Sports are an “avenue for infinite stories about the human experience.”
Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
By Dylan Hart
I was shockingly unathletic as a kid. My crowning achievement was winning a dodgeball game in the first grade, and admittedly it was probably because all of the hyperactive kids knocked each other out.
I wasn’t just unathletic, though, I was averse to anything with a ball.
Part of it was the people around me — none of my friends were interested in watching sports, and my mom told me that people would just do it as a social activity, to hang out and eat wings. I didn’t question it too much. I stayed in my lane and enjoyed video games, movies, writing and music.
In the long, scorching summer between high school and college, I can’t remember exactly how it happened or who was playing, but I ended up watching a full game of basketball for the first time. It was the playoffs, the year that the Cleveland Cavaliers miraculously upset the Golden State Warriors.
Somehow, it enraptured me. I started following teams, looking at crazy offseason roster moves and learning that there was a lot more depth to the game than just aiming and throwing. There’s still so much for me to learn about it. People do it for a career, and some still can’t learn some of the more advanced aspects of the game.
But the real reason why it caught my interest was the potential for storytelling. It’s the same reason why I like history and film. Stories are a way to connect with situations you wouldn’t experience otherwise. They’re a way to get a better understanding of the world.
The best part is that you don’t have to rely on the stories told by the broadcast or outside journalists, although those are typically a great way to find new perspectives. You can find a story anywhere in sports.
Look to your favorite player. Read their statistics — find out what they’re good at, what they’re bad at, why they do things the way they do — and there are a million stories you can uncover. Look at why a team made certain decisions that got them to a championship. You could even look at the people on the sidelines, and why they thought sitting there was the best way to spend their afternoon.
It’s an avenue for infinite stories about the human experience. It’s about people who want more than anything to achieve for a variety of reasons.
Do they do it to honor lost family members? Is it to provide for the people around them? Is it just for fun and glory? It’s not in every profession that you see people so blatantly giving their all, and there’s something admirable about that.
So in the course of a year, I jumped into something I knew nothing about and found a new favorite hobby. I’ve since looked into other sports and found a lot of the same interest rekindled.
If there’s anything I learned, it’s the value of trying something new. College is the perfect place to do that. Join clubs. Talk to people you wouldn’t otherwise. Try a restaurant you would walk past on any other day.
I don’t know a single thing about high fashion, and I have no clue why some people seem to love it so much. From the outside looking in, it seems like an exercise in excess and forcing nonsense to make sense for the sake of money. But on the inside, I’d be willing to bet there’s a lot of depth there.
Never let someone tell you that knowledge isn’t worthwhile. Frying your brain by doing nothing but keeping up with the Kardashians might be an exercise in futility, but knowing more will only make you a fuller person.
It might be why journalism appeals to me — my knowledge may be shallow, but I want to make sure it has the width of an ocean. And even if that “something new” turns out to be awful and repulsive, at least I’ll be a damn good trivia player.
