Springtime Musings
Spring Forward for the Final Four and NASCAR

This Sunday, April 3rd at two a.m., legions of groggy Americans will stagger from clock to coffeemaker, from VCR to wristwatch, making sure all their devices with clocks in them are moved forward an hour. Those who don’t do this will have a built-in excuse for getting to brunch an hour late. This is the “spring forward” that ushers in Daylight Saving Time (notice that it is “Saving,” not “Saving-s”).

Like every issue involving all fifty states of America, there are always a few rebellious malcontent states who refuse to get with the program. In this case it is Arizona and Hawaii—along with the territories of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and American Samoa—that stay on “standard time” all year long. What’s the matter? Are you guys too busy basting in coconut oil and sipping tropical drinks to be bothered with adjusting your clocks twice a year? Maybe if you had to shovel snow out of your driveway for five months out of the year like the rest of us, you’d see that re-setting a clock is no big deal.

Hawaii and Arizona’s inherent laziness aside, when it comes to just plain not understanding the Daylight Saving Time concept, no state comes close to Indiana. With their unique system of recognizing time—apparently based on crop rotation and hourglass technology—folks in the Hoosier State are virtually guaranteed that at least half of their appointments will be screwed up.

Under its current system, 77 of Indiana’s 92 counties are “in the Eastern Time Zone but do not change to daylight time in April. Instead they remain on standard time all year. Except for two counties near Cincinnati and Louisville, which do use DST.” The state also has several counties in its northwest corner and the southwestern area that are in the Central Time Zone. They use both standard and daylight time.

Indiana University basketball and Notre Dame football have suffered from Indiana’s curious timekeeping ability as players find it impossible to get to sleep at a reasonable hour. Because of this deliberate timekeeping malfeasance, the rest of country has decided to boycott Indiana altogether except during the weekend of the Indianapolis 500.

Sports Mysteries

Speaking of sports, one of the bigger mysteries of life is how college basketball can be so thrilling while its professional counterpart is tedious at best, repulsive at worst. March Madness has taken over classrooms, offices and restaurants as even casual sports fans start sounding like Dick Vitale while keeping abreast of their bracket guesses. It is especially crazy around North Carolina with the Tar Heels back in the Final Four for the first time in five years. Did you know that in the past 20 years, there have only been four Final Fours without either Duke or Carolina coming to the big dance? (1991 was the only time they both made it).

The success of those two teams has a lot to do with why our region loves its college ball but can only feign moderate interest in the exploits of the NBA’s Hornets or Bobcats. The concept of “one-loss-and-you-go-home” appeals to our sense of courage and fairness while the pro ball seven-game series smacks of money-grubbing and even political correctness. Give the loser a few more chances before it has to face the ugly truth…

Professional sports in general have suffered in the last 20 years because paid marketing experts have emphasized individual players over the teams on which they play. There are exceptions to that rule such as The New York Yankees and the Atlanta Braves in the late 90s. Great players excelled on those teams but none of them, apparently, were indispensable.

Call it the ESPN Syndrome if you will, but since it is impossible to interview an entire team, sports media has moved toward the “cult of personality.” Players’ salaries, marital woes, drug and alcohol problems, and spending habits are now treated as actual news on ESPN Sports Center, much more so than the games themselves. And people are getting turned off.

This past winter, the owners of National Hockey League teams and the NHL Players Association basically decided that it was okay to forfeit an entire season while quibbling about money. The players knew in their hearts that salaries had gotten out of hand and the owners knew they had signed contracts that they had no intention of honoring. But instead of finding some middle ground and saving the season, both sides listened to their lawyers (who are not in the business of quick resolutions, after all) and did nothing.

When this entire mess is over there are few things you can count on: 1) Much of the best hockey talent available will have moved overseas to stay. 2) Many of the 50-something (or whatever it is now) NHL teams will close their doors for good. 3) Players will be lucky to make the same, if not less, money for their work. And 4) An entire generation of budding hockey fans will have moved on to other pursuits, never to return.

Other professional sports are also in trouble. Baseball has treated steroid abuse by its bulked up stars as a mere nuisance for years. Never mind that many of the substances were illegal in the United States to begin with. Never mind that baseball is a sport where personal records are sacrosanct. Steroids helped launch the long-ball era and for that reason people in baseball kept their mouths shut and hoped the public wouldn’t be too outraged when the cheating was discovered. Guess again.

For the first time in 45 years, we have a major league baseball team in our nation’s capital. We should be celebrating that fact but the sad truth of the matter is that the baseball players and executives testifying about steroids on Capital Hill last week sort of stole the thunder of the Washington Nationals’ first season.

In pro basketball, there is more news analysis devoted to Kobe Bryant’s legal trouble and his feud with ex-teammate Shaquille O’Neal than there is on the Phoenix Suns and the San Antonio Spurs—two teams having exceptional seasons. I guess their players are too law-abiding and boring for a mention on ESPN.

The only sport that seems to be thriving today is NASCAR, which is growing by leaps and bounds. As a sports fan who spent his formative years in the North, I have always considered “motor sports” to be an oxymoron. Racing is one of those contests that relies more on skill than athleticism and as such I relegate it to the list of lesser sports such as golf, billiards, bowling and lawn darts.

But man, is it entertaining! NASCAR understands its fans and its product perfectly. It relies on individual personalities for its popularity but there is an underlying team concept in NASCAR that other professional sports could learn from. You never hear about Dale Jr. threatening to hold out for more money or Jeff Gordon demanding to be traded. These guys love what they do, feel privileged for the opportunity to risk their lives doing it, and don’t mind sharing the glory (to crew and sponsors) when they win a race.

The only open criticism you ever hear of NASCAR is that it is becoming an international sport that might be forgetting its Southeastern roots. Well, when you’re the fastest growing sport in the world and there’s a nation of bored Canadian hockey fans to woo, that’s not a bad problem to have.