I admit it's a strange thing to me when an athlete blames his success on Jesus. Over the years, American sports have had their run-ins with religion. Prayer after a score became so pervasive that there was, for a time, debate about banning such practices from professional sports, though the compromise has been to cut away to another camera instead.
Recently, recovering drug addict Josh Hamilton hit a record 28 shots over the wall during the All Star Game Home Run Derby, and while the commentators could not set aside his dramatic fall and rise in baseball lore, Hamilton certainly capped it by making a fool of himself in an on-feld interview. His props to Jesus were even more awkward than most.
There's also "Touchdown Jesus" at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, or my cousin's ex-husband who once said it wasn't him running the marathon, but rather his savior Jesus Christ. And who the hell really believes that with wars and rumors of wars, starvation, corruption, and general human misery all over the planet, God really gives a damn about who wins a baseball game? Sometimes I think of an old Mark Steel joke: probably never in history has a general stood before his troops and said, "Last night, in this, our hour of need, I prayed to God. Unfortunately, it seems he's backing the Turks on this one."
This mingling of religion and sports is bizarre.
The one that gets me, though, is professional fighters.
This is not to suggest that fighters should not have religion, or should not make their religion known, but Michael Brick's article on cauliflower ear for the New York Times contains a curious paragraph that set me to thinking about the issue yet again:
It's a strange phenomenon, and while one can easily imagine a fighting gym that demands Christian behavior of its students, the most puzzling thing is that the mix of combat and Christ doesn't stop there. Watch any major MMA event, and inevitably you will see someone wearing a t-shirt or hoisting a banner that reads, "Jesus didn't tap".
There are a couple of things wrong with that. In the first place, Jesus did tap, twice; God simply didn't stop the bout. The first came before the main event, when Jesus prayed in Gethsemane that God should remove from him the burden of what was to come. And, indeed, as legend has it, on the cross Jesus asked why God had forsaken him; in his dying throes, even a savior breaks faith.
And yet, for some reason, a scene from McNally's Lips Together, Teeth Apart comes to mind (something to the effect of, "Go ahead! Break my fuckin' arm!")
The sport is about fighting. It is brutal. Sometimes we wince when we see a fighter drop, and his opponent pounces. We in the televised audience can see the light disappear from the stricken fighter, but is the fact that he's actually out clear to the man pummeling him? Indeed, a recent UFC fight saw one fighter look up to the referee and proclaim the fight over. And it should have been. And a couple of seconds later, the referee decided he agreed.
But what can they do? If a fighter doesn't pounce when the opportunity presents itself, he could be making a critical mistake. Overwhelmingly, the victors break away as soon as the referee intervenes, but the reality is that mercy and compassion can turn a fight. A moment's hesitation—Is he really hurt, or just baiting me?—can turn what seems a certain victory into harrowing defeat.
And last weekend, I caught a pretty good boxing match between Cotto and Margarito; I can't recall either of their first names. While Jim Lampley gushed over Cotto's prowess, it seemed to everyone I was watching the fight with that Margarito was, in fact, the more effective fighter. And, in the end, this theory was proven correct. In the eleventh round, Cotto took a knee and the fight was stopped. Even so, having just rocked Cotto and driven him to a knee seconds before, Margarito pounced, and delivered blows to an exhausted fighter who was giving over the match.
Yet, well it should be. The game is about fighting. While Christian principles might serve these fighters well outside the ring, or the octagon, it seems an absurd proposition to figure how to extend that notion during the fight. And after watching a fighter lose because his opponent had repeatedly jabbed him in the eye—in contravention to fight rules—until he was no longer able to continue, one might think of Lisa Simpson when they read that Jesus didn't tap: What does that even mean?
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Notes:
Brick, Michael. "A Badge of Honor for the New Fighter: Mangled Ear". New York Times. July 31, 2008. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/31/sports/othersports/31ears.html
Recently, recovering drug addict Josh Hamilton hit a record 28 shots over the wall during the All Star Game Home Run Derby, and while the commentators could not set aside his dramatic fall and rise in baseball lore, Hamilton certainly capped it by making a fool of himself in an on-feld interview. His props to Jesus were even more awkward than most.
There's also "Touchdown Jesus" at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, or my cousin's ex-husband who once said it wasn't him running the marathon, but rather his savior Jesus Christ. And who the hell really believes that with wars and rumors of wars, starvation, corruption, and general human misery all over the planet, God really gives a damn about who wins a baseball game? Sometimes I think of an old Mark Steel joke: probably never in history has a general stood before his troops and said, "Last night, in this, our hour of need, I prayed to God. Unfortunately, it seems he's backing the Turks on this one."
This mingling of religion and sports is bizarre.
The one that gets me, though, is professional fighters.
This is not to suggest that fighters should not have religion, or should not make their religion known, but Michael Brick's article on cauliflower ear for the New York Times contains a curious paragraph that set me to thinking about the issue yet again:
It's a strange phenomenon, and while one can easily imagine a fighting gym that demands Christian behavior of its students, the most puzzling thing is that the mix of combat and Christ doesn't stop there. Watch any major MMA event, and inevitably you will see someone wearing a t-shirt or hoisting a banner that reads, "Jesus didn't tap".
There are a couple of things wrong with that. In the first place, Jesus did tap, twice; God simply didn't stop the bout. The first came before the main event, when Jesus prayed in Gethsemane that God should remove from him the burden of what was to come. And, indeed, as legend has it, on the cross Jesus asked why God had forsaken him; in his dying throes, even a savior breaks faith.
And yet, for some reason, a scene from McNally's Lips Together, Teeth Apart comes to mind (something to the effect of, "Go ahead! Break my fuckin' arm!")
The sport is about fighting. It is brutal. Sometimes we wince when we see a fighter drop, and his opponent pounces. We in the televised audience can see the light disappear from the stricken fighter, but is the fact that he's actually out clear to the man pummeling him? Indeed, a recent UFC fight saw one fighter look up to the referee and proclaim the fight over. And it should have been. And a couple of seconds later, the referee decided he agreed.
But what can they do? If a fighter doesn't pounce when the opportunity presents itself, he could be making a critical mistake. Overwhelmingly, the victors break away as soon as the referee intervenes, but the reality is that mercy and compassion can turn a fight. A moment's hesitation—Is he really hurt, or just baiting me?—can turn what seems a certain victory into harrowing defeat.
And last weekend, I caught a pretty good boxing match between Cotto and Margarito; I can't recall either of their first names. While Jim Lampley gushed over Cotto's prowess, it seemed to everyone I was watching the fight with that Margarito was, in fact, the more effective fighter. And, in the end, this theory was proven correct. In the eleventh round, Cotto took a knee and the fight was stopped. Even so, having just rocked Cotto and driven him to a knee seconds before, Margarito pounced, and delivered blows to an exhausted fighter who was giving over the match.
Yet, well it should be. The game is about fighting. While Christian principles might serve these fighters well outside the ring, or the octagon, it seems an absurd proposition to figure how to extend that notion during the fight. And after watching a fighter lose because his opponent had repeatedly jabbed him in the eye—in contravention to fight rules—until he was no longer able to continue, one might think of Lisa Simpson when they read that Jesus didn't tap: What does that even mean?
____________________
Notes:
Brick, Michael. "A Badge of Honor for the New Fighter: Mangled Ear". New York Times. July 31, 2008. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/31/sports/othersports/31ears.html