Friends:
Sunday night, my son and I channel surfed between Sunday Night Football and the American League Championship Series. Hoping for a Jets loss and a Mets win, we didn't get everything we wanted (a Subway Series would have been AMAZING!), but we love watching sports together. As we commiserated a bi-coastal series, my son said, "At least they're not the White Sox."
For those of you not in the know, the south-side "White Sux" (as fans and foes know them), just accomplished a historical milestone - the most losses in a season ever, 121, eclipsing the previous record of 117, held by the 1962 New York Mets.
In an article for The Times, author Sam Anderson described the farcical nature of the White Sox's season fittingly and musically:
"Over the course of the 2024 season, the White Sox have explored the full spectrum of losing the way a great actor uses every corner of the stage, the way a jazz saxophonist probes every note in a scale. They have lost nobly, tragically, cleverly, inspiringly and deflatingly. They have lost late at night and early in the afternoon, in soggy rain and on crisp sunny days. I have seen perfectly professional losses that could have gone either way — but of course didn't — and games that should have been stopped, for cruelty, in the fourth inning. I have seen the White Sox lose in front of huge roaring crowds at Fenway Park and also, back home, in their own nearly empty stadium. (On a sunny Tuesday, just before game time, I once counted 199 people sitting in the vast sea of outfield seats — and when the announcer finally said, "Play ball!" the applause sounded like someone had just done a magic trick at a church picnic.) I have seen the White Sox hit their catcher in the groin with the baseball three separate times in a single inning. I have seen the White Sox lose because three fielders ran into each other like clowns. I have watched a bloop single flutter and fall delicately onto the outfield grass, like the first leaf of autumn, at the most devastating possible moment. I have seen games in which Chicago's hitters looked like All-Stars, but their pitchers looked like impostors, and games where it was vice versa, and games in which they all played great, but the ball just bounced the wrong way."
(That is some excellent writing!)
No one remembers the second-place team - or the team that went 89-73 (my hometown Diamondbacks). How unforgettably boring and non-consequential. Yes, winning matters, if for no other reason than to justify the existence of the scoreboard. But winning is not the point of OUR game, and our team is not comprised of highly compensated professional adults.
Ask yourself this - do you know who won Grand Nationals in 1984? Do you know who won your state contest in 1997? Do you know who got what rating at your spring concert festival - or who played at Midwest in 2003?
Of course, you don't. Neither do I. And if we are being honest, I don't care.
Sports are about a shared experience among a community of people who are passionate about the same thing. Its vernacular evokes meaningful memories - "wide right," "Music City Miracle," and "thirteen seconds" are more than just words to a Buffalo Bills fan, they are a shared language and collaborative epic memories.
And as heartbreaking as those thirteen seconds were, I shared them with my son. We ran through the house joyfully and screamed in agony with each of the four touchdowns scored in the final two minutes. When it all ended, as heartbreaking as it was, we knew that we had just witnessed perhaps the most fantastical and greatest game in NFL history. This shared experience is whatbinds us together, making us part of something larger than ourselves.
That's what competition and being a fan are about: shared experiences.
In a few weeks, my son will travel with his band to San Antonio to compete in the Bands of America Super Regional. Despite working extraordinarily hard and being led by phenomenal directors and an incredible staff, they will not win. If you know anything about this contest, you know they will not make finals either. But that is not why they are going. The expectation is not to "win," or win in the traditional sense. It's to provide these kids and their parents with a shared experience that will bond them together forever.
As they take the field, my wife and I will be in the audience, screaming and cheering for our son and his bandmates not to cheer them on to victory, but because we want to share in the experience, and attach ourselves to this memory in some small way, win or lose. In this way, for us, losing becomes winning.
A finite few of us will ever understand what it's like to be revered, to have tens of thousands of people chanting our name. But doing our best and falling short? Being bested by a superior? Things not working out as we hoped?
We all know and can share in that feeling.
Have a great week.
Scott