T
taekwondaveI made the mortal mistake of reading cougarboard today. Some Aggie fan who is LDS said he thought the church should drop BYU sports because too often it can shed a negative light on the church through over-zealous behavior.
Now, obviously at first I wanted to punch him, but I continued to read and he had a couple of good points. I don't think the church should drop sports at BYU, but I DO think there are some ways they could take the reigns in turning up the sportsmanship notch a little bit. That is, if indeed they wish to use BYU football as a chance for positive public exposure, which I've heard is a big reason for keeping it. I mean, it's not so we Mormons have someone to root for. Were BYU sports not around we'd all find other teams for other reasons. But considering the mission of the church and the fact that BYU sports does REFLECT on the church (some say it REPRESENTS the church. I disagree with that. Reflect is a better word to me.), it might be wise to take steps to reaffirm Christ-like love (i.e. sportsmanship) at games.
Now I think that prayer at home games is good, but I kind of wish whoever gave it would quote what Uchtdorf just said in his talk every time; the part about all of God's children wearing the same jersey. As of now the common prayers are just to bless our troops and keep everyone from getting injured. Sometimes someone says something about sportsmanship, but that word has been stretched to the broadest limits of interpretation even by yours truly here :P For some reason that word doesn't carry much meaning for me, and I suspect many others from what I've seen and heard at our games.
Something else I would like to see is some outward sign of brotherhood from our team offered to the other team before the game. Something along the lines of our whole team lined up at mid-field, helmets off, hands extended to shake the opponents' hands or something similar. Just some kind of outward sign, whether it be our team buying a super cool gift for their team to take home, or providing visiting teams with coupons for a nearby pizza place or SOMETHING. You know what I mean?
And ESPECIALLY when playing Utah. I would hope we would go above and beyond what we do for any other team when we play them. Why? Well, when you return love for hate, like the light dispels the darkness it can change the nature of a relationship almost overnight. Even some kind of friendly wager between teams, like the loser agrees to put on the opponents jersey after the game and take pictures with the owner of it. That would make the game extra intense, as nobody wants to wear their rivals uni, but the intensity could relax after the game when the loser of the contest shows a ton of humility and plays along and does it. When you're humble towards your opponent, they can't help but like you more. Stuff like that could do wonders for our image.
I hate the hate with the Utes and I would love for our team to do some game time sign of good will towards them. (You see, I LOVED the haka, but I can see how that seemed obnoxious and inflammatory to some other teams. I didn't really realize that until all the Polys at Utah came out in 2008 and disrupted it. I was pissed at them for it, but in hindsight maybe a pre-game war cry wasn't the best way to get people to like us.)
Anyway, I'm sure if I sat around and thought about it I could come up with some other things that would make playing BYU, win or lose, an overall good experience that causes no ill will for our opponents. I definitely don't think we should ditch sports, but coaches and administrators could probably do more in regards to pre-game and post-game traditions, etc that would help dissipate ill will between the players of both teams, as well as the fans of both teams. I would LOVE for people, after losing to BYU 42-0 say, "You know, we lost to them, but they're just so dang...LIKABLE."
That would be cool.
Now, obviously at first I wanted to punch him, but I continued to read and he had a couple of good points. I don't think the church should drop sports at BYU, but I DO think there are some ways they could take the reigns in turning up the sportsmanship notch a little bit. That is, if indeed they wish to use BYU football as a chance for positive public exposure, which I've heard is a big reason for keeping it. I mean, it's not so we Mormons have someone to root for. Were BYU sports not around we'd all find other teams for other reasons. But considering the mission of the church and the fact that BYU sports does REFLECT on the church (some say it REPRESENTS the church. I disagree with that. Reflect is a better word to me.), it might be wise to take steps to reaffirm Christ-like love (i.e. sportsmanship) at games.
Now I think that prayer at home games is good, but I kind of wish whoever gave it would quote what Uchtdorf just said in his talk every time; the part about all of God's children wearing the same jersey. As of now the common prayers are just to bless our troops and keep everyone from getting injured. Sometimes someone says something about sportsmanship, but that word has been stretched to the broadest limits of interpretation even by yours truly here :P For some reason that word doesn't carry much meaning for me, and I suspect many others from what I've seen and heard at our games.
Something else I would like to see is some outward sign of brotherhood from our team offered to the other team before the game. Something along the lines of our whole team lined up at mid-field, helmets off, hands extended to shake the opponents' hands or something similar. Just some kind of outward sign, whether it be our team buying a super cool gift for their team to take home, or providing visiting teams with coupons for a nearby pizza place or SOMETHING. You know what I mean?
And ESPECIALLY when playing Utah. I would hope we would go above and beyond what we do for any other team when we play them. Why? Well, when you return love for hate, like the light dispels the darkness it can change the nature of a relationship almost overnight. Even some kind of friendly wager between teams, like the loser agrees to put on the opponents jersey after the game and take pictures with the owner of it. That would make the game extra intense, as nobody wants to wear their rivals uni, but the intensity could relax after the game when the loser of the contest shows a ton of humility and plays along and does it. When you're humble towards your opponent, they can't help but like you more. Stuff like that could do wonders for our image.
I hate the hate with the Utes and I would love for our team to do some game time sign of good will towards them. (You see, I LOVED the haka, but I can see how that seemed obnoxious and inflammatory to some other teams. I didn't really realize that until all the Polys at Utah came out in 2008 and disrupted it. I was pissed at them for it, but in hindsight maybe a pre-game war cry wasn't the best way to get people to like us.)
Anyway, I'm sure if I sat around and thought about it I could come up with some other things that would make playing BYU, win or lose, an overall good experience that causes no ill will for our opponents. I definitely don't think we should ditch sports, but coaches and administrators could probably do more in regards to pre-game and post-game traditions, etc that would help dissipate ill will between the players of both teams, as well as the fans of both teams. I would LOVE for people, after losing to BYU 42-0 say, "You know, we lost to them, but they're just so dang...LIKABLE."
That would be cool.