Spectator Life

There was a time, not long ago, when any NFL franchise with a coaching vacancy was desperately searching for the next Sean McVay. This was explicitly spelled out: we want the next McVay, a literal clone if possible. Now, only six years into his head coaching career and following his first losing season, Sean McVay isn't entirely sure he wants to be Sean McVay anymore; at least not Sean McVay the football coach, at least not for a while. That McVay spent years representing the mold that coaches aspired to had something to do with the cult of the wunderkind. Every few years, there's a new hotshot coordinator or ascendant college coach who is said to be taking the NFL by storm.

Another bowl season has come and gone. For a college football fan such as myself, bowl season has typically been its own holiday. Taking trips to popular vacation destinations like Miami, New Orleans, or Southern California if your program is pretty good, or slightly less popular destinations like Shreveport, Mobile and Birmingham if your program is mediocre. Hanging out with family and catching up with old school chums and seeing who’s getting fatter and who’s getting richer. Participating in low- or high-level alcoholism, depending on your preference. (Like the Air Force, I prefer to Aim High.) I loved bowl season. For years, I used to watch practically every game.

Argentine soccer legend Diego Armando Maradona died in 2020, at that time still the last man to lead his nation’s team to a World Cup championship. On Sunday, in some sense Maradona passed away again, as Lionel Messi lifted the golden trophy and his own legacy as not only the greatest Argentine player of all time, but possibly the greatest to ever lace up boots in the world. Tuesday has been declared a national bank holiday in the South American nation, not that anyone there has stopped partying since the famous win on Sunday. The heroes' welcome will be for this band of players, especially Messi, who snapped the thirty-six-year World Cup drought. But make no mistake, the image of Maradona will also be on display far and wide.

Americans are truly excellent at four things: ingenuity, marketing, making chicken wings and inventing their own sports. The first three, of course, are also all foundational pillars of American sporting glory; it would be nothing without the wings. And so, as the US gears up to face the Netherlands on Saturday, its first ever appearance in the knockout round of the World Cup this century, I am duty bound to issue a plea: for the love of all that you hold sacred, please America, don’t get into soccer. This would be a huge mistake. While covering the World Cup in Doha, I’ve watched the US men’s national team, or USMNT as they are unforgivably referred to, play in a couple of games. And I have to say I'm pretty concerned.

The 1-0 Team USA victory over Iran in a World Cup match that was crucial to both teams seemed to take place in a different universe from the grand geopolitical narratives that swirled around it. This was nothing like the infamous 1956 Melbourne Bloodbath between the Hungarian and Soviet water polo teams, facing off weeks after the USSR's bloody suppression of Hungary's revolution. The stakes in Doha were very high: for Iran, only a win or a draw would see them advance; for America, win or go home. Yet there did not appear to be any tension or enmity between the players on the field. No screaming matches, head butts, or dirty fouls. There were few controversial calls by the referee.

The World Cup has just begun and it’s already shaping up to be the wokest iteration of the world’s grandest sporting event in history. Twelve years ago, corrupt FIFA officials awarded the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, a Gulf state of less than three million people and about the size of Connecticut. In the intervening years, most of the criticism of this decision focused on the bribery scandal that engulfed FIFA and claims from human rights groups that some 6,000 migrant laborers died on the job during the frenzied construction of eight stadiums and other buildings for the tournament. Attacks on the host country have broadened in recent days, focusing predominantly on Qatar’s laws criminalizing homosexuality.

Two days before the start of the FIFA World Cup in Qatar, authorities have decided to ban the sale of alcohol within the eight stadiums hosting matches. Only non-alcoholic options will be available. Cockburn is appalled at the audacity of such a move — soccer without booze!? How will anyone cope? Beer will apparently be available at the Fan Festival among other areas, but that's little consolation. Not to mention the fact that Budweiser had a sponsorship deal with FIFA for the World Cup. Who knew that the Gulf nation could be so ruthless? (Lots of people.) Qatar is already struggling to attract fans, with inadequate lodging options and incredibly high fees.

