- Not The Only One!
- ” Game Day”
- Post# 93
- 17 Aug 23
- Howdy,
- Welcome once again and thank you for being there. If Game Day sounds familiar to you ,then you are probably aware that it is the name of a Fox network program on Saturdays for college football. Yeah!, its getting to be that time of the year. I love the fall and all that it has to offer. We get to enjoy hay rides, everything gets to be about pumpkin spice this and that. It’s that time of the year, where you can just roll the windows up or down and not worry about running the heat or the air conditioning. The skies get clearer at night, so there can be star gazing from the back of a bed of a pick up truck. When it’s all said and done, nothing says fall like “Football Season “. I am a fan of the game, both college and professional and it’s about the only sport that moves the meter for me, now days. When I was younger, I played the game and I also kept up with other sports as well, but for one reason or the other, the others have lost their appeal to me and are missing that zest . It’s not the sports it’s a me thing! I gave up on baseball back in the late nineties. There were players who were having a hell of a season just banging the balls out of the park Mcguire, and Sammy Sosa, to mention a couple. I was really into it and excited, and then the millionaires had a fall out with the billionaires and they went on strike. I was done, it really wasn’t about what was best for the game or the fans, like a lot of things in life, it was about the money. Then ,the kicker was to find out that some of the players, like Barry Bonds and others were using ” PEDs”. I won’t make you look that one up, because you will get some weird things pop up☺️☺️. It stands for performance enhancing drugs, your basic steroids. They were taking things that gave them an unfair advantage over the other players . Then there’s basketball. I like the sport better when I knew that the players didn’t like one another. They are just to damn chummy for me now. They party together, spend their off seasons together and they recruit or solicit one another to come play together on the same team. Their goal is to put together a super squad, so that they can chase championships. Something about it, just seems wrong to me. I will occasionally watch a little golf, I use to play back in the day. I must admit that Tiger brought a lot of excitement to the game, and while there are some really good golfers out there, no one is dominant like Woods was in his hay day. Golf can be such a mental game. I look at Tiger and his health issues and I think that he can still play, but I don’t think that he has the mentality to close out the field as he did in years gone by. You must respect what he has done on the course over the years. I will admit to being a little redneck and watching some Nascar. I use to go to races, and it is one of the few sports that is better In person than on TV. The atmosphere is very compatible to what you may have at a college football game and I believe that Nascar has the most brand loyal fans of any sport. And what I mean by that is, if a driver endorses a product or service, Nascar fans totally buy in on it. I know some don’t believe it’s a sport, but the stamina and focus those guy have to have for the hours that they spend in those cars, will make the argument for them. I don’t keep up with it as much now, mostly to have something to share with my son in law, big Nascar fan. I know that there are other sports, but for me, it’s mostly about the game and the game is football. We are mere weeks away from opening day and the pros are doing preseason games which can tell you very little about what the season will be like. I have a couple of teams that I follow closely and I will call them ” my teams”, but I’m not fanatical as some are known to be. I cheer for and stick with them through the lean times, and celebrate the victories, but I don’t live and die, based on their performance. I think far to many are over invested and have not come to the realization that they don’t actually get a say in who is drafted, who the coaches are, or what plays are called on the field. If you listen to some, you would believe that they were the actual owner and they some how receive some kind of financial benefit from the victories, or some how have actual shame, when they loose. It is a business , but at the end of the day, it is just a game. Football is an entertainment, in fact all sports are, much like going to a movie, a play, or even an amusement park. I’m not sure what exactly it says about us ,when our lives are so heavily invested in a sport, perhaps we don’t have a life ☺️☺️. So, I guess that it is about perspective. It’s great to be able to follow a team, and the stats and now it’s even more so crazy with the fantasy leagues. I mentioned that I follow a couple of teams. I became a FSU fan back in the nineties when I met the coach of the team. His name was Bobby Bowden and he struck me as a man of incredible integrity. He was about so much more than just the wins and the losses, but he was challenged by preparing young men for the future and knowing full well that only a few go on to the next level. He was concerned about his players character and their success for the future. I know that the coaching ranks have changed , and now instead of it being about the student athlete, it’s the boosters about the coaches chasing the biggest pay checks and wanting to be known and associated with the most prestigious programs. The recruiting is just crazy now , with schools approaching eighth graders with potential scholarship offers. The coaches will still show up at your house with their pitch and tell how they will treat your son or daughter as their own, but you should probably want to think about getting that signed in blood, because if a better offer comes along, ninety percent of the time they will be gone with the wind. Enough of that, let’s talk for a minute about my pro squad and that would be the L.A. Rams. I have been a Rams fan since I was about twelve years old. I’ve been with them through the lean years and all of the moves ,to and from St. Louis, and the time they spent in Anaheim. So how did an east coast guy end up with a west coast team? Actually that’s an easy one. When I was a kid you connect with and idolize certain players, and of course I dreamed of being a QB. The Rams had someone lining up under center, who looked like me. His name was James Harris and he played his college football at Grambling University. That was very progressive back in the day to have a black quarterback. There were basically two teams that were out in front with that , and the other one was the Pittsburgh Steelers, with a guy named Joe Gilliam, who was also from Grambling. I think that Harris was the better of the two, and