Silly Little Games

The meaning in the chaos of sports and life.

I could feel myself becoming anxious at the start of the third quarter against Arizona State, and I had to watch the rest of the game alone. I didn’t want those emotions to rub off on the people I’d been watching it with, and, since I knew I’d be writing, I wanted a clearer head to get words out if I needed to vomit up thoughts about a heartbreaking loss. Later, my wife told me that my five-year-old son was a pretty rough hang in the second half. He went full-on negative fan mode: “We’re gonna lose! We stink! I knew we’d lose.” Unfortunately, he comes by it honestly.

I’ll admit that the Longhorns’ second-half collapse and near loss to ASU was just as hard for me to watch, but it didn’t have the same bite that it normally would have—or at least, it didn’t bring forth much outward emotion. Normally, witnessing a full-on capitulation of my favorite team would bring out a lot of things, but on New Year’s Day, I just took it. And, even in my dread about the looming offseason, I felt somewhat guilty for caring so much.

Because a silly college football playoff game pales in comparison to the despicable terror attack in New Orleans that killed up to 15 people and injured even more, devastating lives and families. The senseless attack caused the Sugar Bowl between Georgia and Notre Dame to be postponed by a day, and the gloomy fog of that attack will hang over whichever team won the game by the time this is being read. It’s all a reminder that the ability to enjoy our silly little games is a blessing—none of it is promised.

I remember the dread I felt in August of 2020, before the season was almost canceled due to Covid, and how I was willing to accept all the heartbreak if we just had a season at all. We had one, and it absolutely brought sports misery, to be sure. But I’d take that any day over not having it at all. It was the first time in my life that games weren’t promised, and it peeled back the layers of why it all matters to me in the first place. It isn’t the wins or losses, nor the bragging rights. It’s the stories filled with agony, ecstasy, heartbreak, and hope. The ability to share in all of it. If not for that experience, I’m not sure I ever would have fully leaned into writing about it in the summer of 2021. But it’s all a gift—one that must be shared, something we should hold onto. Because it isn’t always as simple as we expect it to be.

We’ve learned that the messiness of life—the evil in the world—can even infect and disrupt the sports we love. It can dampen the thrill of victory while providing a reality check on the losses. It’s so sobering. I hate that when I take my son to DKR, I think about things like what happened in Louisiana on New Year’s Eve. Things like exit strategies. Will we be safe if there’s one evil person among 103,000? Will I be able to protect him if so? If my dad thought about those things when he took me to dozens upon dozens of Spurs games growing up, he didn’t let it affect me. He let me take in all of it—all the good parts of these silly little games.

I felt bad leaving the watch party in search of solitude. It was a violation of my number one rule of fandom: it only has value when it’s done communally. I felt worse for sticking my wife with the five-year-old in an Oilers Earl Campbell jersey who was sporting a terrible attitude. But I was also glad to hear her retell me about his behavior. It was comforting knowing he was unaffected by what I knew—what had held me back from fully experiencing all of it. He can still fully lean into the unadulterated emotion of it all. The innocence of it, even when it’s negative and on the verge of heartache. Because I know he won’t always be able to feel this way. It’s a silly little game, yes. It always will be. But life is precious, and, when he realizes that, he’ll have to learn that even things like sports aren’t always so simple.