Winter is just around the corner — and you know what that means: the Soccer World Cup? Yes, as sleigh bells ring and children listen, a motley crew of twenty- and thirtysomething millionaires will be kicking balls around in hastily constructed stadiums in the desert. The tournament is in Qatar for the first time — not known as a great footballing nation (their men’s team has never qualified on merit), but the head of their FA was deputy head of FIFA during Sepp Blatter’s appallingly corrupt tenure, so that’s got to be a good enough reason to host it there. In the middle of the regular season. In new arenas that thousands of migrant workers died building.

As with a couple of prominent unmarried senators, Americans have long suspected that soccer might be gay. Now, it’s official. On Monday, the US men’s national team unveiled a redesign to the team’s logo that replaces red stripes in the crest with the rainbow colors of the gay pride flag. https://twitter.com/USMNT/status/1592266453952172041 Soccer’s decision to come out of the closet ahead of the World Cup, and to live as its authentic self, was met with shrugs of “well, obviously” and “I always thought soccer might be gay since that time I caught soccer trying on my make-up and lipsyncing to Donna Summer.

The hapless Washington Commanders can’t do anything right. And I do mean anything. In September, a first-time Washington Commanders season ticket holder won more than $14,000 in a charitable raffle. After about six weeks of pestering the franchise, he finally received the check. It bounced. Of course, Washington’s football team — whose new name I can hardly muster the energy to speak, let alone write — is having yet another lackluster year on the gridiron. The team enjoys a miserable, if predictable, losing record. Coach Ron Rivera, who all things being equal is better than many of his predecessors, earlier this month seemed to throw shade at underperforming (and now injured) quarterback Carson Wentz.

Cheating scandals in sports are, sadly, not uncommon. Tom Brady was suspended for several games after the NFL claimed he was "generally aware" of a plot to deflate footballs to make them easier to throw. The Houston Astros fired their manager for using video footage to steal opponents' signs. Barry Bonds missed out on a spot in the baseball Hall of Fame over his use of performance enhancing drugs. Cyclist Lance Armstrong was stripped of his seven consecutive Tour de France titles and an Olympic medal for doping. Still, it's fairly unusual for cheating to make national headlines unless it occurs outside of one of the four major professional sporting leagues. That's why it caught my attention when there were three major cheating scandals involving niche sports in just one month.

Ever since the Supreme Court's 2018 ruling that allowed sports gambling to explode across the nation, the United States has seen a steady increase in the ready availability of gambling opportunities and apps that are now some of the main advertisers and sponsors for sports coverage of all stripes — from ESPN, Fox, NBC and CBS to the likes of Barstool and podcasts a plenty. Some traditionalists and conservatives are put off by this — gambling, they've long argued, is bad for communities and imposes a tax on working-class Americans. That's certainly true when it comes to the presence of casinos and the regressive taxation of lotteries. But sports gambling, unlike other forms of gambling, has significant social benefits that should not be ignored.

National soccer teams can have terrible build-ups and do well in the World Cup. They can have great results before the World Cup and flop at the tournament. But is any US Men’s National Team fan confident this team can get out of its group? Are the players? Remember, US Soccer waited a year for Gregg Berhalter. So far, he has matched the accomplishments of previous managers Bruce Arena (for 2002, at least), Bob Bradley and Jurgen Klinsmann: qualify for a World Cup and win a Gold Cup. The CONCACAF Nations League didn’t exist during the tenures of the other managers, though I wouldn’t hang my hat on laboring through to the Nations League finals, then beating Mexico in extra-time on home soil.

All signs point to the BYU-Duke volleyball incident being just another hate crime hoax. Add it to the list with Jussie Smollett's run-in with MAGA hat-wearing, bleach-pouring racists outside a Chicago subway, Bubba Wallace's terrifying encounter with a noose in a NASCAR garage, or a Colorado Rockies fan's injudicious shouting of a racial slur at a black batter. Duke University volleyball player Rachel Richardson claimed after a match against Brigham Young University two weeks ago that a member of the BYU student section was repeatedly calling her the N-word while she was serving. The only problem? There's no evidence it ever happened. BYU provided an update on its investigation into the incident on Friday.

