This Time Maybe It's Not About the Money

First appeared on February 25, 2013
in The Lebanon Reporter

A gallon of premium gasoline hit $4.00 this week. And, for those looking to diversify their chosen method of transportation, they aren’t giving hogs away either. We in the 99% realize money is tight these days and, with the ‘Roaring Twenties’ firmly in our rearview, most in the Midwest have been raised to keep an eye on the sky and a tight grip on their wallets.

So you go to the coffee shop for a bottomless cup, knowing it’s also one of the last places a free newspaper still exists, one without pay walls and pop ups. But the rack is empty so you slide to the counter, sandwiched between an insurance man on the prowl and a newly retired newspaperman. The buzzing chatter seems to intimate Al Qaeda is behind the rising price of hogs and the Indiana Pacers are fighting a rash of empty seats downtown.

The team itself is surely not to blame you theorize, after all they’ve axed ticket prices, given away everything from umbrellas to bobble head dolls, hired plate twirlers who set themselves on fire while swallowing a fistful of Asian Forest Scorpions just to entertain the folks at halftime and still, despite all this, the Fieldhouse remains half empty.

At 14 games over .500 Indiana has one of the top teams in the East, one that has already defeated the defending World Champions twice this season. One that includes a group of young men who trust each other, know no jealousies and can rely upon the services of a budding superstar poised to leave many Pacer fans wondering “Reggie who?” soon. And still it’s not been enough to get people to put down the remote, load the kids in the car and drop a hard earned Benjamin Franklin at BLF.

Considering there is no half-full optimism in the Pacers Marketing Department, they must be wondering if maybe, this time anyhow, it’s not about money. When one takes a second to look at the state of the NBA (for a second is all many can tolerate anyway) it isn’t entirely clear what one sees. Clearly it boasts the most athletic and ultra talented basketball players on Earth playing a fast paced, physical game above the rim. One might be left believing this alone would be enough to spin the turnstiles nightly but such has not been the case, at least not in Indianapolis.

Some blame the Colts, others the Hoosiers and still another lost soul makes some hair brained proclamation it’s somehow or another connected to race. Alas many have missed the most obvious of villains; apathy. Apathy, not about the Pacers themselves, but rather what the Association has become.

Apathy borne from multimillionaires complaining about having to practice and wear ties to games. Apathy that results from seeing a self-proclaimed Superman quit on his team only to fly cross-country with designs on teaming up with a Superstar. One already in possession of a reputation for taking 95% of the shots and yet we pretend to be shocked when his spoiled toddler shtick continues after discovering the aforementioned Superstar continues taking 95% of the shots.

Apathy that can only result from a man already living the dream of millions intentionally firing an air ball up in a game before storming to the locker room upon learning his coach is somehow disappointed in him. If I could hand David Stern a solution we’d all be eating bacon on our doughnuts and driving Hummers. Until then, understand apathy here means fans lack the hunger required to jump those hoops associated with attending games; and the sooner the NBA addresses this, the better.

© 2013 Eric Walker Williams

Father Christmas has been good to Hoosiers

First appeared on December 12, 2012
in The Lebanon Reporter

It’s that time again. Time to brave the crowds, embrace our hunter gatherer roots and fight the animal tendency in all of us to hammer our fellow man in the face, all in the name of making the Christmas dreams of our bright eyed children come true.

And knowing full well you won’t be the father of a four year old who can’t find Indiana on a map, you settle on the Melissa and Doug Wooden Puzzle of the United States. A must-have of every toy closet, stately cornstalks of gold mark Nebraska and there’s Florida with its proverbial giant round orange while a lone Saguaro cactus stands guard over Arizona.

Yes a marvel of modern Elf ingenuity indeed. But what’s this? Indiana has no race car or basketball? In their stead, crouched over the crossroads of America, is some strange creature that appears half whistle pig, half beaver.

This is what the national impression of Indiana has come to? An overgrown rat? Hoosiers have a better chance of seeing Sasquatch roaming their backyards than this Capybara-like creature. Melissa and Doug’s official statement is they chose a beaver for Indiana “due to all the parks.” Really? It’s insulting; to Indiana and beavers.
One can only hope that, in the last two months alone, Sports Illustrated has done more to remake Indiana’s image than anything Melissa and Doug could ever do to trash it. In that time the editors of SI have chosen the images of Indiana’s Cody Zeller, Notre Dame’s Football Team and the Colts’ Andrew Luck to move their magazine. This alone proves sports historians would be hard pressed to find a better time to be a Hoosier.

