Sports break

Minnesota Public Radio, exhibiting one of its whorish pledge drive behaviors, is today broadcasting a 45-minute speech over two hours, with ample breaks for shilling. This normally makes me crazy, even if I enjoy the speaker or subject. Today I didn’t mind, as I had time to make notes between segments. The long-time Sports Illustrated writer Frank Deford, also a popular public radio commentator, gave the opening speech at this year’s Chautauqua Institution in New York.

Deford’s writing always strikes me as candid and fair. His cynical side was on full display today, mocking the cash grab that is major college sports. He bemoaned the fat scholarships athletes enjoy while others’ extracurricular activities—he mentioned the college orchestra player and radio station worker—remain mostly unrecognized, let alone financially supported. His scathing review of the Olympics as an obsolete “spectacle,” an anachronistic event in a globalized sporting universe, stands in stark contrast to the cheerleading that passes for journalism from many sports reporters. And Deford noted that “America produces leisure” in a way that no other country in the world can even fathom.

But Deford obviously loves sport, even referring to it as an art. I was particularly intrigued by his claim that of all our society’s entertainments, sport is the only one in which popularity and excellence meet. That is, the best in sport is the most popular, whereas the best music might not be the most loved, nor does the best theater necessarily achieve the biggest audiences. Now, we may get in trouble when we start talking about the best in any category, and who defines best, or even good, is part of what this project is all about. But Deford’s larger point, that what might be considered excellent in the arts is easily ignored and/or misunderstood by its audience, is something that working artists face all the time. As a pianist, I know that an overwrought, sentimental Romantic waltz is going to get more applause from the average audience than a challenging Scriabin etude or a subtle Chaminade impromptu. In the arts, and sport, familiarity doesn’t breed contempt, it brings comfort and satisfaction.

I am reminded that thoughtful criticism can be found across any number of genres, even sport. Besides Deford, I regularly read L. Jon Wertheim, another writer at Sports Illustrated and tennis columnist for si.com.