The Last Thing the Internet Needs Now

sterrapin Gets Easily and Irrationally Offended, Part Two

From the men’s basketball forum at OUInsider.com, in a thread reacting to an Oklahoman story about poor attendance at Oklahoma State Cowboys games and college basketball as a whole.

It was just a matter of time before someone would play this card. And I freely admit that if he can generalize about basketball players, then I can damn sure generalize about bubbas, which I presume him to be. His remarks are indented and italicized.

Well, if you would like some evidence behind the statement, here goes:

1. Basketball does not ignite an entire state or portion of a state like football. Maybe except in rare places like Chapel Hill and Durham,

First of all, you assume that every school even has football. If they don’t have a football program at all (Gonzaga, Butler, Creighton — whose most notable basketball alum is Jazz guard Kyle Korver — this means you) the fanbase has to have something to galvanize it. You probably don’t mean to but it kind of sounds like you’re putting down schools that don’t happen to have a football program.

OTOH, there are programs like Duke and North Carolina whose football programs have not enjoyed as much success as their basketball programs in recent memory.

And just because their football team had some kind of freak successful season doesn’t mean that Kansas is suddenly a football school either.

And always, of course, college sports can be cyclical in nature. Take Kansas, for instance. The next few seasons might tell if KU football is for real. Does anybody remember a few short years ago when Oklahoma basketball (both teams!) went to the Final Four? Can you name the last five or six NCAA basketball champions and then tell me where they are now? One minute you’re up, the next minute you’re down. It happens, and the cycle goes around. The cycle *might* come around for Duke and/or UNC football someday, too (of course you and I and everyone else may be dead by this time and the stands may be filled with roaches, in that they’ll be the only creatures that survive some kind of future holocaust).

but that’s it. Football is gripping, and there is so much more riding on it week by week.

true, college football is a shorter season where every game matters — a chance at a championship can be lost in the first game of the season: Witness OU’s season-opening upset at the hands of Texas Christian a couple of years ago, or this past season’s Michigan/Appalachian State affair — that concludes every year on the convoluted clusterfuck that is the BCS system that has actually turned off my interest in college football.

2. Basketball players are probably not much different than football players. However, I think the main reason interest has waned across the country is a failure to identify with the players.

oh, so I guess you don’t mind paying $3 or $4 for bottled water or a soft drink, or the same for a meat product made out of Things You’d Rather Not Know About at the concession, eh? Or being told by one of the yellow shirts at LNC that “no, you can’t go down to the lower level to that vast sea of empty seats.” If there’s a problem with attendance at sporting events across the board, look at things like that — concession prices, ticket prices, fan experience. I don’t think its fair to blame the kids for what the suits do.

I mean, these guys are up close and personal, within feet of fans.

um, yeah, tell that to everybody in the upper level, where even a good-sized player like Blake Griffin looks no bigger than an ant, and the only way you can watch little Austin Johnson dish and shoot is through the Hubble telescope.

No helmets or pants, you see it all.

wow, I didn’t know they were playing naked … maybe you should shield your wife’s eyes since she apparently can’t do that herself and, well, per Southern Baptist doctrine, she has to completely and totally submit to you and all that shite.

Has anyone informed Senator Coburn of this flagrant nudity at OU athletics events so he can go off on some insane rant similar to his “rampant lesbianism” screed?

To be fair I think he meant “pads,” but hey, if you find something that wasn’t supposed to be there, roll with it.

And what do you see most of the time? Tattoos, headbands, and dreadlocks. Regular people have a hard time identifying with that look.

oh, jumping Jesus on a pogo stick, THAT again. And define “regular people.” Your concept of “regular people” might be different from how someone else defines “regular people.” BTW, Austin Johnson has quite a few vivid tattoos. Does this make him a thug? Let’s see, I never, ever remember reading about him getting in trouble with the law. And not to mention he is flourishing as a player under Jeff Capel more than he ever did under Kelvin Sampson (although injuries have had something to do with that too). Tattoos don’t necessarily make a thug. I thought we were through that shite. Apparently not. And no, I’m not going to rehash the argument about image issues and the like in the NBA. It’s old and its been beaten to death before.

I also hate to tell you that your very existence was the result of two people having sex. Just thought I’d throw that out there, since I sense a kind of subliminal puritanism in your remarks.

Last time I checked, middle class white America had a little problem with beatniks, hippies, punks and goth kids too, but I guess they’re out of your scope because none of them for a variety of reasons would be even a one-star recruit to play any sport, let alone a revenue sport, at a major university.

