George Will Is Definitely Not Ready for Some Football

[n2doc]

By Jonathan Chait


George Will is a longtime hater of liberalism, and a longtime hater of football, so it makes sense that he would try to align his hatreds and write a column arguing that college football is an expression of liberalism:

College football became a national phenomenon because it supposedly served the values of progressivism, in two ways. It exemplified specialization, expertise and scientific management. And it would reconcile the public to the transformation of universities, especially public universities, into something progressivism desired but the public found alien. Replicating industrialism’s division of labor, universities introduced the fragmentation of the old curriculum of moral instruction into increasingly specialized and arcane disciplines. These included the recently founded social sciences — economics, sociology, political science — that were supposed to supply progressive governments with the expertise to manage the complexities of the modern economy and the simplicities of the uninstructed masses.

Football taught the progressive virtue of subordinating the individual to the collectivity. Inevitably, this led to the cult of one individual, the coach.

One flaw with Will's thesis here is that the regions of the country most enamored with college football are least enamored with liberalism. College football is most popular in the Deep South, followed by the Midwest, followed by the West Coast, followed by the Northeast. The popularity of liberalism by region is that list in reverse.

The obvious solution here is for George Will to tour the Deep South explaining to rabid football fans that they have been taken in by the sinister hand of progressivism.

http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2012/09/george-will-is-not-ready-for-some-football.html

[bluestateguy]

1. On the Ken Burns baseball documentary Will said:

that he grew up a Cubs fan and all his friends were Cardinals fans. They grew up happy and liberal and he grew up bitter and conservative.

[randome]

2. Has prissy little George ever played ANY sport?

He thinks the world revolves around his love and hate for specific sports, you would think he would have at least some experience to shore up his yawning metaphors.

He leaves nothing behind him that anyone will take note of. Just pointless connections between unrelated things.

[Initech]

7. He was probably the kid who got picked last every time.

And has taken it out on athletes ever since.

[randome]

10. Except for baseball.

He probably made one good catch in his life and that's why he wants to marry the sport of baseball.

[rocktivity]

3. Yawn -- Another attempt to turn "collectivism" into a four-letter word

Last edited Tue Sep 11, 2012, 03:17 PM - Edit history (5)

Collectivism is what powers civilization itself -- not its political offshoots. We'd still be living in caves and dragging our womenfolk by the hair if we hadn't figured out that we do better at surviving and progressing when we coordinate our abilities. And most of the athletic coaches who fail at coordinating the abilities of their players don't get keep their "cults" for very long.




rocktivity

[jaysunb]

4. I sat next to him at Curt Floods' funeral and

thought he was a big sports fan.But afterwords I realized it had more to do with his fascination w/ Floods' court case.

[Tom Ripley]

5. I always saw football's wastefulness, brutality, specialization, and group-think as being...

anti-progressive.
I guess that's another place where Will and I disagree.

[Yavin4]

6. Football Is Socialism

It takes an entire team to win a championship. Sure the coach is important. Sure the QB is important. But if the lowly special teams guy muffs a punt, or the kicker misses a chip shot FG, then it doesn't matter how good the coach or QB is. A team is only as good as its weakest link.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

8. George F. Will's Sports Machine (SNL Transcript-- can't find video)

Saturday Night Live Transcripts

George F. Will's Sports Machine
Sam Donaldson.....Kevin Nealon

Sam Donaldson Voice-over: It's "George F. Will's Sports Machine", the sports trivia show for the real fan. And now, here's your quizmaster, syndicated columnist, George F. Will.

[ cut to game studio, with an audience of die-hard sports fans cheering, as George F Will enters ]

George F. Will: Good evening. "Sports, say the ancient Greeks, is morally serious because mankind's noblest aim, is the loving contemplation of worthy things." That's an excerpt from my new book on baseball entitled.. [ holds up book ] "Men at Work", and I'd say it's particularly a propos in light of today's Expo-Padre game. [ audience issues a blank, sluggish stare ] Joining me today are two gentlemen who would no doubt agree. First, former slugger for the Philadelphia Phillies, Mike Schmidt. Good day, Mike. Tell us, what do you miss most since retiring from baseball last year?

Mike Schmidt: Well, George, I guess I miss going to the ballpark every day.

George F. Will: Ah yes, ballparks. In humanity there exists a vestigial memory of an enclosed green space as a place of freedom or play.

Mike Schmidt: [ confused ] Yeah. I guess.

George F. Will: Excellent. Competing with Mr. Schmidt today is skillful practitioner of the managerial arts - from the Dodgers, Tommy Lasorda. Salutations, Tommy.

Tommy Lasorda: [ slaps his stomach ] Good to see you, George. I'm ready to play!

George F. Will: Well, the manager's role is one of both hector and helper, naysayer and nexus. Around his circumference lies the full measure of the game.