he was pretty good before he became injured , and when he came back, he was never quite the same. If you are a Steelers fan and don’t know or remember the name, you have to think before the Bradshaw years. One of my uncles got me into the college game, so I will follow players from their college days, through the draft, and many times through retirement. So, I’m a true fan just not fanatical. It is a kids game and yet some make millions of dollars to entertain us on Sundays. There are many who love the game, but I don’t believe that they play for the love of the game, but it’s about ” show me the money “☺️☺️. I do understand about getting paid and I understand about the possibility of injuries and sometimes career ending injuries. We watch players come and go and we never think about the average NFL career is only about two and a half years. There are not many Tom Brady’s who get to spend two decades in the lime light, he’s an oddity by far, and not what the majority of the players get to experience. Let’s turn the page so that I can get onto some of you guys nerves, just incase I didn’t do that enough earlier when I reminded you that you are not an actual owner ☺️☺️. I’m not real sure how some of you may have felt about the late Rush Limbaugh, but one thing he was always on point about was ” Follow the money “. It almost doesn’t matter what you are talking about now days, whether it’s politics, the environment, organized religion or just corporate America as a whole, it comes down to dollar and cents. So, let’s just talk about You ” fans” for a bit. This is my rub, and it doesn’t matter the sport, but many of these fanatical people who are cheering from the stands or yelling at the TV also happens to be self professing believers and I’m not even going to single out Christians, because I believe it to be a universal across landscape. I just want someone to explain to me how the loudest of fans, the absolute most vocal, you know the one in the breakroom or at the water cooler ,always doing the dance and the bragging about their squad, be the most silent when it comes to sharing with others about all of the wonderful things that God has done in their lives. After all , all you get from a sports franchise is bragging rights and the following year could be a drought ☺️☺️. God is faithfully consistent. They can be shouting it from the roof tops when it comes to their favorite team ,but no boasting and verbal appreciation about the most important decision of your life. Talk about something being out of sorts and priorities being contradictory. What is it that makes us just so comfortable with sharing about our college or some other associated sport, but nothing about God. I wish that I could tell you that it’s just about sports, but it’s not, it could be your book club, rotary club or any of a hundred other different social settings that we may find ourselves in , and when it comes to sharing and shouting praise to God, the word is mum. I fully understand that it can be a deeply personal thing, but we have already covered that it’s not to be a secret either. God goes out of His way to place people, sometimes directly in our path , on occasions for the explicit hopes that you would mention Him or some how work Him into the conversation, when you encounter hurting and broken people. It’s no grand discovery that we all have junk in our lives and that we often need help or wisdom and most of the time both to navigate the twist and turns of life. I have no ax to grind with sports or any other thing that we use to amuse or distract ourselves from the grinds of life. However I’m not exactly sure how knowing about how many home runs were hit or how many touch downs were scored ,,help people or encourage them to not give up when life gets hard, because some do. I have a friend who has over the last three weeks, has shared with me about two such people who have just given up and cashed in their chips in the form of suicide, we aren’t going there today, but somewhere down the road for sure. . Since we are here and talking about how and what you don’t share out of fear, or some complexity of what others may think of you, and yeah!, I’m one of those , and so what people!. I’m saying so what as to what they think of you, but I’m not saying to be disrespectful , rude or a bully. Those three things do more harm than good and should never be representative or associated with God. We should stop giving into fear , and especially fear as to what others think about us, after all they aren’t putting money in your pocket anymore than your favorite team☺️☺️. As, I was saying since we are here, can someone please tell me how some of you ” Fans” can justify spending hundreds of dollars on sports jerseys and other athletic sports gear that brand identifies you with a particular sports franchise, but can’t justify giving a single dollar to a church or some other charitable organization? It’s kind of a long question the way I presented it, but doesn’t it speak to priorities and the condition of one’s heart? I know that an NFL jersey can run a hundred and fifty bucks easily and I also know that , that same hundred and fifty dollars would provide dozens of pairs of shoes for kids in Hatti, or Beliez or some other developing or third world country. That same hundred and fifty dollars would provide meals for at least fifty people at a homeless shelter . The tipping at Gods house on the weekends or the few bucks you give the guy on the corner with the sign, should not be enough to ease your Conscience, after all, it is just a tip. Where is our vision, in addition to our priorities?. It should be about paying it forward. We are often in amor over the sacrifice and selflessness of our military and we should be. They stand in the gap as generations before did to keep us safe . So someone somewhere paid a price and most of us have benefited from someone else paying it forward. It could be someone who was a pioneer for a particular race or gender in some field.. Perhaps you benefited from tax payers dollars when you got a grant or scholarship for school . The Word of God says not to store up treasures here, where they can be stolen or easily loose their value, but to store up in Heaven, or to send them a head of your arrival there. If you don’t believe that is your final destination or the end game, then that’s another whole different conversation that needs to be had. I’m sure that I’m going to get some of the ” how dare he! “, but for all of you who thought that this was brutal with me talking about your commitment to God and if your money is where your mouth is ….trust me, I was being very gentle opposed to the unloading that probably should have taken place here. ☺️☺️.
- Till Next Time ✌️ Peace!
- Sandy The Southerner
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