Dork 2 I commend you on your last post, which was definitely the dorkiest in recent memory. It serves as a nice reminder of the gaping hole in sports coverage that this blog fills. When is the last time that you saw an article on “grammatical prescriptivism” on ESPN.com?
On an unrelated note, I am currently visiting the greater Los Angeles area and I was just at a sports bar watching the end of overtime in Game 4. It was a rowdy scene—with a couple of revelers already handcuffed on the curb—but everyone was in high spirits. After Ko-Bry tossed the ball out of bounds, the crowd suddenly broke into a chant: “Defense! Defense! Defense!”
Maybe, I just don’t really like the Lakers, but I am hereby calling for an end to this crap.
First off, Paul Gasol can’t hear you. You’re in a bar in Long Beach and he’s playing in Orlando. So to whom are you talking? If you’re at the game, okay, I’ll let it slide, but otherwise shut up.
Second, chanting “Defense!” while watching basketball is like cheering “Swing!” watching Tiger Woods. Granted sometimes, during halftime, when I’m sitting in my house I just like to yell “Halftime! Halftime! Halftime!” at the screen. It really gets me fired up. In fact, once I was so psyched that I extracted myself from the couch and made nachos during a commercial break.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
A Plea for Sanity
The Kobe-vs-LeBron finals that never was---the overhyped-by-the-sports-media, desperately-hoped-for-by-the-NBA, fetishistically-envisioned-by-those-who-flatter-themselves-to-think-that-they-are-witnessing-history matchup that was basically a foregone conclusion all season long (I mean, Lakers-Celtics happened last year in the same situation, right?)---has, most improbably, brought our long national nightmare of grammatical prescriptivism to the fore.
I'm talking, of course, about subject-verb agreement with the Orlando Magic. Media outlets all over the country, undeterred by the otherwise exceptionless generalization in American sporting grammar that teams control singular agreement when referred to by their city name (Boston is trailing at the half) and plural agreement when referred to by their team name (seriously, why are the Celtics such a bunch of pussies?), have been tripping all over themselves writing ugly, awkward, and, yes, ungrammatical sentences like "Just in time, the Magic goes back to basics." No one, I think, would dispute that the English noun magic controls singular agreement, though perhaps the NYT has some interest in demonstrating to the American public that it recognizes this workmanlike, if mundane, point of grammar. But of course it's not magic, nor any contextually salient amount of same that could be referred to as the magic, that won game 3. It's the Orlando Magic, the basketball team, and basketball teams are plural, regardless of whether or not they have stupid names based on singular mass nouns. To use singular verb agreement here is to succumb to the same type of braindead prescriptivism that led ESPN to briefly force all of its anchors and commentators to use the form RBI as both singular and plural (like moose), leading to a period of broadcasting idiocy in which you would hear that Pujols had four RBI last night, and so on (I mean, why not RsBI, then?).
Like so many other ills in American life, the scourge of singular team names can be traced to the state of Florida, with the entry into their respective leagues of the Magic and the NHL's Tampa Bay Lightning in the late '80s and early '90s (see also: Miami Heat). This subsequently led to an explosion of silly singular names throughout American sports, though the fact that MLB and the NFL have so far avoided the naming malaise (the Devil Rays notwithstanding; Florida again), combined with the fact that the bulk of the singulars are found in the perpetually-below-the-radar MLS, has conspired to keep the agreement issue largely out of the public eye.
But now the Magic are on the NBA's grandest stage, with a river of proverbial ink being spilled about their every move. So, at the risk of sounding like a scone-munching, soccer-obsessed limey like Dork 3, I implore the American sports media to yield to their baser grammatical instincts and use plural agreement with the Magic. We needn't go as far as the Brits themselves and use it for teams referred to by their city name (Manchester are now running aimlessly about the pitch); that just sounds barmy. But if I have to hear one more comment about how the Magic is really shooting well tonight, I might just have to go watch hockey or something.
I'm talking, of course, about subject-verb agreement with the Orlando Magic. Media outlets all over the country, undeterred by the otherwise exceptionless generalization in American sporting grammar that teams control singular agreement when referred to by their city name (Boston is trailing at the half) and plural agreement when referred to by their team name (seriously, why are the Celtics such a bunch of pussies?), have been tripping all over themselves writing ugly, awkward, and, yes, ungrammatical sentences like "Just in time, the Magic goes back to basics." No one, I think, would dispute that the English noun magic controls singular agreement, though perhaps the NYT has some interest in demonstrating to the American public that it recognizes this workmanlike, if mundane, point of grammar. But of course it's not magic, nor any contextually salient amount of same that could be referred to as the magic, that won game 3. It's the Orlando Magic, the basketball team, and basketball teams are plural, regardless of whether or not they have stupid names based on singular mass nouns. To use singular verb agreement here is to succumb to the same type of braindead prescriptivism that led ESPN to briefly force all of its anchors and commentators to use the form RBI as both singular and plural (like moose), leading to a period of broadcasting idiocy in which you would hear that Pujols had four RBI last night, and so on (I mean, why not RsBI, then?).
Like so many other ills in American life, the scourge of singular team names can be traced to the state of Florida, with the entry into their respective leagues of the Magic and the NHL's Tampa Bay Lightning in the late '80s and early '90s (see also: Miami Heat). This subsequently led to an explosion of silly singular names throughout American sports, though the fact that MLB and the NFL have so far avoided the naming malaise (the Devil Rays notwithstanding; Florida again), combined with the fact that the bulk of the singulars are found in the perpetually-below-the-radar MLS, has conspired to keep the agreement issue largely out of the public eye.
But now the Magic are on the NBA's grandest stage, with a river of proverbial ink being spilled about their every move. So, at the risk of sounding like a scone-munching, soccer-obsessed limey like Dork 3, I implore the American sports media to yield to their baser grammatical instincts and use plural agreement with the Magic. We needn't go as far as the Brits themselves and use it for teams referred to by their city name (Manchester are now running aimlessly about the pitch); that just sounds barmy. But if I have to hear one more comment about how the Magic is really shooting well tonight, I might just have to go watch hockey or something.
Sunday, June 7, 2009
Common Sense
You know that old story about how it's better to play at home; how the crowd is the sixth man; how the cheering helps put you over the top?
Well, it doesn't apply if you are the U.S. Soccer Men's National Team. In the crucial 2010 World Cup Qualifier yesterday the crowd of 55,624 at Soldier Field was made up of 60% Honduras supporters.
This is embarrassing. And probably goes some distance towards explaining why the U.S. has yet to become a serious football contender.
Where are the American football fans? Where are the people who love this country? Who bleed red, white, and blue? Where is Glenn Beck?
Seriously, Mr. Beck, instead of putting your efforts into tea bagging, how about you lend a hand to something that isn’t totally lame and asinine.
You think America is number one? Put your money where your mouth is.
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