| Benjamin Haley. 14th January, 2008 - 5:58 pm
 All of the up-in-arms disgust about the decision by Tony Romo to take Jessica Simpson, his current inamorata, to Cabo San Lucas before their game with the Giants reveals something in the starkest of terms – we expect more out of athletes than almost anyone else. Indeed, we expect more of them than we do of ourselves.
Imagine life faced with this decision of Tony Romo – whether or not to take a blonde, admittedly slightly vacant, vixen to sunny Mexico for vacation. It is a difficulty conceived of dream. Most of us can’t even charm imaginary women that attractive (personally I find that even when I dream out of my league I’m quickly humbled back into going for more realistic figments of my imagination).
After more than a passing moment’s effort, hopefully you’ve now arrived at that fateful choice and determined how you would proceed. I also hope, for your sake, that your dream continues, and you have a whale of a time in Mexico. Because you went. We all did. There’s no shame in such a choice, though keeping this thought experiment and the subsequent conclusion from any significant-other would be a prudent idea. Admitting this, why are we so very incensed that Tony Romo made the same decision we all would have? Why? Because we’ve lost all reasonable perspective about the role of athletes in our lives.
Tony Romo, you understand, in our judgment lost the singular focus that must define a football player over the length of his career. We don’t expect this of any profession besides athletics. To illustrate the difference, if you ran into your accountant on vacation would you shoot him dirty looks? Would you say in the space of three seconds of eye contact, “You get back to your office this instant, sir. Lazing about. Socializing. Sunning yourself. It’s embarrassing. And to think I’m trusting you with my tax returns.” Of course not, but there arises the question of just why we think it’s our place to require this of athletes.
We absolutely cannot get enough of stories about coaches and players holing themselves up in their offices, working all night, showing up at morning meetings ragged and unkempt after catching a brief sleep in the film room. Our appreciation borders on the perverse. We ask these men to sell their lives for our victories. We ask that they forfeit everything else so that, on Monday morning, we can spend copious amounts of time at the water cooler asking people who are only interested in slaking a thirst, “Did you see the game last night?...Yup. Been a Cowboy’s fan my whole life.” We tie our self worths to the fortunes of our football teams. To win is everything; capitulation is tied like an anchor to our sense of honor.
To Cowboys fans, Romo did more than let them down. He was -- in the very purest sense of the word -- a traitor. He betrayed the very tenets of sacrifice and hard work that they vicariously appreciate and reflect upon themselves. I say vicariously not because they don’t themselves work hard. However, their agency in the game of football is three hours a week sitting on a couch. As three-hour tasks go, I can think of few less strenuous. Players, on the other hand, devote thousands of hours of toil to their professions. Some devote their future health. It’s never enough, though. Never. Just look at Tony Romo who, if this did serve as a distraction, took his eyes off the prize for a mere moment. Cowboys fans, you see, never did. Fans never fai,l but their teams fail them. It is this inescapable fact that distorts the relationship. That a Super Bowl was his prize to win, that they’re simply spectators of this game, that he owes them nothing, is a pill hard to swallow. So they don’t. They rail at him and begrudge him even a momentary misplacing of his own happiness above theirs.
Nobody knows if it hurt the team. His coach didn’t think it would. His star receiver didn’t think it did. Nobody knows if it played any part in the loss. Likely, it didn’t, but even if it didn’t that fails to be the issue. At stake is whether fans must accept that players, while competitors, perhaps can never match their intensity. Just think, more fights, admittedly alcohol fueled, break out in the stands than on the field where players are hurtling themselves at each other, gouging eyes, and wishing other players were only trying to gouge their eyes. After games, players shake hands, smile, are often gracious in defeat; fans are a rabid, offended mob. What’s frightening is really not that we expect more out of athletes than we expect of ourselves. What’s frightening is that I might have been wrong in assuming that most of us would have gone to Mexico. Maybe we would have declined the offer. Maybe we would have watched film until our eyes bled. Maybe we would have slept on the training table. Surely (not maybe anymore), we care too much.
Many Cowboys' fans will be avoiding the water cooler for the duration of the week. Work time will be dominated with furtive e-mails sent to fellow Cowboys' fans decrying Romo’s poor play and intimating that Cabo San Lucas was a tragic error, that their season ended not in Irving, Texas, but farther to the south. Their spirits will only brighten when they hear a story about his relationship with Jessica cracking under the pressure. They’ll laud his coping mechanism of retreat into the film room. However, before this concludes with the rest of America’s football fans sagely nodding and saying that they always knew Cowboys fans were deranged, remember Tony Romo’s name could have been Eli Manning. Or Phillip Rivers. Or Brett Favre. Or Tom Brady. The clowns change, but the circus remains the same. They only play for us. We can’t expect them to live for us, too.
Comments can be sent to Benjamin.r.haley@gmail.com |