Duke University volleyball player Rachel Richardson claimed that she was the target of racial slurs during a match against Brigham Young University this past weekend — but her story seems to have less evidence than the rape allegations once leveled against members of her school's lacrosse team. It was actually Lesa Pamplin, Richardson's godmother, who first made the accusation on Twitter. She claimed that Richardson was called the N-word "every time she served. She was threatened by a white male that told her to watch her back going to the team bus. A police officer had to be put by their bench." Richardson later confirmed the alleged incident in her own Twitter statement.

“Paradoxes arise within an individual in proportion to their growing status or fame,” the author Stewart Stafford reminds us. Whether it’s the sexual peccadilloes of Bill Cosby or Harvey Weinstein, Lance Armstrong’s relaxed approach to his diet, or the apparent reluctance of certain well-known television performers to overdo it when it comes to wearing trousers in the green room, for many of our celebrities it seems that personal license is the rule and sustained self-restraint the exception.

There were runners on first and second. The batter hit a ball through the gap between the shortstop and third base, and off the runners went. Except the shortstop immediately got in the way of the runner coming from second, and started smacking him with a glove. The confused runner covered his head with his hands as he maneuvered around the shortstop, and barely made it to third base in time to beat the throw from left field. Such are the joys of little league baseball, of which I recently completed my third season of coaching. I approached the shortstop after that play, and explained to her that she was not allowed to tag the runner with her glove unless she actually had the ball. “Oh, I know,” she retorted. “I was trying to stop him from getting to third base.

The Washington Redskins — sorry, Football Team — sorry, Commanders — aren't letting a name change be the end of their ridiculous virtue signaling. Last week, the organization fined defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio $100,000 for expressing a completely benign political opinion about the January 6 Capitol riot. Del Rio first caught the attention of the woke scolds when he responded to a tweet about the January 6 committee hearings by the Brookings Institute's Norm Eisen. Eisen hasn't been shy about calling January 6 an "insurrection," and insists that former president Donald Trump is going to be charged with crimes for his alleged role in the Capitol riot. Del Rio asked why Eisen wasn't talking about "the summer of riots, looting, burning and the destruction of personal property.

The woes of the world are a’plenty. People are anxious, stressed-out, and burned-out. It seems that no matter what side of the political aisle you gravitate toward, there’s a new battle to be fought at the dawn of each day. Even innocent settings — school board meetings, comedy shows, the Magic Kingdom itself — are not immune from partisan vitriol. Luckily for us, though, this is Derby Day, which means it’s the perfect time to do something about the very real but underreported disorder that’s been plaguing our society for a while now: we’ve forgotten how to have fun. It’s a contagious disease that affects brain function and mood, and if left untreated, could result in everyone becoming a smug, humorless elitist (a prognosis worse than Covid).

The left is now arguing that the people most upset about biological men like Lia Thomas and Laurel Hubbard competing in women's sports are the ones who otherwise don't care about or watch women's sports. It's nonsense, just like the argument that men can't have an opinion on abortion, but allow me to present my credentials nonetheless. I was a three-sport varsity athlete in high school, and was most accomplished as a goalie for the field hockey team. I broke my school's record for saves in a season and was named Defensive Player of the Year in my region. Alas, I wasn't quite good enough to be recruited to a Division I team, so I opted to play on the club team at Georgetown.

Reka Gyorgy showed commendable courage this weekend for finally speaking out against the National College Athletic Association's rules regarding trans competitors. The Virginia Tech swimmer and Olympian was bumped out of a finals spot in the 500 free due to transgender University of Pennsylvania swimmer Lia Thomas's participation. In a letter posted to her Instagram account, Gyorgy wrote, "It feels like that final spot was taken away from me because of the NCAA's decision to let someone who is not a biological female compete... [Thursday] is the result of the NCAA and their lack of interest in protecting their athletes." Gyorgy is one of the first NCAA female swimmers to speak publicly about the negative impact Thomas's participation in the sport has on women.

