Butchblog

Men and Sports

I’ve played and watched sports for most of my life. And in some (maybe many) ways they have shaped who I am. I don’t think I’m going too far out on the proverbial branch to say that many men are in a similar position. This is not to say that women, especially in current times, are not also athletes and enthusiasts, but traditionally there has been more emphasis on male sports. That’s often how men first shape our identities.

            My first introduction to sports was playing catch with my father. He bought me my first glove and baseball. I cherish those moments with him. He also took me and my brother to Phillies games and to watch Penn football games at Franklin Field. My sister never came. Girls then were not expected to participate in, or like, sports. My sister certainly didn’t. But for some reason(s) I quickly fell in love with all aspects of athletics. Maybe it had a lot to do with spending time with my father and hoping always to get his approval—which was otherwise hard to come by.

            Once in elementary school, I became acquainted with the nature of competitive sports, racing the other kids around the playground, straining to win, enjoying it when I did, that bolt of adrenalin, the primitive joy of beating your opponent that is somehow baked in to the male psyche. In the upper grades, I became even more competitive, as did my boy friends. I discovered I was good at baseball, an unexpected feeling—that moment when you recognize you can do something well. It doesn’t apply only to athletic pursuits of course, but that’s where I found it. As old as I am now, I can still remember that first time swinging the bat and connecting solidly with the ball and watching it sail over the outfielder’s head. Racing around the bases, I knew I was hooked, solidly hooked.

            At home, me and my buddies would play endless street games, primarily stickball and step-ball. If you don’t know what those are, you probably didn’t grow up in a crowded city neighborhood. Luckily, we lived across the street from a large city park where we would play a rough form of tackle football, no helmets allowed. But for me, the biggest draw was the concrete basketball court, where pick-up games were played night and day. It’s where I learned the game. Not many games on TV in those days, so you learned your moves and shots from watching the older guys. When I first got up the nerve to try to get in a game I had to wait till one of the teams didn’t have enough guys for a five-on-five, so had to call me in from the sidelines. “Come on junior, let’s see what you got boy.”  By the time I was in junior high I’d be out there for hours every day. It’s where I met all sorts of other people that I probably would not have met otherwise, both young and old. And it’s where I learned to push and scrap and stand up for myself. Sometimes it worked, sometimes not. Getting beat is part of competition too, and part of maturing.

            Since I went to a large urban high school, the competition for the school’s teams was intense. Then I had to measure myself against kids who were bigger and stronger and more athletic. I made the freshman basketball team, but didn’t start. I’d sit on the bench and my stomach would churn with anticipation, and anger that I wasn’t playing. I was discovering the downside of sports and how they can also tear you down as well as build you up. For me at that age, a large part of my self-image was directly connected to how well I was doing at any one moment in sports. In retrospect it was not entirely healthy. My focus on sports got in the way of developing interests in other aspects of life—like academics and art and books.

            What also happened along the way is that I lost that important connection with my dad. Sure, we still talked about sports, whether the Phillies or the Eagles won. But that was the only thing we ever talked about. I was glad to have even that, but it wasn’t enough. I needed to know my father in other ways, and for him to care about me in ways other than how well I was doing on the baseball field. When I finally made it to varsity, proud as I was, Dad down-played it. “Well, let’s see how you do,” he told me. And then never showed up to watch any of my games. I could never understand why. Did he stop caring? Was he disappointed in me? To this day I still don’t understand and it still hurts. Crazy.

            I eventually learned to not take sports so seriously. It took a while. In my 30’s and 40’s I was still a regular for pick-up games, and always played my hardest. Old habits, you know. It was only after knee surgery, that I started looking for gentler, less competitive pursuits. Running worked for a while, till those same knees pleaded for me to stop. In my later year I re-discovered surfing, still chasing that adrenalin rush. Later today I will head out into the surf at high tide, and tonight, I’ll watch the Phillies on TV.

            You see, I’m still addicted to sports. It’s part of who I am. Certainly not as big a part as when I was a kid. But that pull toward activity and challenge is still there and I dread the day it finally disappears. Is the way boys are indoctrinated into sports a healthy thing? Probably not. Especially today, when some parents push their children from a very young age to excel in one sport or another without checking to see if their kid is as interested as they are. But for the majority of boys—and now, thankfully, girls—measured participation in sports brings joy, good health, and character. As for competition, I’m not so sure that’s always a positive. But you can’t play baseball without keeping score.