FOOLSBALL

This past weekend, in response to an article at The Bulwark, I posted the following:

“People who pay attention to what athaleets have to say (even the "good ones") are the people Mencken had in mind 97 years ago when he said "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public." Professional athletics are what they have always been, going back as far as you can to find evidence of their existence: a distraction. Aaron Rodgers and Bugs Bunny operate in the same space, except Bugs has a brain.”

As of this morning, it’s gotten a lot of “likes” - from lib’ruls, conservative never-Trumpers, independents of all stripes. Sports fans.

Which I have to admit surprised me, given the way most Americans are about sports, and particularly so about what I have called “Foolsball” since I was back in high school.

I’ve hated foolsball since the guy who became my high school’s leading wide receiver ended up in my home room class in 7th Grade and decided I would be his victim. After three years of his bullying (supported by the laughter and egging-on of his fellow team mates in whatever it is little league foolsball is called), we were finally on the high school swimming team sophomore year, and one night after practice, in the shower, he decided to have some fun, at my expense. Except this time I beat the shit out of him. He made a rat tail of his towel and started snapping me. I grabbed it, which pulled him off-balance and he went down. It took six other guys to pull me off him; I was on top of him, slamming his face into the tile floor repeatedly, and I was screaming “I’ll fight you all!”

Nobody. EVER. Fucked. With. Me. Again. It was the only fight I ever got into in my life.

I learned from friends at the tenth year high school class reunion (the only one I ever attended; I left Denver 72 hours after graduation and have never “been back,” even though I have returned for various family responsibilities and did go to college for a year in the state) that most people were afraid of me in high school “after you beat up Darryl.” As it turned out, I also learned he was one of the two members of my class whose parents were “the first ones on their block to have their boy come home in a box,” as Country Joe McDonald (a veteran) put it. There were rumors he’d been “fragged,” which I thought when I heard them would have been an appropriate karmic end for a useless asswipe. And he still had that scar over his left eye that took four stitches to close up.

One can be loved, respected, or feared. Personally, I prefer the first two, generally in a combination of “both, please.” But “Yea, I have no fear, when I walk through the Valley of Death... for I am the baddest motherfucker in the valley” is not a bad reputation to have in some circles. (I once learned that an idiot agent had said of me, “Don’t cross him - he’ll kneecap you,” which is a very good reputation to have in Okeefenokee West)

There are several would-be internet bullies who were very surprised when they were tracked down and their address given to the FBI, who knocked on their door and gave them a lecture on the workings of the Internet Terrorism Act. Certain idiots in my hobby (it unfortunately has more than its share of them, though the overwhelming majority are so nice I can even be nice to the ones I know voted for That Fucking Guy) call the experience “being cleavered,” as in with a meat axe. I’ve outlived almost all of them. Nowadays, I don’t have to do any of that anymore; the reputation is known.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate all sports. Just “team sports” - and most of them I don’t hate; I just never took up any interest in them. (Don’t get me started on why watching paint dry is more interesting than a World Series baseball game. To each their own.)

I love single-participant sports, where it’s you versus the game. To me, the Greatest Sports Moment Ever can be googled, and I don’t know how many times I have watched it; it will never get old: go to YouTube and search “Franz Klammer Olympic Downhill 1976” and you can watch it too.

Klammer was the favorite to win the downhill at that Olympics, but on his final run, he was almost two seconds behind at the halfway point. That’s an eternity. And you can see the moment where he Turns On The Afterburner. He is flying down the hill! He is hanging it out so far over the edge that if he “catches an edge,” “tips his balance,” even the slightest, does the slightest anything “off,” when they dig him out of the snow and put him on the stretcher, the blanket will be over his face. Do or die, there is no try. And he does it! He not only makes up the seconds he was behind, he ends up two seconds better than the Silver Medallist.

The. Greatest. Moment. In. Sports.

My high school swimming coach once gave us a lecture that the reason to participate in a sport is to find out who you are, what you are.

He was right, and it’s true: sports does reveal who you are. What you are.

My favorite “sports movie” is “Downhill Racer,” made in 1969, directed by the great Michael Ritchie at the start of his career. It stars Robert Redford as “Billy Chappelet,” the first American to win the Olympic Downhill (something that wouldn’t happen for many years yet when it was released); Gene Hackman as “Coach Claire;” my friend Jim McMullan plays “Creech” (he still says it’s the best thing he ever did, and he’s right); the screenplay is one of two ever written by the amazing American writer, James Salter.

