My kid got mad at me the other day when I said esports were video games masquerading as athletic competition. He said I didn’t know what I was talking about. He said esports require tremendous coordination, concentration and stamina, and involve lots of money.
Those qualities define modern competitive sports, he said.
My kid’s in graduate school, which means he’s smarter than me. But I was a professional sportswriter for 20 years, and still know a few things. For instance, I know a great way to get sports fans arguing is to suggest their favorite game isn’t really a sport.
One notorious activity I’ll introduce now is auto racing.
Motor sports were immensely popular in Sacramento in the middle of the last century. Open-wheel and motorcycle races drew thousands to the State Fairgrounds, Hughes Stadium and West Capital Raceway. Some residents still enjoy watching vehicles go in circles.
In my sportswriting days, to suggest race car drivers weren’t real athletes was blasphemy. Arguments took a predictable course:
“You can’t call someone an athlete if they play sitting down.”
“That’s crazy. It takes strength, endurance, brains and guts to push a race car around a track with 20 other drivers trying to shove you into a wall at (insert high speed).”
“It’s one step above driving at rush hour.”
“I’d like to see you try it.”
Today there’s no debate about race car drivers being athletes. Indy, NASCAR, Formula 1 are sports spectacles. Same with other games whose connection to athletic legitimacy brought laughter three or four decades ago.
Take golf. Before Tiger Woods demonstrated the benefits of weight lifting and diet, rare was the pro golfer who touched a barbell or skipped the 19th hole. If modern touring pros guzzle beer and don’t stay in top shape, they miss the cut.
These days, fishermen, chess masters, bridge and poker players are considered athletes in competitive sports. The Paris Olympics next year will indulge us with wall climbing, skateboarding, mountain biking and break dancing.
I can only guess what Jim Thorpe and Jesse Owens would have thought about wall climbing and break dancing.
But guesswork is relative. The 1912 Stockholm Olympics, where Thorpe won gold medals in decathlon and pentathlon, made tug of war a sport. Police teams competed for medals before crowds of thousands. Sweden won the gold, pulling eight British coppers to exhaustion.
In the modern age, one way to tell if a sport is really a sport is to measure the depths to which competitors sink when they cheat to win.
Fishing tournaments are scandalized by anglers stuffing their catches with lead weights and bait. Cheating sweeps across the highest ranks of chess, spreading from internet games to in-person championships. My laptop can beat a grand master. Cheaters plot moves with laptops.
Even games that honor personal integrity—I’m thinking about bridge and poker—have seen top players stand up and accuse opponents of cheating. No world champ has kicked over a table and pulled a gun, but it’s only a matter of time.
One of my favorite sports is billiards. I like it for many reasons. It’s played indoors, requires physical stamina and deductive prowess, and obeys no clock. Time is irrelevant.
Pool ignores technology and savors tradition. Legendary players had wonderful names, Meanie Beanie, Boston Shorty, Tugboat Whaley, Wimpy Lassiter, Minnesota Fats. Gambling runs with pool and makes things interesting.
Cheating at pool is impossible. Cheaters need subterfuge and misdirection, difficult under artificial lights that illuminate green felt, cushions and pockets. Sacramento has the greatest action room in California, Jointed Cue on Fruitridge Road.
One time I asked Terry Stonier, who owned Jointed Cue, whether gambling might inspire pool players to try to cheat.
“People are always going to gamble,” he said. “But here, they’re people who know how to gamble, who know how to win and know how to lose.”
Terry Stonier died in 2001, age 65. I wish my kids could have met him. We could argue about what makes a sport a sport, and why billiards beats esports all day long.
R.E. Graswich can be reached at regraswich@icloud.com. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram: @insidesacramento.