So what more do we have to do? Indiana hammers North Carolina and clearly has Kentucky’s John Calipari on the run (BTW John, you’re not fooling anyone, it’s not about capacity of arenas as much as it is your precious undefeated record at Rupp which you clearly understand Indiana will soil forever). Notre Dame runs the table and it still isn’t enough for national pundits to accept that maybe they’re just the best team in College Football. Meanwhile Andrew Luck has done nothing but prove his worth as the number one overall pick by making good decisions, throwing lasers and extending plays with his feet; all this while helping the surprising Colts sprint out to 9 wins.

Still in the national consciousness we remain sod-busting corn pickers who spend weekends ogling our cousins through the flickering television light. In one fell swoop Melissa and Doug has taken nearly 200 years of proud Hoosier tradition and reduced it to what appears to be a Grizzly Bear that’s had the gross misfortune of crossing paths with a Martian shrink ray.

So you bypass the puzzle and tuck a Tonka Truck tuck under your arm, sprinting towards the check-out line like OJ in a Hertz Commercial, leaping shopping carts and shoving pregnant mothers out of the way. And you do so because it’s the most wonderful time of the year and you’re a Hoosier; a gift you can never return. Hoosiers are proud of our deep fried Twinkies and lone Toll Road; even though it’s owned by a foreign country most can’t find on a map.

It will take more than a child’s puzzle and the worst artists’ rendering of a beaver since Grog first took to cave walls to ruin our holidays. For Hoosiers everywhere it’s time to celebrate who we are; and we do so knowing we have Indiana, Notre Dame and the Colts to speak for us. And speak they will.

© 2012 Eric Walker Williams

Hoosier odds are long, but are they Buster Douglas long?

First appeared on February 3rd, 2010
in The Lebanon Reporter

February 11th will mark the 20th anniversary of the night James “Buster” Douglas knocked Mike Tyson out to win the Heavyweight Championship of the World. Coming in a 42-1 underdog, Douglas left Tokyo having shocked the sports world and secured a place in boxing eternity.
Some believe the Indiana Hoosiers will face similar odds when the Purdue Boilermakers come to Assembly Hall Thursday night. The Boilers sprinted out to a 14-0 start and, after some part-time hack of a sports columnist cursed them by spotlighting their dominance in his writing, they proceeded to lose three straight. Now, after beating Wisconsin and drumming Penn State, it would seem they have righted the ship. Surely Boiler fans want nothing more (outside of a National Championship) than to hear the drumbeat continue Thursday night in Bloomington.
One could say with some certainty the Hoosier’s season to this point has been quite different. After letting a winnable game at home against Iowa get away, the Hoosiers controlled the second half Saturday at Illinois and played well enough to win, only to be beaten at the buzzer. So they’ve lost their top scorer, dropped an ugly game to Iowa and lost at the buzzer to Illinois. What could be worse? Oh yeah, here comes nationally ranked Purdue. The question in the B-town coffee shops now is how much life can be left in the Hoosiers after they’ve lost so much?
The fervor of this rivalry is well documented (see one side chanting “BOILER UP!” and the other answering in unison, “BANNER UP!” for proof), so truth is this series is so much about emotion that it really doesn’t matter where these two find themselves now.
It’s a time when the proverbial records are actually given the proverbial toss out the proverbial window. A rivalry so volatile we’re used to seeing coaches so heated they resort to throwing things; Knight and his chair. Keady and his jacket. Samson and, well take your pick between his future away or the program under a bus.
In a new era Tom Crean and Matt Painter fit the mold. Both are fiery in a “fire in the belly for winning” kind of way. Certainly not the “lose temporary touch with reality” way we saw after Mike Davis stormed the court in Lexington only to dance around like somebody had tossed a voodoo doll of him into a hot skillet.
So what will happen Thursday? The only certainty in all of this is, at one time, an unknown like Buster Douglas could never have ever beaten Mike Tyson. Tyson was the closest thing to Superman the sports world had ever seen. He had never even been knocked down in a fight before. Of course twenty years later we’ve all heard how that story turned out (well Evander Holifield has heard bits and pieces of it anyway).
Crean said recently his kids need to be tougher. The Hoosiers will have to be physical to survive Purdue’s football on hardwood style, even if Tijan Jobe goes 4/5 from downtown. This game will merely be a progress report for Crean’s crash course on toughness however and not a final exam.
What we see Thursday night could be interesting…or it could be ugly. If it’s analysis you seek, the Hoosiers will be smart to stay aggressive and attack Purdue even when logic says protect the ball in the face of their smothering pressure. Crean’s mantra should be “Take them 10 rounds”; absorb their best shot and outlast them. Thursday night the Indiana Hoosiers could do worse than aspiring to be Buster Douglas for a day.