The Top Ten Sports of All Time
I kind of write a soccer blog so let’s quit with the false drama and go straight to number one:
1. Soccer is the best sport in the world – not even close. For many countries around the world, soccer is religion. In fact, the collective mood of the people living on four of our planet’s continents rests squarely on the shoulders of people running around kicking a ball, sometimes each other and theatrically falling to the ground. But since you’re reading a soccer blog, I’m probably preaching to the choir, so I’ll stop explaining what you already know and what Franklin Foer wrote – Soccer Explains the World. For all those who disagree, you can be cute and amusing, but sadly you’re also wrong.
Now for the also rans:
10. Boxing. C’mon, let’s be honest here, boxing is ridiculous. You hit somebody until they concuss, then some guy grabs your arm and raises it to the ceiling and declares you a winner. Personally, I don’t think anything judged should be called a sport. Diving, ice skating, gymnastics – give me a break. Judging is for pie contests and beauty pageants. A sport’s contest ends with one team having more points than the other or, say with track, a better time.
That said, so why is boxing even on my list? For the theater. Boxing is our nations’ morality play. Rich men with money, often gangsters, manage the affairs of poor men, mostly minorities, who beat the brain cells out of each other for the public’s viewing pleasure. If you want historical significance we can talk about great fighters like Jack Johnson, Rocky Marciano and Joe Louis, but for my money one name stands above them all. Muhammed Ali epitomizes the drama of the sport and, given his stances on Civil Rights and Vietnam, the societal and cultural conflicts of our times as well. At one time, Muhammed Ali was, arguably, the most recognizable athlete or human on the planet–in a dead heat with soccer great Pele. Ali defined an era and inspired people around the world. So thank you Muhammed, you put boxing at number 10 on my list. Oh, I almost forgot, you’ve got to give a nod to all the great boxing movies: Rocky, Raging Bull, Million Dollar Baby, The Fighter. What’s more fun than watching people get beat senseless on the big screen?
9. Swimming. Most of the world is covered in water so swimming has got to make the list. In Wisconsin, where I live, if you’re not paying attention you can trip and fall in a lake. Everyone needs to know how to swim, and those who are great at it should be cheered, revered, and strangled with gold medals every four years at the Olympics. Greats like Mark Spitz, Michael Phelps, the girl from Berkeley with the preppy name – Missy Franklin – and that guy who’s been underwater too long and it’s affected his ability to speak in coherent sentences – Ryan Lochte.
8. Lacrosse. Lacrosse is on this list because I need ten sports. (I mean who’s ever heard of a Top Nine?) Sorry, but baseball, cricket and any sport utilizing animals will never make my list. So, I’m including a sport I’ve never really watched. I certainly haven’t seen a complete game. But I do like the name – kinda elegant and French-like, maybe dine on a little patois de fois gras while you’re watching. I do know it’s a sport dominated by guys from Connecticut named Chaz. Here’s an interesting tidbit: lacrosse might be co-opted by East Coast Boarding Schools, but it was invented by Native Americans. It’s America’s true indigenous sport. Like soccer, the players must play both offense and defense. Like soccer, women play it. The greatest Lacrosse player of all time is arguably the greatest football player of all time – Jim Brown. Just this moment I’ve convinced myself that Lacrosse is pretty damn cool and highly deserving of the number eight spot. Now I just need to pour myself a glass of Bordeaux and go watch a match, a game, a contest – whatever the hell they call it – and find out why I like it so much.
7. Ski Racing. Man became one with water and learned to swim. Then Sir Edmund Hillary climbed Everest. At some point someone got tired of trying to snowshoe down a snowy mountain and decided to strap some lumber on his feet and shred the edge. Skiing’s awesome! Try it sometime before global warming takes over. Skiers have strong legs, like soccer players. Skiers, like soccer players, are made up of both genders. Skiing is gravity’s greatest purpose. A big snow year makes winter the best of the four seasons. I love skiing.
6. Track and Field. Besides wrestling is there any sport older than a running contest? Track and Field does have a few issues. Maybe it tries to do a little too much. I mean if you have Track why do you need to add Field? What does a shot-putter have to do with a sprinter? Okay, the decathlon – guess I answered my own question. Track and field occurs on every continent, both genders participate and it doesn’t cost much to put on shoes and run. Hell, in Africa they do it barefoot and still kick everyone’s ass in the long distances. Now running barefoot is a North American fad (like that’s the secret to winning). Soccer players often start in soccer and finish in track or do both track and soccer. Anything over 200 meters is painful – real character-building stuff. I may need to move track and field up.
