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I'll watch if there's no choice, and I can even appreciate the skill involved, but there are usually at least a dozen things I would rather be doing than watching sports. For participation, unless it involves hitting someone with something, I tend to lack both the raw talent, and the inclination to acquire any real skill.

Let me ask you all a question?

How is knowledge of what some would consider obscure sports statistics any different people knowing the names and weapon yields of fictional spaceships from movies and television?


Different strokes for different folks, my friend.

My wife is the sports-nut of the two of us, and she is looking forward to the Super Bowl. It is another day for me. It is not that I mind sports, I don't, but I don't go out of my way to keep up on what is happening. I really don't have any favorite teams, and I often surprise myself when I can hold a conversation about sports (especially with my father-in-law).

I don't care too much about sports on TV. I like playing sports, but not watching/following the teams.

The only sports I can watch are college football and pro hockey. Go figure. I was a competitive soccer player, but damn if I could ever be a spectator to that shit. Ugh.

Playing is something else entirely. I love to toss the pigskin with a crew of guys after school on occasion (but I rarely have the time/am not fucking zonked from sleep deprivation), and I want to get into some fighting sports, like boxing. I dabbled in TKD. And as I said, I was a competitive soccer player for years.

Baseball. It's legally required in Massachusetts. And Hockey, but only the college and high school games. I watch the boy's teams because of the violence (they know what the boards are for) and I watch the girl's team because I want a good laugh.

Col. Crackpot wrote:Let me ask you all a question?

How is knowledge of what some would consider obscure sports statistics any different people knowing the names and weapon yields of fictional spaceships from movies and television?


Different strokes for different folks, my friend.

I've no criticism at all for people who simply enjoy sports, and soak up some of the knowledge of it as they watch, and read about it, and listen to the commentary - provided they also have a good breadth of knowledge in other areas.

The kind of person I criticize (if you will go back and reread my post, for you seem to have somehow missed this point entirely) is the one for whom sports becomes a religion. And I even made comparison to religion in the other post. I am referring to the kind of person who can recite the most esoteric minutiae of his favorite sports and any conceivable sports statistic you can think of, but can't tell you something like who David Lloyd George was, or what the lightest element is, or point to Sierra Leone on a map. I criticize such people because they lack any sense of what is really important. It's fine to have your interests and hobbies, and to devote some of your mental energies toward these things. But to exalt such frankly trivial things to the point that it drives far more important matters entirely out of your mind is silly and childish.

And incidentally, I feel precisely the same way about people who are equally ignorant of important matters, but devote themselves with equally religious fervor to sci fi. I have nothing but scorn for people who spend years mastering Klingon, but not some actually useful language like German or Spanish or Japanese etc.