Tommy Lasorda: I.. uh.. well, I'm ready to play!

George F. Will: Very well. Let us engage the sports machine. Gentlemen, as always, the questions will focus exclusively on baseball, the only game that transcends the boundary between fury and repose. All right, hands on buzzers. [ he hits several buttons on the machine, which spits out a quiz card that George reads ] "The precarious balance between infield and outfield suggests a perfect symmetry. For $50, identify the effect of that symmetry."

[ the contestants stare cluelessly, as the buzzer sounds ]

George F. Will: Sorry. The answer is: "The exhilarating tension between being and becoming." Being and becoming. Next question: [ hits several buttons, dispensing another card ] "In 1954, Willie Mays, in an emphatic stroke of Byzantine whimsy, made his over-the-shoulder catch off of Vic Wertz. What was it not unlike?" [ no answers ] Take it? Anyone?

Mike Schmidt: The.. uh.. the catch in Cincinnati that.. [ buzzer sounds ]

George F. Will: Sorry. "It was not unlike watching Atlantis rise again from the sea, the bones of its kings new-covered with flesh." [ audience members stare blankly in awe ] Well, gentlemen, no score as of yet, but the night is young. Perhaps what you gentlemen need is a little incentive, so here to tell you about today's prizes is our own Sam Donaldson.

Sam Donaldson: Thank you, George. Thank you. Today's winner will receive a copy of Roget's Expanded Thesaurus. [ holds up book, singing ] "Buy me a Roget's and crackerjacks, I don't care if I never come back. And they'll also receive.. [ holds prize up ] ..Chocowhip, chocolate-flavored whip topping. It's sweet and fluffy. Mmmm, Chocowhip!

George F. Will: Sam, isn't it somewhat of a given that a whip topping would be sweet and fluffy?

Sam Donaldson: Oh, come off it, George! You can't see the forest for the trees!

George F. Will: We'll continue this spirited discussion later. As for now, it's time we moved on to the Big Board. And the categories are: "Baseball as Narrative", "Aristotle and Comiskey", "Joyce Carol Oates", "Left Field: Myth or Monopeia?", "Pitch Patch Potch", "Dulce et Decorum Est", and "Pot Luck". Mike, choose a category.

Mike Schmidt: [ contemplating ] Uh.. "Pot Luck".

George F. Will: Very well. [ $100 card under category is removed, revealing question ] "Like freedom, baseball is that stake where energy and order merge, and all complexity is purified into a simple coherence." Piffle, or not piffle?

Mike Schmidt: Uh.. piffle.

[ bell sounds ]

George F. Will: That is correct, it's absolute piffle. It's baseball's complexity, not its purity, that instills in us our freedom, and you have $100.

Tommy Lasorda: Hey, wait a minute! What's this piffle crap? What kind of question is that?

George F. Will: I'm sorry, Tommy, but this is not a forum here for debating the merits..

Tommy Lasorda: Oh, no, no, this isn't a joke. I'm playing for a bunch of kids in the hospital, you're making me look like a chump!

Mike Schmidt: I feel kind of stupid too!

George F. Will: Everything in good time, gentlemen. We certainly need to..

Tommy Lasorda: Let me ask you something: you ever play baseball?

George F. Will: If, by play, you mean drink deep the aura of the game, then..

Tommy Lasorda: No no, I mean play the game.. in the field.. in the field. Here. [takes out a baseball and throws it to George ] Throw this ball.

George F. Will: I'm sorry, Mr. Lasorda, but my duties as quizmaster compel me to move the game along.

Sam Donaldson: Throw the ball, George! Throw the ball.

George F. Will: Shut up, Sam! Now then, next question. Mike, you have control of the board..

Mike Schmidt: Throw the ball! Come on, throw the ball!

Tommy Lasorda: Throw the ball! Throw the ball!

[ audience joins in chants of "Throw the ball!", as George, confusedly, tries to think of what to do. Overcome by the crowd, he releases the ball weakly, landing only a few feet in front of him. Everyone laughs, and George, embarrassed, breaks into a weak run and leaves the studio. ]

Sam Donaldson: [ pointing ] He's getting away!

[ Tommy Lasorda and Mike Schmidt chase George, leaving Studio 8H and running into the hallway. They pass actual photos of the "SNL" cast members as they leave. Superimposed title and music plays. ]

Sam Donaldson Voice-over: That's all for today's "Sport's Machine" this week. Good night.

[ fade out ]


Submitted by: Rob Holtman


SNL Transcripts





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[msanthrope]

9. Here's the video....

http://www.hulu.com/watch/3519

[RagAss]

11. College football is all but non-existent in the Northeast.

[Fawke Em]

12. I'm a Southern liberal who LOVES college football.

I'm also white, middle class, female and straight.

I guess I blow all the North/South, sports fan/hates shopping stereotypes of the water.

BTW, equating college football with presidential politics is rather silly.