To me, the interesting “inside baseball” thing about the movie is that it’s the first thing Redford did after Making It as The Sundance Kid in “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.” When you Arrive like that in Hollywood, the first question everyone has is “What do you want to do, that I can do with you, Mr. Star?” And Redford’s answer was “I want to do this,” and he whipped out the screenplay, which a friend of Salter’s had gotten to him when he was described as “throw a stick at Malibu and you’ll hit ten of him,” by Jack Warner when George Roy Hill announced Redford was his choice to play Sundance. “Downhill Racer” at the time had been floating around Hollywood for “awhile,” as they say. People read it and loved it and then asked “But how do we make it?” because at the time film technology didn’t have the ability to get feature-quality film results for the Skier-POV shots.

Also, the protagonist was “dislikable.” He wasn’t the hero. The hero is a guy whose name nobody knows. (He’s played by the - uncredited - great German actor-director Christian Doermer)

Which is the point of the story.

With Redford’s star power, and his willingness to “adjust his quote” (down), they went out and made the movie, and because he figured out how to get those Skier-POV shots (which are still exciting to watch), Michael Ritchie “arrived.” Jim once told me that Ritchie and Cinematographer Brian Probyn came up with a mount they could put on a special helmet, and the “really good skiers” as Jim described the stunt department, to shoot the skier shots with 16mm cameras with the film running 32 fpm and blown up to 35mm in the lab.

The movie is a wonderful portrait of sports. The simplicity of the way the ski team lives will boggle the modern sports fan; the simple sincerity of their belief in what they’re doing will also boggle the modern sports fan, since it’s something that almost doesn’t exist anymore in modern sports.

It’s also prescient. Billy Chappelet is a perfect example of The Modern Sports Hero. He’s an unworthy asshole. From beginning to end, and his assholery is rewarded at the end.

But he walks away at the end, knowing in his heart who the real champion is.

The finale is the last run of the Olympic Downhill. Chappelet overcomes every difficulty he’s mostly put in his own way, and he sets a record. He’s the winner! The first American to win the Olympic Downhill! The crowd surges around him, ecstatic.

But there’s one skier left to make his run. Nobody pays attention to him.

When he’s at the three-quarters point, someone down below glances up, sees him, then sees the timing clock. He taps a friend on the shoulder, whispers to him. The rest of the crowd surrounds Billy. The friend taps another friend. The Last Skier continues his run. It’s one for the ages. Finally, someone whispers the news to Billy and he looks up just as the guy passes the halfway point. His time is better. Much better.

And then, disaster strikes. He catches an edge and loses his balance. He’s suddenly a ball flying through the air, skis coming off, to land in a pile of snow to the side of the course.

The crowd goes back to congratulating the champion. But Billy keeps glancing up the hill. The Last Skier gets up, cleans off the snow, finds his skis, puts them on, and pushes off. He has no chance of accomplishing anything anyone will remember. He gets to the bottom, stops, and looks at Billy. He and Chappelet “lock eyes.” And then Chappelet looks away because he can’t meet the look.

The crowd surges around him, he’s the champion.

But the look on his face in the midst of the celebration says he remembers the words of Coach Claire: “The trouble with you, Chappelet, is you have no respect for the work.”

Fade to Black, as they say.

I’m serious, if you look at the character of Billy Chappelet, you are looking at the Modern Sports Hero. The guy (they’re all guys) who becomes a multi-millionaire, fawned over by an army of “friends” dependent on his money-making ability - his agent, his manager, the team owner, all the other sycophants. They love him. He’s the asshole. As my friend Ron Shelton also demonstrated in “Bull Durham” when it’s Tim Robbins’ Ebby Calvin “Nuke” Laloosh who goes to The Show while Kevin Costner’s “Crash Davis” remains behind.

He’s the guy who becomes Aaron Rodgers. Professional. Asshole. Moron.

Like my coach said, participating in sports will reveal who you are. What you are.

It also does that to the people who watch. Because while Aaron Rodgers deserves to get a colder shoulder than Colin Kaepernick’s gotten for Being Not A Sports Asshole, he’s getting cheers.

He should be fired. But it won’t happen. The team won’t fire his ignorant white trash ass, because sure as Goddess made little green apples, as they say, the line of teams wanting to give him even more money to play for them in their Corporate Welfare Socialism Roman Coliseums would be out the door.

He’s good for putting more money in everybody’s pockets and letting the Fans believe that We’re Number One. USA! USA!

Because that’s all sports, and anything else that used to be worthwhile, is now in these here United States of Today.

“People who pay attention to what athaleets have to say (even the "good ones") are the people Mencken had in mind 97 years ago when he said "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public." Professional athletics are what they have always been, going back as far as you can to find evidence of their existence: a distraction. Aaron Rodgers and Bugs Bunny operate in the same space, except Bugs has a brain.”

Fuck you, Aaron Rodgers, you worthless piece of shit. And the fucking morons who think you’re Da Man.

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