Hello loyal and distinguished readership. Welcome back to college. Welcome to my article. As you all know, there are only 100 things in this world that I hold dear. One of those things is a table. Another is the conceptual idea of tables. A third, more importantly, is sports.
I love sports. I have long used them as a vehicle for promoting my own masculinity, and I sometimes even use them as an agent of socialization by which I subconsciously attempt to gain approval from my surrounding culture. Plus, there’s nothing more exciting than a powerful breakaway lay-up shot in a competitive basketball match.
It is mainly due to these underlying psychological forces that I am compelled to follow and comment on the major sporting events of the sporting world. Two of them come to mind. The first has been followed incessantly by the entire world as of late, and the second is the Olympics.
Brett Favre makes me so angry. He retired, waited patiently for me to write an article about it last semester and then unretired several months later. All the while, he slyly pretended not even to have read my article. And now he wants me to look like the fool. Not so fast.
I’ve said it once, and I’ll continue to say it until someone politely asks me to stop. Brett Favre is very, very old. In a lot of ways, he’s like John McCain. Considering the fact that politicians age twice as fast as humans, Favre is actually the elder of the two. Conclusion: Favre is old, and sports are for the not old. He’s bad for sports. Get him out, New York Jets.
Now let’s talk about something good for sports, the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, which is one Olympics away from being the Games of the XXX Olympiad. I’m not sure if that’s exciting or revolting, but it does conjure up a variety of strange images.
Anyway, I recently overheard a friend talking about how he had recently overheard a stranger discussing the Olympics. Here is what he said she said: “Can you believe the Olympics? What about this Michael Phelps character? He’s going to win like 20 medals! That’s gotta be a record!”
I wholeheartedly agree that that is likely a record. But that doesn’t mean that I have to agree that Michael Phelps isn’t a cheater. Before you allow yourself to become enraged with anger, hear me out.
Here is the deal. Michael Phelps is a cheater because he time-traveled from one year in the future to compete in these Olympics. That is the only explanation for his complete dominance in so many swimming events.
Since world records in swimming are apparently broken on a daily basis, it makes perfect sense that a swimmer from one year in the future would have no problem destroying his competitors with their archaic training methods, wet suits and supplements. Not to mention the fact that he already knew he would win since he’s from the future.
Of course, since he hasn’t technically broken any official rules, I support him in full. He is an excellent role model, and as one NBC announcer stated, “He has hands the size of dinner plates.” There’s nothing wrong with dinner plates in my book, so I must say that Michael Phelps is unequivocally good for sports. And so are the Olympics (unlike Brett “Old” Favre). Enjoy them while you can, America. They only come approximately once every four years or so, not counting those snow Olympics or whatever.
Robert Scribner is a graduate student majoring in business administration. He can be contacted at [email protected].