why even watch the sport that you can't even play?

I stopped watching sports about a year ago when i realized i can barely pick up a 30 pound sack of grain, the more sports i watch, the more incompetent i feel.......

Originally posted by EmLasker
I stopped watching sports about a year ago when i realized i can barely pick up a 30 pound sack of grain, the more sports i watch, the more incompetent i feel.......

Can you build a house? If not, do you live in one?

Originally posted by EmLasker
I stopped watching sports about a year ago when i realized i can barely pick up a 30 pound sack of grain, the more sports i watch, the more incompetent i feel.......

I always find it amazing that many of the guys who talk and watch the most sports are the same guys that can't play.

I've always wondered what goes through their minds when they are watching a game. Are they just passive observers simply content to see the result of the play? Do they really even know WHY the play occured? WHY that goal was scored? Why that hole appeared in the O-line? etc. Do they understand the difference between what the player did and what the player was thinking when the player did it?

I find this most interesting in Hockey. Goals are scored all the time but alot of my friends will say it when in because it was a nice shot, or because the goalie let in soft goal or some surficial level answer. They don't know the real reason was because the goalie was screened by the defense or the defensemen was beaten badly because he took his eye off the play for half a second just as the player with the puck made his move causing the D-man to lose his balance as he re-positioned himself with his bodyweight on the wrong foot and at the wrong angle relative to his intended altered direction....

Having played the game myself, I understand what the players are thinking when they do the things they do, but I always wondered what people who've never played must think when they watch a game. I think it must be like reading a book and knowing what the individual words are but not having a clue what they mean when put in a whole sentence.

I find leaf fans are like that.

😛

Originally posted by uzless
[b]I always find it amazing that many of the guys who talk and watch the most sports are the same guys that can't play.

Excellant point- this is the TV SPORT generation.
Most have never played the sports they comment on- their views are shaped by what they see and hear from the 'expart panel' in the studio or what the media brain wash them into thinging what is right or what is wrong.

You always find a bigdiffirence of views of an incident from thoses who play and thoses who have only ever watched

I always find it amazing that many of the guys who read books are the same guys that aren't published authors.

Why would anyone think that the requirement for watching a sport is being able to play it?

Originally posted by quackquack
Why would anyone think that the requirement for watching a sport is being able to play it?

um, we're talking about the difference between simply WATCHING what happens versus UNDERSTANDING what happens.


There is no requirement for simply watching a game. Any monkey can do that.

Originally posted by Marcusr
I always find it amazing that many of the guys who read books are the same guys that aren't published authors.

To use your example, I can read a book written in italian but if I never learned to speak italian I won't understand what the book is about it.

Originally posted by uzless
To use your example, I can read a book written in italian but if I never learned to speak italian I won't understand what the book is about it.

Actually, you are arguing the opposite. The more difficult skill is to play (because presumably you must understand and have skill) just like the more difficult skill is to write a book not read a book. There are many people who can understand a book in Italian who have no qualifications to play and they are 100 millions of people who are qualified to watch professional sports even though only a tiny percentage can actually play.

Originally posted by quackquack
and they are 100 millions of people who are qualified to watch professional sports even though only a tiny percentage can actually play.

There are no "qualifications" to watch something. Anyone can look at something.

Go to an art museum. Stand in front of picasso (not his early works, his more famous impressionist works).

Now, if you didn't know that the painting you are looking at is just an impressionist/abstract take on earlier famous religious paintings, you might find picasso to be confusing. You might think his art is just weird.

The point, dear Henry, is that if you can't put what you are watching into context then there really is no way for you to understand what you are watching.

Art you can learn to appreciate without knowing how to paint. It's really just brushstrokes and a steady hand that seperate artists from non-artists. But, the gap between sports players and non-sports players in much larger. The only way to really understand a sport is to play it.

So, the point is if you don't understand something, why watch it? In the same sense that I don't know why people look at paintings that they don't understand, i don't know why people watch sports that they don't understand.

Originally posted by uzless
There are no "qualifications" to watch something. Anyone can look at something.

Go to an art museum. Stand in front of picasso (not his early works, his more famous impressionist works).

Now, if you didn't know that the painting you are looking at is just an impressionist/abstract take on earlier famous religious paintings, you might find picasso to b ...[text shortened]... hey don't understand, i don't know why people watch sports that they don't understand.

Your characterization of watching sports as an "all or nothing argument" is just wrong. Michael Jordan may have been the greatest basketball players who ever lived be sure has no idea how to be a good GM. Magic Johnson certainly was a bust as a coach as well. A-Rod is a great hitter; he won golden gloves as a shortstop, play third base, might even one day play the outfield or DH. He probably has great knowledge to go with his tremendous skill. He'd be an awful announcer. Matsui had a great world series I am sure he knows a lot about hitting but I doubt he'd have a clue how to pitch, or know how to be a catcher, he might not be able to perfectly analyze footwork around seond base either. You simply do not have to be an expert in all facets of sports to appreciate it or play it.

Originally posted by quackquack
Your characterization of watching sports as an "all or nothing argument" is just wrong. Michael Jordan may have been the greatest basketball players who ever lived be sure has no idea how to be a good GM. Magic Johnson certainly was a bust as a coach as well. A-Rod is a great hitter; he won golden gloves as a shortstop, play third base, might even one ...[text shortened]... You simply do not have to be an expert in all facets of sports to appreciate it or play it.

none of your "comparisons" are actually comparable. Being a player and being a coach are two completely different animals. Being a player and being a GM need to completely different skill sets.

Your examples don't work at all.

But, you obviously won't change your mind but try this next time you are watching a game that you never played. After a goal, or big play, ask someone who played the game and was really good at it. I guarantee you they will give you an explanation of the play that is at a whole different level than the one you are on.

(If they don't give that kind of explanation, they probably figured you wouldn't understand or have tried to explain it to you in the past but you just didn't get it...)

A final thought....

If you can't watch a player and know what is going through his mind, you don't understand the game.

Most of the sports on TV has an announcer team that usually includes someone who's played the game. Every important play (and many not so important plays) are scrutinized in slow motion from many angles. The analyst then goes to great length to explain all those things that the non-player would be slow to pick up on.

For an example. The only hockey I've ever played was floor hockey in gym class (and I was bad even at that). But when watching a hockey telecast, I can see how a given goal was set up by a particular series of passes, or the shooter getting the goalie to commit and then shooting over or around them, or how a player in front blocked the goalie's view, or how a player in front tipped the puck ever so slightly at the last minute, or whatever --- because the analysts do a great job showing you what happened -- and after awhile you start picking up a lot of the stuff that's going on in the game.

Obviously, there are probably subtle things that I will never pick up because I've never really played hockey. Just like there are some subtle things I could tell you about what's going through the mind of a long distance runner during a race that you'd never pick up on because I've had a lot of experience in that area (unless of course, you're a runner yourself) -- but I'm sure you'd be able to pick up 90% of what's going on if you watched a lot of races on TV with good analysts.

Originally posted by uzless

Art you can learn to appreciate without knowing how to paint. It's really just brushstrokes and a steady hand that seperate artists from non-artists. But, the gap between sports players and non-sports players in much larger. The only way to really understand a sport is to play it.

So, the point is if you don't understand something, why watch it? In t at they don't understand, i don't know why people watch sports that they don't understand.

I'm sure if you spoke with great artists, they'd tell you that there's a whole lot more to a great painting than mere brushstrokes and a steady hand. Perhaps you're proving your point by making the same assumptions with art that the non hockey-player makes when watching a hockey game.

But I'm sure you can still appreciate great art - especially if aided by the analysis of a (good) art expert.