I Just Watch Sportsball

There's a Monty Python skit - bear with me, Ron - where John Cleese plays an oaf a soccer player who can hardly put a sentence together while Eric Idle is an interviewer trying to get into the intricacies of the game. Cleese answers a question, "I kicked the ball, then there it was, in the back of the net." That was in response to Idle asking about the positioning of the opposing players and blah, blah about what deep strategies led to the goal. It's clear that even Cleese doesn't get it. He's just a guy who scored a goal, a deer in the headlights of a self important reporter.

I feel like the Cleese character these days, when watching sports. When did they become so complicated?

Watching golf early this morning, a replay of an earlier event, the broadcasters were describing a shot where so-and-so was taking advantage of such-and-such by using a club with a 52 degree head angle rather than 51.5, which was surprising considering tons of various other factors including that the club shaft was a rare Uruguayan titanium alloy and it had rained six hours ago in northeast Ohio while a local woman delivered twins in the back of a taxi with the help of a well I won't go into that. All the while I'm thinking, about the golfer, "He hitted da ball good."

I see it in other games too. A shortstop throws a batter out at first base and the announcers describe the play as though they're writing War and Peace. Meanwhile I'm slapping my son on the shoulder, shouting, "Did you see that throw?"

All right, players are looking for every possible advantage and reporters want to sound like they know what they're taking about. But it doesn't add a thing to the game for me, and I doubt most others. And I can't help wonder if any of it really makes a difference anyway.