Game theory

As anyone will tell you, I am so, so far from being a spectator sport nut that I can’t even brag about my ignorance because it is too embarrassing. Football mystifies me (both what goes on on the field and why people are watching). Baseball is only a notch above soap operas. Basketball looks like it ought to be fun but somehow, for me, it isn’t.

All this is puzzling since many would regard me as moderately athletic. I like sports. I’m not especially talented at many but I have done a lot in my life. I have even rowed for the UW crew team (that would be the University of Warsaw!) and I have considered amateur downhill racing one especially gratifying skiing season back in New England.

So what’s with sports watching?

Ann blogged (here) how she disliked watching team sports. I am with her on that, even though I have no good reason for my disfavor. In fact, you’d think I’d be the type to appreciate watching a team join together in the pursuit of excellence. But no. What I love to watch (and this spills over into non-athletic domains as well) is individual excellence. And so, indeed, I make a sports exception: I am an Olympic nut.

Summer Olympics, however, have been a cruel presence. With one exception (Australia, in September), they are always…. in the summer. Since I am often chasing my European roots then, I have been forced to look at the games through Italian eyes twice in the last dozen years, and through Polish eyes once. It’s been a nightmare. The Poles (up until this year where I am sure they are obsessing about their medalist swimmer) seem keen on airing the flight of the ping pong ball: back and forth and back and forth, through endless elimination rounds. The Italians – well, they get so PASSIONATE about all things Italian. The medals are rare, but when they come, the craze level rises to such heights that you might as well give up thinking that you’ll see anything but the repeat of the speed walker, over and over again, until the next medal is awarded, sometime in the future.

I should also say that being in Europe does trump watching the Olympics and so for me, the summer games get shortchanged. But come winter, two years from now -- that's when I can really indulge this little love of mine. Nothing distracts me in February. [I have no kind words to offer about February in Wisconsin.] Once, every four years, the world comes alive through athletic competition during that dullest of all months.

But for now, I can just catch the tail end of an event. Here and there, by myself. It’s not the way it was meant to be. A boisterous crowd of like-minded people would be preferable, but one takes what one can get – in this case, a private moment, late at night, relishing the victory of some very talented individual, wherever she or he may come from.