5. Hockey. I’m biased toward winter sports. Pond hockey makes me nostalgic for my childhood, even though I never played pond hockey. Just seems as if I should have. Canadians play hockey and who doesn’t love Canadians? They’re so nice. In hockey, like soccer, you play offense and defense. Like soccer, you must be great in transition. For Americans, hockey has a readymade villain – the Russians. I would move hockey up on this list except for the following reasons: no checking allowed in women’s hockey, too much equipment, you can never locate the puck, and the fighting is just plain dumb. I don’t care how much fun it is to watch two grown men punch each other in the face (see number 10 on this list), what sense does it make to skate up to someone and punch him in the teeth when the object is to put a puck in the net. No, hockey remains a solid five.
4. Tennis. I only include tennis on this list for one reason – Serena Williams and her big sister Venus. I don’t think there’s a more powerful and empowering female athlete than Serena Williams. Venus and Serena, and those before them — Billie Jean, Chris, Martina, the girl that grunted a lot (Monica Seles) and Steffi – sell out arenas as well as the men. So Venus and Serena said, “if we sell like the men, then pay us like the men.” Here’s what else I love about Serena, she ain’t perfect. We’ve had the pleasure of watching her grow up. We watched her struggle with her temper, lousy attitude, boredom, complacency, ego – you know, those human things we all share. She dealt with body-shaming, race issues, gender issues and the inhuman expectations of being the best in the world. And you know what, she turned out to be an incredible role-model. She should’ve been a soccer player.
3. Basketball. Basketball has very few flaws. Body type is a little too important, which might be seen as sour grapes for someone who climbs on his kitchen-counter to reach the top shelf. The timeouts are a pain. I mean, call the timeout, but what’s with the committee meetings on the sideline? If the coach can’t get it organized during practice, why do they have to waste my time as a fan? Now that’s a soccer coach talking! Other than that, I can’t think of anything I don’t like about the game. Like soccer, it requires skill and athleticism. Like soccer, it’s a game of transitions; it has rhythm and drama. It’s also a world sport, now more than ever, and both genders can play. The rules are simple but being good isn’t. If I wasn’t 5’6, I’d have been a superstar. No, I was average at soccer and would’ve been average at basketball, even if I was 6’6. Now, if I was 7’6 who knows.
2. The Green Bay Packers. I can’t get myself to list football. Why? The sport’s a mess. All the ex-players are crippled. The sport is burdened by an endless litany of rules. It takes seven referees and a couple chubby guys in a booth to monitor a single game. Only men play (unless you include Lingerie Football – easily the most misogynistic and perhaps, okay I’m saying it, the best idea ever). The kicker, punter, the long snapper – all these guys are on the field for about 60 seconds and involved in live action for about 25 of those 60. Not to mention, what are kickers and punters except soccer players who couldn’t run. Everyone is a specialist. The game takes too long: six timeouts, one halftime, two quarter breaks, TV timeouts, review booth pauses and challenge flag pauses.
So why the Green Bay Packers? you ask. Aren’t they a football team? you astutely observe. This brings us back to religion – where we started. It would be sacrilegious for a born and bred Wisconsinite to exclude the Green Bay Packers from a greatest sports list. The Green Bay Packers exist in the marrow of our bones. Named after the Acme Packing Company –a Green Bay meat packing company, the team was founded by local kid Earl ‘Curly’ Lambeau in 1919. Unlike most sporting venues around the country, the Packer stadium, Lambeau Field, is named after the team’s founder and not an insurance company. What’s more, the fans are the owners, which means some fat cat asshole can’t sneak them out of Green Bay in the middle of the night. (You know who you are Cleveland/Baltimore.) You can put your name on a list to purchase Packers season tickets and, if you’re lucky, your great-great grandkids will get them–the waiting list is that long. And of course there’s the legendary Vince Lombardi, a tough little Italian, who embraced the African American athlete within the confines of a small, freezing cold predominantly white upper midwestern town and created a dynasty in the 1960s.
One year, my wife and I were in Nashville, Tennessee when the Packers were set to play Detroit for the final game of the season. We wanted to watch because the game had some playoff implications. But it wasn’t a do or die game – the Packers were already in the playoffs. We walked across the street from our VRBO and the second bar we walked into was filled with Packer fans. This is replicated in every major city throughout the country. Eat your heart out Dallas, go hang yourself with your lariat Cowboys, no other team in the country has that kind of following. Soccer may be the world’s religion, but as a Wisconsinite, the Green Bay Packers will always be mine, for ever and ever – amen.
