An open letter to IU Fans

First appeared on March 18, 2015
in The Lebanon Reporter

Dear Hoosier Nation,

If you don’t mind, I’d like to take my Part Time Pretend Sports Columnist hat off for a moment and talk to you one Indiana basketball fan to another. I grew up in a house where Indiana Basketball took center stage. I saw Knight toss the chair and remember the shirt I was wearing when Keith Smart beat Syracuse. I grabbed my socks at the foul line in Junior High School and screamed at the television while Ted Valentine fouled our four best players out of the National Semifinal in 1992 against Duke. I was in the Georgia Dome when we flirted with banner number six and will maintain forever that Calbert Cheaney was the best college basketball player I ever saw.

I was also in the stands two weeks ago when 17,000 booed the Hoosiers during the Iowa game and read with great horror what happened to Tom Crean’s son later that week. We’re better than this. For as long as I can remember, Hoosier Nation has demanded excellence, but there are boundaries.

I understand these boundaries are invisible and thus really hard to see, but Americans still seem steadfastly determined to push them further than ever before. Two weeks ago, Hoosier Nation obliterated them by booing 18 and 19 year old kids over a coach. Booing a group of kids who turned down numerous other schools in order to play for you is counterproductive and just plain dumb.

And, if it’s true some high school students chanted “Tom Crean sucks” when his son took the floor during a Sectional game, we should all stop following sports right now. Cancel the Big Ten Network, box our gear up and ship it off to some needy Third World country like the Central African Republic or Kentucky.

It’s true the actions of a mass of high school students have forever been largely amateurish and entirely unpredictable, but these are presumably the children of Indiana fans. The same sons and daughters who’ve heard their parents cursing Tom Crean in the kitchen, in the car, on the phone and between the pews.

As far as fake nations go, we used to be a standard bearer. Taking our candy striped pants and down home Hoosier values from sea to shining sea to watch our beloved team play. All the while laughing, smiling and remaining gracious in the face of back-handed compliments like “I’ve always said, somebody has to farm.”

Now we risk spiraling into some dark chasm of ill mannered temperament. A freefall destined to bottom out amidst the doldrums of sportsmanship, stranding us in a place inhabited by the worst the sports world can offer (see fans of the Red Sox and Ohio State Football). I’m fairly certain Thomas Paine had never seen an Indiana game when he wrote “These are the times that try men’s souls”. Still, no quote is more fitting for Hoosier Nation at this moment.

If you don’t like Tom Crean, rise up. Rise up and send Fred Glass a sharp-toned email. Rise up and write a letter to your local editor. Rise up and post your scathing thoughts to a message board hiding behind the handle ‘Hoosierdaddy87’. Rise up and shout it out on sports talk radio. Rise up and refuse to go to games.

Whatever you do, leave 18 and 19 year old kids out of the equation. Show the rest of the world what Hoosier Nation is about. Show them we bring a lot to the Sports World Table, including a rich history of tradition, sportsmanship and, above all else, class.

Yours in fandom,

Eric Williams


© 2015 Eric Walker Williams

Calgon! Take the Cubs Away!

First appeared on September 28th, 2012
in The Lebanon Reporter

WARNING: What you are about to read comes from a red, white and blue Cubs fan and is not intended to bring disgrace to anyone, past or present, who has played on the North Side.

Like me, channel surfers everywhere may have stumbled upon the single most disturbing event in the history of television last night. And before you guess, it wasn’t the Dancing With the Stars All Star competition or a replay of Piers Morgan's interview with a perpetually incoherent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, rather it was the fact the Chicago Cubs are still playing baseball.

Finding out the Cubs are still playing baseball is like discovering Branson actually has a Neil Diamond Tribute show. And with Chicago at 59-97 it’s no stretch to say the ticket to see a fake Neil Diamond 2,000 miles from the real Las Vegas is likely hotter than anything Wrigley can offer. In fact something tells me more people would walk across the street to see how many pork rinds Honey Boo Boo can eat before throwing up than those who would actually want to see the Cubs play.

The Cubs should do their fans, Cooperstown, all competitive sports everywhere including Jai Alai and the integrity of the game a favor and stop playing baseball as soon as possible. In fact maybe the Diamondbacks could play the recently fired NFL Replacement Refs tonight in Arizona if only to give us a break from the Cubs and MLB ratings a temporary bump.

Since mid June the Cubs season has been dying a slow death; like a Billy the Kid has already emptied his Six Shooter and they’re still clinging to life with garbled groans kind of slow. Call them what you will, a hot mess, a dumpster fire or God’s gift to perpetual disappointment, the Cubs are on a fast track to whatever the next stop beyond irrelevance is. And while this isn’t uncharted territory for the Northsiders, Cubs fans have had enough and the brass at Wrigley better do something in the next 7 months or the only thing their ticket takers will be gathering next season is cobwebs.

In fact if the Cubs don't do anything before next year I’m not sure a "Free Season Ticket Night" will be enough to get people out to Wrigley. Barring a remarkable finish, this team is going to lose 100 games which means that, instead of newspapers, people will begin associating Cubs tickets with the lining of bird cages or as a cheaper option for papier-mâché.

And don't tell me to wait for next year. Waiting for next year is the single greatest marketing ploy since Publisher’s Clearinghouse or the Doublemint Twins. Besides there are no 40 somethings out there actually sitting in their parent's basement clad in Cubs garb with a copy of the 2013 schedule and calendar in hand waiting for the season to begin or Mitt Romney would have mentioned them by name during the welfare crusade he launched at his $50,000 a plate fundraiser.

But alas if we’re to raise any fingers towards the Cubs organization for their 2012 product perhaps it’s best pointed at Theo Epstein for he is the one who traded, released or reassigned almost every player the Cubs had who could hit, field or stay upright with any regularity. The good news for Epstein is Cubs fans may be a beleaguered and oft-tortured bunch but, if anything, they’re also patient. And in the interest of being fair most will wait Epstein out. After all he is seen as the man who ended the Red Sox curse.

He better hope the “trade every relevant player you have away” philosophy he’s borrowed from the Marlins organization actually pans out however because, after a 100 loss season, nothing less than a World Series win will suffice. OK, so maybe we’ll settle for an appearance. Heck even after 100 years, we’re still willing to settle for baby steps.

© 2012 Eric Walker Williams