Let’s Root for Our Side!

I’m concerned when I see players, spectators, and especially coaches, cheering when opponents commit errors or mistakes. And then watching them as they keep imploring the opposing players to commit those errors or mistakes. Instead of trying to win, we wait and hope and encourage our opponents to find a way to lose so that we will win by default. In effect, we give the other team the power to win or lose.

The message we are sending to our kids is “We don’t think you can win, so we are trying to make the other team lose.” If I hear from my friends and fans that those other guys are going to lose, I just may not work as hard on doing my best.

I have a similar concern about a trend I see - another movement toward making our opponents perform less well so that we can win. Not too long ago it was very poor sportsmanship to ridicule, intimidate, or insult our opponents. Those kinds of tactics brought on unsportsmanlike conduct penalties, technical fouls, even ejections.

This also worked its way into other areas of our society. We find it in our product commercials and in our political campaigns – our product isn’t good enough to outsell their product and our candidate isn’t good enough to outvote their candidate. We can’t win on our merits so we have to downgrade their qualities.

Let’s look at some of the professional and college sports and the trend at belittling and intimidating the opponent -- the taunting, the insults, the trash talking, the “victory dances” the “in-your-face” behavior. Not many years ago, these actions would have earned the performer an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty, a technical foul, or even ejection. Now it is a part of the “color” of the game and the crowd loves it. In fact, the crowd has joined in with its very creative and often offensive signs.

Contrast this to some other sports. Have you ever seen a golfer laugh at or taunt an opponent who missed a putt or hit a drive out of bounds? Or a bowler, after stringing together five strikes, get in the face of his or her opponent? It’s essential that we, as coaches, teach our players and supporters to have the utmost respect for our opponents -- to honor them for their contributions and to honor the game.

The only thing that enables us to express our excellence as coaches, players and fans is an adversary who demands this excellence from us by competing with us at its highest level.

And then, we can deal with the challenges of our defeats:

“We lost but they had to play their best in order to beat us.”

Or we can really experience the joy of our victories:

“We beat them even though they played their best.”