It was only fitting that China's hopes of putting on the perfect Olympics should ultimately be dashed by its new partner in crime, Russia. The two countries started the Beijing Winter Olympics by announcing a "no-limits" partnership against the West, and ended them with one of the biggest sporting scandals in recent Olympic history. If the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics were China's coming out party, then the 2022 Winter games would tell the world that the rising authoritarian regime was stronger — and cockier — than ever. The opening ceremony jabbed at those critical of China's human rights abuses by highlighting China's diversity and allowing a Uighur to carry the Olympic torch.

“The Big Game” was this weekend. A hundred million or so people of all races, genders, ages, creeds and sexual orientations from Nome, Alaska, to Key West, Florida, to Bangor, Maine, to Monterey, California, and everywhere in between were drawn together, like moths to a plasma screen TV, to tune in to “the most watched TV event in America.” What is it about the Super Bowl? Why does it cause so many of us, even those who don’t really understand the game, to suspend our Sunday scaries and partake in this most sacred ritual of pounding domestic beers, Buffalo chicken wings, and seven-layer dip, partying like there’s no company-wide conference call bright and early Monday morning?

The Chinese Communist Party has a brilliant new propagandist in Olympic gold medalist Eileen Gu, the American-born freestyler skier who is competing for China in this year's Winter Games. Gu is a talented athlete, gifted academically, and, well, gorgeous — she has done modeling campaigns for Louis Vuitton, Fendi and Gucci and has appeared on the covers of Elle and Vogue China. She's also a traitor. Gu, who is 18, was born and raised in San Francisco by her American father and Chinese mother. She plans to attend college at Stanford University. Yet she announced in 2019 that she would represent China in the 2022 Beijing Olympics.

The media showering that China has received during the Beijing Winter Olympics has been both a national and international disgrace. NBC has been tiptoeing around how the Games are being held in the shadow of Uighur concentration camps, while athletes describe horrid living conditions including food that makes Fyre Festival’s cuisine look like a gourmet meal. But almost nothing compares to Western outlets repeating Chinese Communist Party talking points over the coerced interview confession that Chinese tennis star Peng Shuai gave to the French magazine L’Equipe this weekend. Late last year, Shuai accused a former senior CCP official, Zhang Gaol, of sexual assault in a social media post.

The thing I am looking forward to the least right now is the Olympics, and I have a colonoscopy scheduled. The only answer is a drinking game. Enough with "politics by sportscasters for those who only care about politics." I threw away my Mao (and Che) T-shirts sophomore year. We all know Beijing is not a democratic regime. So for some sort of balance, can we all agree that for every hundred references to the Uighurs, Tibet and Hong Kong, we make one to where and how Covid all began? Or will the mainstream media continue their coverage détente? Bottoms up for every reference to bats, pangolins and Chinese wet markets. Speaking of Covid, a drink every time announcers insist China's Covid crackdown is autocratic draconianism while ignoring that much of the same was done in America.

Apologies to woke athletes — Nancy Pelosi doesn’t want you to “use your platform” in Beijing. On Thursday, the House Speaker testified before the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, and discouraged America’s Winter Olympians from issuing political statements about China’s authoritarian regime. “I would say to our athletes: you’re there to compete. Do not risk incurring the anger of the Chinese government, because they are ruthless,” she said. “I know there is a temptation on the part of some to speak out while they are there,” Pelosi continued. “I respect that. But I also worry about what the Chinese government might do to their reputations, to their families.

Tom Brady was never the most approachable quarterback in the NFL. That would be Peyton Manning, who just last weekend brought down the house on Saturday Night Live. Aaron Rodgers is probably more athletic; Patrick Mahomes and Matthew Stafford have those cannon-fire arms. Lamar Jackson knows when to run the ball, while any number of QBs might be said to be faster. Yet it's Brady who is indisputably the greatest of all time. Somehow the geeky kid from that rookie weigh-in photo all the way back in 2000, the one who looked like he spent too much time brooding in a computer lab, blossomed into a force of nature the likes of which the professional sports world has never known.