Diamond Leung Leung’s thoughts and
prayers are with the victims of the terrorist attacks and their
families. But to him, the Yankees still stink. E-mail your thoughts
to [email protected].
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Props to the terrorists. You guys really took it to us this
time, didn’t you? I hope you’re happy with
yourselves.
You forever changed every person who lives in America ““ a
nation you will never understand. You made us stop in our tracks.
You disrupted our lives.
You also momentarily took away the heart and soul of this
country ““ our sports.
How dare you!
Sports around the country came to a grinding halt following the
attacks on the East Coast. Major League Baseball postponed its
games that week. So did the National Football League. No college
football. No hockey exhibition games. No nothing. The entire world
of sports in America was quiet, and rightly so.
It’s just infuriating to me that these terrorist acts
forced Americans to focus all of their attention on the horror in
New York and Washington, D.C.
Sports became meaningless. There were no home runs for Barry
Bonds, no return of Michael Jordan and no game for DeShaun Foster.
No one wanted to see that kind of stuff. It was definitely
inappropriate.
It was a time to grieve, a time to mourn, a time to reflect.
We sports fans are generally a fun-loving bunch. We usually care
about the frivolous things ““ the price of a nude picture of
Ichiro, the steps to the Dirty Bird dance, the color of Dennis
Rodman’s hair.
And we care because that’s our way of getting away from it
all. The sports world is the ultimate diversion. It’s life in
a nutshell. The sweetness of victory and the bitterness of defeat
““ that kind of stuff. It’s a fantasy world that we
relish.
But when the real world is in trouble, it’s not the time
to be living in a fantasy.
Sports have become therapeutic now, when they should be just
plain fun. People who go to sporting events participate in flag
waving, candlelight vigils and impromptu chants of “USA! USA!
USA!” It’s part of the healing process. Still,
it’s sad that we’re put in the position to even have
these things taking place.
I’d much rather we just get the games back to normal.
Sports fans want the highlights, not hijackings. The suicide
squeeze, not suicide bombers. Bobbleheads, not bin Laden.
But it remains difficult for me to achieve that elusive state of
normalcy. Every time I get excited about sports, I ask myself why
I’m cheering. Thousands of people are dead. That horrific
image of the Twin Towers collapsing is in the back of my mind.
I would really like to cry over my fantasy football team
starting the season with a 1-2 record, but there are people crying
over the death of their loved ones.
It’s just not right.
In our country, we have the luxury of being able to focus all of
our attention on sports. We Americans indulge ourselves with
on-base percentages, rookie card values and point spreads.
We can debate sports issues to no end. A lot of things annoy me:
‘SC exists. Shaq can’t shoot free throws. Steve Lavin
is still coaching.
I want to care about these things. I really do. But right now, I
can’t. They’re still pulling bodies from the rubble,
and war is on the horizon.
And that ticks me off. The terrorists are controlling the way we
think. They actually have a say in our lives now.
They’ve taken away our freedom, if you will, to sit back
and relax, watch a sporting event on TV and not have to worry about
breaking news of another terrorist attack. We can’t do that
anymore because the terrorists robbed us of our innocence.
We’re starting to get back to normal now, but we’ll
always remember what happened on that terrible day. Terrorists made
our lives meaningless. They made sports meaningless.
How dare they.