may invest their time in following particular kinds of music. Others will spend their non working hours watching reruns of their favorite television shows. And others may want to collect nickles from every year that nickles have ever been made.
The possibilities are endless.
Sports have been so deeply ingrained in our culture that it becomes harder and harder not to pay attention to what is directly in front of us. So whether it be baseball, football, hockey, basketball, bull riding, swimming, gymnastics, soccer, track and field or another sport not on the list, the choice to watch is completely up to you. Just know that the world of sports is quite captivating if you look long enough.
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