I miss the days when I didn't know or care to know an athlete's politics because they were irrelevant.
But the latest installment of "No one asked you for your opinion" features former U.S. Goalkeeper Tim Howard, who in his op-ed for the Daily Mail attacks Christian Pulisic for doing the "Trump Dance."
I've been an avid sports fan since as far back as I can remember. I played little league baseball and spent much of my teenage years glued to the highlights of Sportscenter on ESPN and playing sports video games.
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I enjoyed sports because there was something pure about watching men strive for greatness and the best person reaped the rewards. Countless inspirational moments of men rebounding from injuries or coming from poverty to achieve fame for their sporting achievements.
However, athletes like Tim Howard feel the need to use their notoriety as a soapbox to lecture their audience about being good people, their desire for cultural change, and personal political perceptions. All three things no one ever wanted to know or asked them for.
For some reason, industry-specific moderately famous people feel the urge to move outside their wheelhouse and lecture their small audience about their political and social standing as if that's why we care to know them.
I partly blame sports media and leagues for enabling this type of behavior instead of dismissing it. It was like sports media got bored with talking about percentages and wanted to make their positions known in greater culture.
Then the leagues became spineless and didn't push back on any protesting and political behavior. As a fan, I shouldn't care about who my favorite player votes for because the reason I like them is specific to their abilities, not their opinions.
Tim Howard doesn't care about staying in his lane because he feels entitled to speak up for something he perceives as wrong yet is too emotional & hubristic to see the errors of his ways. The Trump Dance is literally that, a dance. It's not a statement & he can't understand that.
It's a goofy dance that he's taking seriously and that's what is incredibly sad. He's spending his goodwill capital as a relatively non-controversial figure on a dance that can be performed by anyone, including people who don't like Trump.
U.S. Soccer fan groups are notoriously left-wing and when Portland Timbers display their political messaging, he doesn't call them out. When someone literally holds a sign saying "I'm ANTIFA" he wouldn't have a problem with it.
And this is why politics is poison for sports because we don't need personal political bias to ruin how we perceive a team's athleticism. There shouldn't be any mention or allowance of these non-sporting divisive topics within the sports arena.
The “Trump Dance” isn't a political statement because if it was, I'd call that out too. It's a goofy cultural dance that's easy to do. If Pulisic went onto the field with a MAGA hat, I'd have a problem with it and I voted for Trump.
The dance is a cultural phenomenon and even part of internet culture. It's a funny and simple dance to perform. It's not a declaration of your dying support of Donald Trump. If there was a Kamala Harris dance that was sweeping the nation, I wouldn't really care either.
Donald Trump, whether Howard likes it or not, is a cultural icon and has been for decades. His being in the political arena doesn't take away from that fact. Howard's incessant need to speak up against Pulisic makes him look like an over-reacting egotistical fool.
And the state of how ridiculous things are in sports, after the game, Pulisic was asked why he did that dance...imagine being asked why you danced. Well, he answered: “It was just a dance that everyone’s doing. He’s the one who created it. I just thought it was funny.”
Sports used to be fun, jovial, and at times goofy because we didn't take athletes seriously. We admired their athleticism but even they could occasionally laugh at themselves. I think about the NFL & the Wide Receivers one-upping each other with goofy & memorable touchdown dances.
Pulisic's response, "I just thought it was funny" used to be enough to perform a celebration dance on-field; not anymore.
Howard, amongst other egotistical athletes, has removed the fun from sports and that's the greatest tragedy of all. They've taken themselves too seriously.
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