And BTW, headbands were intended to help sop up sweat before it gets into your eyes, among other things. I can’t help it if some people made them a fashion statement.

Of course, football players have the same traits, but their’s is covered up and farther removed.

at least you acknowledge that its possible they have the same traits, but its “covered up and farther removed.” It behooves me to remind you that some of the most ruthless thugs or otherwise corrupt individuals in human history wore sharp, smart suits and looked presentable to polite society. Those are the ones you really need to be afraid of — they run your corporations, your institutions, maybe your places of worship if you are inclined towards that; and, very, very often, your government.

Right or wrong, basketball [bold emphasis is mine here] players get a thug rap. Middle class, white America probably has a problem embracing that.

Demarcus Granger says hello. Granted, being sent home from the Fiesta Bowl for being caught shoplifting or something isn’t as serious a crime as, oh, rape or dogfighting or drunk driving, but our legal system still defines it as a crime. This doesn’t make Granger a thug by any stretch of the imagination, but it makes him less of someone you’d want your kids to emulate (and how did those kids show up again? It isn’t like you went to Wal Mart and bought a Great Value Child Kit or something, probably because you didn’t want to pay the extra money for the brand-name Child Kit).

And if you don’t think football players are capable of some repugnantly hateful thuggery, revisit this case involving four Oklahoma State Cowboy football players.

And don’t remind me about JR Raymond, Jabahri Brown, Matt Gipson, Terrell Everett, Brandon Foust, or Lawrence McKenzie either. People make mistakes, but it just seems to me that the poster has more of a problem with basketball players fucking up as opposed to football players fucking up. At the end of the day, the result is usually the same: An institution is shamed because of the mistakes of a few, and in that case, nobody really wins. It doesn’t matter if its a football player or a basketball player, or a professor or administrator or even the president of an institution (Oral Roberts University, anyone?)

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And wouldn’t you know it, later in the thread appears this from the same poster. It is possible that he was probably playing to his audience — on the OU boards there has been a longstanding rift between “football only” fans and those who follow ALL OU sports, football included:

Oh, don’t you worry. Owen Field [the OUInsider football message board] is where I’m headed. Hell, I just thought I’d check in over here on the Clark situation, see what the scuttlebutt was. Then I saw the headline about the DOK article and thought “Hey, I used to be a big hoops fan, but now I think it sucks. Wonder if there are more people out there like me.” And sure enough, there are. So, don’t you worry big fella, you won’t see me here again. I much prefer Owen Field and football. Basketball is for jock sniffers. And, by they way, not only did I graduate from OU, but I am also a donor. Just not to the basketball program, Jack.

To which another poster responded:

Actually, if you donate to the University through athletics that makes you a member of The Sooner Club. You not only donate for both basketball programs, but also to sports like tennis, gymnastics and all over varsity sports under The University of Oklahoma: not just football.

So, in short, thanks for your support!

Pwned. Maybe this guy should just give to the Touchdown Club if he doesn’t want basketball-playing student athletes to benefit from his generous gifts to his alma mater (I believe the Tip In Club for basketball is similar … you can be donor to the Touchdown Club or the Tip In Club but that doesn’t necessarily make you a university athletics donor).

Back to the thread though, while there were more rational arguments for explaining poor attendance (overexposure of games on cable, the fact that casual fans don’t pay attention to college basketball until late February or early March, things like that), I was more alarmed by the general apathy at the poster’s comments. A few jumped in to give the guy a well-deserved beating, like this responder:

I go to OU, my family has had season tickets in bball and football for years. We never miss games! Jermaine you obviously never attended nor do you donate to the university. A bandwagon fan you are. It’s sad….. People like you are the reason OU fans get a bad wrap when it comes to bandwagoning. Go cheer for some other school. And the comment on white america not relating to bball players. Ya, that’s why NBA games are so popular. You’re totally right. Have you seen our bball team this year? Who is covered in tats on our team? Your sentiment with bball is obviously not shared with this board. Go to OF where the rest of football only people live. Thank you…..

But except for that and one other response in the thread, these seemed like little voices in the far off wilderness. In the broad picture, sports message boards do give fans a place to congregate and vent, but shouldn’t be construed as the majority opinion of a fanbase — all fanbases have their bad apples.

It’s more the aspect that gives me pause is that I actually know a few people in real life that actually think like this.