We know many athletes play just for the money. But when we’re watching a game, we find a way to forget it.
What do we want from our athletes?
Don’t answer that. You can’t.
Ask 100 people and you’ll get 100 different answers—all of them formal.
I want a guy who cares about the colors on his shirt and the numbers in the win column more than the numbers next to his name.
Or:
I want a guy who cares about these games. I want a guy who cares as much as I do, god dammit!
Or:
I want a guy who’s gonna win and lose with dignity. Win or lose, he carries himself with class on and off the field.
Yes, we all have our own super-specific ideas of what we want our athletes to be. What we want them to achieve. What we want them to do for us. It’s selfish, but that’s OK. We’re fans. We’re selfish by definition.
But, in general, I don’t think I’m crazy in saying that most of us want the players we root for to fall under the umbrella of “Guy who cares more about winning and, generally, isn’t a complete dirtbag.” There’s a ton of wiggle room in that description, but basically, those are the guys we want on our teams. We want them to care as much as we do.
We want Tim Duncan. We want Chris Drury. We want Clay Matthews. We want Derek Jeter.
We don’t want Benoit Assou-Ekotto.
Benoit Izzy-Koko-Huh? (says John Buccigross).
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Benoit Assou-Ekotto is a 26-year-old Cameroonian defender for Tottenham Hotspur, one of the best teams in the English Premier League.
A peacock of a man, he tends to strut around the field—in one of many ridiculously-styled haircuts—puffing out his chest and making himself more visible than most semi-competent defenders should be.
As a player, he’s probably best described as “useful.” He’s scored one goal in his eight professional seasons. He’s built a nice career for himself thus far. He’s made his way up the ladder—from the slums of Arras, France, to London—and is now playing for one of the better clubs in the world. Last summer, he played in his first World Cup.
But, that’s all it is for him. It’s a career—nothing more, nothing less.
Assou-Ekotto openly admits that he plays soccer for nothing other than the money.
In November, he told So Foot magazine:
The reality is I play for money. I don’t see the point of lying, of saying I love the color of my shirt. Today I have a very good job, I can’t say otherwise. All in all, I work two hours a day. But I do it to earn money like everyone else on this planet.
Huh?
It’s a suspension of disbelief. We know they’ll never admit to it, but it kind of lurks there, shadowy, in the back of our minds, waiting to appear and, once and for all, ruin sports as we know them.
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Imagine if Brett Favre said this while he was in Green Bay or Sachin Tendulkar (don’t know him? Stop reading me, and read this) revealed something similar before the Cricket World Cup.
You can’t imagine it. Terrible, unspeakable things would happen.
We know—whether or not we choose to acknowledge it—that there’s a chance our athletes think and play this way. It’s a suspension of disbelief. We know they’ll never admit to it, but it kind of lurks there, shadowy, in the back of our minds, waiting to appear and, once and for all, ruin sports as we know them.
Yes, I know a lot of these guys are just playing for the money. But, please, just don’t ever let me know.
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Since I’m no Tottenham fan (here’s one reason why not), it’s easier for me to look at Assou-Ekotto as this sort of honorable, honest figure. Sure, he’s cutting down our disbelief and beaming into our living rooms every time he takes the field, but he’s also breaking preconceptions that I had.
He’s not that evil athlete who’s just in it for the money, moping around, disinterested in how the game ends. He does his job. And forgets about it when he’s done (No, he doesn’t watch games at home).
Ben Lyttleton wrote on SI.com:
His inscrutability on the pitch should not be confused with indifference. He does not argue with referees’ decisions only because he has never seen them change their mind, and he has little time for those who do. “They are just doing it so the crowd see their reaction,” he said.
But he does care. Assou-Ekotto played for Cameroon at the last World Cup, and was very upset last week when new coach Javier Clemente did not select him for its African Nations Cup qualifier against Senegal. The Cameroon FA overruled Clemente and called him up—he played the full match.
He doesn’t remember the date of his one and only goal, and he doesn’t think much of being a professional soccer player, saying, “You just kick a ball around—it’s hardly helping the world advance.”
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We can think that sports are advancing the world, though.
We think, at least, they’re advancing our world when we get caught up in a game. And maybe they are. Even if they’re not, they sometimes feel like it, and that’s the point.
You can’t watch sports and care about it so passionately, so irrationally, while, at the same time, being aware that you’re watching a bunch of guys, literally, going to work. Instead—most of the time—we’re projecting our passions and our desires onto the guys wearing our favorite colors. And most athletes either accept this or just ignore it—not letting us know, either way.
But Assou-Ekotto lets us know. Yet he still plays. He does his job well enough for us to ignore everything he says and keep on believing that he’s just like us, bleeding our team’s colors.
Really, though, he is like us—just in a totally different way.
—Photo jtadych/Flickr
BAE is barely “useful”. I remember his goal, a beautiful volley from distance, I can’t remember who it was against. I also remember many, many times BAE getting toasted like an English muffin against anyone with a bit of pace or a trick up their sleeve. I think he’s a little disingenuous: he’s not talented enough to have made it to the Premiership without a serious investment in time and effort and passion. I root for a club, and maybe a few players I like (I’m an Arsenal fan but hate Manu Petit and Flamini the ankle mangler). If I… Read more »
it is to be said that BAE is also a very down to earth guy and thankful for his opportunity. He rides the tube around london and and donates thousands of pounds per month to charity.
In the rest of the interview he talks about how he does play footy for fun with friends back in france.
It nice he’s willing to admit it tho, better than lying and he still puts his time in on the pitch. better than a whiner who kisses the badge one minute and demands a transfer the next
Speak for yourself Patrick.
Sports can be that important. My childhood wouldn’t have been nearly as great without sports. And since my father has season tickets to the Patriots, I have some incredible memories over the years of going to games with him. Memories I’ll create with my son when he’s old enough.
Sports just aren’t that important TO YOU. But not everyone shares your opinion. It is possible to passionately follow a team and still do positive things with your life. Why do those two things have to be mutually exclusive?
He ne’er said they weren’t important, just that they probably don’t advance the world.
This point has been made to death for a generation, and it’s been right the whole time, but it’s been associated with weakling un-athletic people the same way feminism has been associated with ugly, bitter women.
Perhaps we should just grow up and recognize that sports just aren’t that important. It is entertainment, just like the movies, so in the end the people are there for the money. If people would stop living vicariously through overpaid whines and focus on doing something positive with their lives, perhaps the so-called sports heros will do the same.