Its Wednesday again. My thoughts today are centred on the importance of winning, or at least the way we perceive that importance. I will use myself as the first example. If I have recorded a football match with Hawthorn in it, and I happen to hear they lost, I wont watch it. I delete it without watching a second of it. I have apparently missed quite a few very good games. An Essendon supporter friend once said to me that Hawthorn was his second favourite team. He knew nearly as much about The Hawks as I did/do and reeled off the virtues of the club in biblical proportions. He asked me, one day why I didnt comment on Essendon. The following is an excuse (questionably of questionable quality) for why I dont watch Hawthorn lose and why I dont comment much on other teams. I looked at my friend and said Mate; youre a football supporter. Im a Hawthorn supporter. I dont really LIKE football that much. I have a passing interest in games throughout the year and a passing slightly closer interest in the Grand Final (but both are different when and if The Hawks are playing) but the game itself has never really captured me. As a veteran of two games (one when I was eleven and one when I was twenty-two), I cant claim to have a significant history in the game, so maybe that affects my thoughts. I dont know. I can sit and happily watch a game of cricket for five days and see Australia lose, and know that I will have enjoyed every aspect, but for the result. I have had disappointments from cricket and devistations from football. I dont know why. Two recent things spring to mind, though, when I think of winning and losing. Firstly, on the telly, before Daniel Geales fight, the tone was in the vicinity of Australian fighter fights at Madison Square. You could just about see the bright lights flashing off the screen. I said to Patsy, Hell be Tasmanian if he loses. Sure enough, the New York power cut rang louder than the centre ring bell and the bright lights faded to an obscurity beyond vision as the air suddenly switched to Tasmanian fighter loses fight in New York. The hype had gone. The fight had been won and lost, and the years of dedication, guts and determination had been brushed aside and deemed unimportant to the Australian scribes who only saw a loser in our Daniel. In my opinion, he is far, far from a loser. Boxing is a big money, largely personal sport; particularly when you lose. The hype truly does just vanish and youre left to pick up the pieces. Daniel Geale should be treated as a hero. He has held a world title and was fighting for another one. That is incredible for a young person from Tassie. Its incredible for a young person from anywhere. The ability to participate at the top level is where we need to be looking. Congratulations Daniel Geale on an effort that showed you have a bigger heart than all those who even consider putting you down for losing. The stories approaching the Commonwealth Games were about the stash of gold Australia was and is expected to bring home. They could easily be about the efforts required to be selected to represent your country, which the majority of us wouldnt even bother to consider. But no... Its all about the glory of the gold medal. Even the silver and bronze medalists seem to be covered in a shroud of underachiever cloth, when they have trained as hard as the winner; they have done the hard yards to be selected for their country (or in this politically correct, metric world, are they now difficult metres?) What are the Socceroos doing now? Huge build up to the world cup. They were going off to represent our country... Then... nothin We tell our kids that participation is the important part. We encourage them to go out and be fit and healthy and enjoy playing sport, then we sit and watch the professionals and yell and scream when our favourites dont win. If we dont yell and scream personally, the media depiction of winning and losing leaves us all in no doubt of the importance of winning and perversely the unimportance of losing. Wheres Richie Porte in Tour de France rankings now... or has that finished? Brilliant effort to, for what seemed like just a brief moment, be outright second. In our world, to lose aint news... even worse, to not win will turn your limelight off, and youre on your own to rebuild or regroup or whatever the current derivation of the term is. People... Winning is not everything. It really isnt. There are not too many cases where you die because you didnt win, although no too many duel losers have lived to rebuild. But were not all fighting duels. We havent all taken the gauntlet and slapped someones face with it. So not winning is not the end. Now, Im going off to enjoy my Wednesday, even if enjoying it only means waiting to see what evil it intends to bring. Oh... and I might also spend some time trying to convince myself that winning isnt everything when it comes to Hawthorn. Im not sure too many of my fellow Hawk supporters will help me with that one :-)
Posted on: Tue, 29 Jul 2014 22:36:11 +0000
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