Why Basketball is the Best Sport
Basically, it's because no one dies or winds up in a wheelchair as an aftereffect of playing the sport.
Can't say that about baseball, football, or hockey. Along with the drama, competition, athleticism, and downright beauty of hoops is a measure of safety when the game is played. The other big three American sports provide the more blood thirsty fans with the chance that something very, very bad might happen. I find that lack of drama compelling in basketball. I don't want to see dudes get hurt. Ever.
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The wicked but, in my mind, perfectly legitimate hit on the Bruins winger Nathan Horton two nights ago has shaken me up good. That was ugly: watching the man suffer like that, with his hand frozen in the air, obviously, at minimum, severely concussed and possibly with a broken spinal column. I had a hard time getting any enjoyment out of the blowout win that followed. Man, Horton's life will be different from now on, all because he kept his head down for an extra second and some guy jammed him good. It's part of the game, and that's what is bothering me.
My sport, the beautiful game of basketball, does not offer the sickening physicality of the other major team sports. When someone blows out their knee on the court, I wince and know that the injury is painful and leads to a long recovery process. But I can live without my knees, and so can the players who get hurt. I can't live without my brain, or have much or a life without my spinal column, and that's what is at risk in the other games.
Dozens of people have died due to batted or thrown baseballs. As an aside, I am eternally confounded by the mindlessness of so many fans at baseball games who do not pay attention: they can die from a batted ball. Don't they know that? I don't know if anyone has ever died on a hockey rink (a fan was killed a few years back by a deflected shot into the stands), but the sport is brutally physical. And of course in football hundreds of players have been killed throughout the century plus of organized play.
I realize the players should come to grips with the risks of their sport when they take the field/rink. But don't tell me they knowingly signed up for life as a quad, or death. No one wants to have happen to them what happened to Horton, or expects it. In the aftermath, I've been slapped in the face with the reality that Nathan Horton almost wound up with a broken neck and a lifetime in a wheelchair on Monday night, and that's altered my enjoyment of the Bs being in the Stanley Cup finals, something I've longed for for 19 years.
Can't say that about baseball, football, or hockey. Along with the drama, competition, athleticism, and downright beauty of hoops is a measure of safety when the game is played. The other big three American sports provide the more blood thirsty fans with the chance that something very, very bad might happen. I find that lack of drama compelling in basketball. I don't want to see dudes get hurt. Ever.
----------
The wicked but, in my mind, perfectly legitimate hit on the Bruins winger Nathan Horton two nights ago has shaken me up good. That was ugly: watching the man suffer like that, with his hand frozen in the air, obviously, at minimum, severely concussed and possibly with a broken spinal column. I had a hard time getting any enjoyment out of the blowout win that followed. Man, Horton's life will be different from now on, all because he kept his head down for an extra second and some guy jammed him good. It's part of the game, and that's what is bothering me.
My sport, the beautiful game of basketball, does not offer the sickening physicality of the other major team sports. When someone blows out their knee on the court, I wince and know that the injury is painful and leads to a long recovery process. But I can live without my knees, and so can the players who get hurt. I can't live without my brain, or have much or a life without my spinal column, and that's what is at risk in the other games.
Dozens of people have died due to batted or thrown baseballs. As an aside, I am eternally confounded by the mindlessness of so many fans at baseball games who do not pay attention: they can die from a batted ball. Don't they know that? I don't know if anyone has ever died on a hockey rink (a fan was killed a few years back by a deflected shot into the stands), but the sport is brutally physical. And of course in football hundreds of players have been killed throughout the century plus of organized play.
I realize the players should come to grips with the risks of their sport when they take the field/rink. But don't tell me they knowingly signed up for life as a quad, or death. No one wants to have happen to them what happened to Horton, or expects it. In the aftermath, I've been slapped in the face with the reality that Nathan Horton almost wound up with a broken neck and a lifetime in a wheelchair on Monday night, and that's altered my enjoyment of the Bs being in the Stanley Cup finals, something I've longed for for 19 years.
posted by joe sweeney at 9:02 PM
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