The Athletes Influence

From Trayvon Martin, to the Ferguson decision, to the choking incident with Eric Garner, there is no shortage of controversial interactions with the police. While we will never know the honest trust of what happened, I believe the problems with values that have risen from these three incidents have created a platform for athletes to speak out. 

Devin Gardner and the Magic Circle

According to Johan Huizinga’s definition of The Magic Circle, which is generally, a fun yet serious contest that ties us together, is limited by space and time, leads to rituals, and goes against social expectation, the Michigan-Ohio State college football game is the perfect example of that. With their mutual hatred, Michigan and Ohio State always seem to bring their A-game against each other no matter how good or bad the team is that year. The competitiveness of the Magic Circle is at his highest with each teams motivation being bragging rights for a whole year. Even our now former coach, Brady Hoke, who is known as a very nice guy disrespected OSU by coming up with the term, “Beat Ohio” when it came to the rivalry game. 

The Fan’s Divine Experience

Fans are a very much visible and instrumental aspect of sports. They determine the popularity of a sport or a team, generate the revenue for professional teams and certain college programs, provide an aspect of school spirit and unity in a designated amount of time, and, to a certain extent, elevate the performance and caliber of athletes. It is no wonder that Cameron Indoor Stadium, where the Duke Blue Devils Men’s Basketball team plays, is one of the hardest arenas for visiting teams to get a win; with their famed Duke Crazies student section constantly creating a racket of noise and forming a sea of painted blue bodies. In an interview with several past and present Golden State Warriors’ players, many of them credited the noise their fans made as pushing them on and making them more competitive and energetic than other teams as a game reaches its final stretch. These are just a few of many examples displaying the fans’ importance and how they can make or break a game; what is often debated upon however is what the fan gets out of cheering for a team and is there sense of pride only at its peak during the game?

LeBron’s State of Nature

In the summer of 2010, the whole world was captivated by the news of LeBron James announcing his shock decision to leave the Cleveland Cavaliers, the team that drafted him first overall out of high school, for the Miami Heat. Not only was LeBron the unquestioned leader of a Cavaliers team that through seven years had gone from one of the worst teams in the league to annual title contenders, but Cleveland was also his hometown team. LeBron James was an icon that the state of Ohio could claim as their own, making his subsequent departure all the more shocking.

13 Year Old American Professionals?

During August this year past two year, stories of a 13 year old little league pitcher by the name of Mo’ne Davis broke out. What set Mo’ne apart was not that she was a girl in a male dominated league, according to sociologist Gary Alan Fine, there are thousands of girls who play on Little League teams nationwide. What set Mo’ne Davis apart was how she really defied all ideologies of girls not being able to compete with guys by dominating against some of the best 13 year old baseball players in the world. Her groundbreaking seventy-mile per hour fastball and array of off-speed pitches however, were just the beginning of all the talk. 

Present-Day Machiavellians?

In 1991, five freshmen stepped onto the University of Michigan and throughout their two years together, transcended basketball culture on and off the court. You could probably guess who they were right?

Steve Fisher and the Fab Five used to be all smiles

Well of course it’s the Fab Five! The team made up of Chris Webber, Jalen Rose, Juwan Howard, Jimmy King, and Ray Jackson. Who doesn’t know about them?

Now ask a person who was the guy at the sidelines barking instructions at those five players and the answer may be harder to come by. Steve Fisher, despite his notoriety as the head coach of the infamous Fab Five as well as successful tenure pre-Fab Five, is not a name thrown around loosely in Ann Arbor. Someone with his track record should be glorified just as much as Michigan legends such as Bo Schembechler, Lloyd Carr, and even current basketball coach, John Beilein. So why is it that the Fab Five is so famous (or infamous), but their own leader is little known outside the realm of basketball fans?