Monday, December 29, 2003
Divine Sparks
Yes, the sky seems a little brighter and the world much more benign on a day such as this. Strangers speak to each other in coffee shops and convenience stores where on other days, they'd keep their eyes straight ahead and their minds on their own business. Hangover from the Christmas season? Nope. This is how it feels up here in Wisconsin this morning, to be a football fan, to bask in the the Green Bay Packers' improbable capture of an NFL playoff berth yesterday.
The 16-game NFL regular season is such that every game matters, unlike the NBA and NHL, whose bloated playoffs render their regular seasons almost entirely meaningless, and even major-league baseball, where there's always another game tomorrow. The rhythms of the football season--a game every Sunday, post-game autopsy Monday, looking forward to the next one starting Tuesday, are as comfortable as an old sweater. Beyond that, the NFL has cunningly constructed its playoff system so that several teams have something significant to play for right down to the last game. So it was with the Packers yesterday, needing a win over Denver and a Minnesota loss to Arizona to qualify for the playoffs. Leading up to the late-afternoon kickoffs of both games, the math looked grim. Even if the Packers beat Denver, which had already secured a playoff berth and looked great doing it, they had to depend on Arizona, one of the four worst teams in the league, to pull an upset. What gave Packer fans hope was Minnesota's dismal performance in the last two-thirds of the season--after starting with six straight wins, the Vikings had lost seven of their next nine. The Packers were taking care of their business, rolling to an easy win. But when the Vikings took a 17-6 lead with two minutes to go in their game, Packer fans began contemplating the end. With bad news from Arizona, we would be left only with memories of two spectacular plays--Ahman Green's 98-yard touchdown run, the second longest TD run from scrimmage in NFL history, followed immediately by another Packer touchdown when the Broncos fumbled the next kickoff--to get us through the spring and summer.
When the season comes to an end, particularly in disappointment, the sense of disruption is almost painful. Suddenly there's no game next week--no game until August--and while we try to fill the void with other things, the rhythm of our days feels a little bit off all the while. But we have felt it before, and we know how to prepare for it. And so the preparations began.
But then, a break in the gloom. Arizona scored and it was 17-12. Then we heard that they recovered the next kickoff. Then we heard that they were inside the Minnesota 10-yard line with 30 seconds to go. Then our game went to commercial, and we waited. During the break, my brother said to me, "I have faith in the Cardinals. They're doing it. They're doing it right now." And they were. Back from the break, the first thing we saw on-screen was "Arizona 18, Minnesota 17." It turned out that Arizona had scored on fourth-and-24, the last play of the game, with no time left on the clock. Our living room erupted. Lambeau Field, where the score of the Minnesota game had been neither posted nor announced all day, erupted. The whole state erupted. Improbably, the Packers had made the playoffs--and our most hated rival (yes, hated more than the Chicago Bears) had suffered the most painful sort of defeat there is--from playoff contender to spectator, a once-promising season lost, on nothing less than a miracle play.
To understand how it feels up here this morning, you need to understand more than just the rhythms of the season or the details of what happened yesterday. You also have to understand how we grow in our Packer fandom here. It's like a church, really. We are in the pew every Sunday, even when there is no evidence that what we are worshipping reciprocates our devotion at all. And it's a nearly universal church--my brother, for example, who has never been much of a sports fan, continually surprises me with his Packer devotion--that brings us together in a way nothing else does. While younger fans are fired with the enthusiasm of the newly converted, untempered by disappointment, we older fans know that the road of faith is neither straight nor smooth. My generation grew up on the fading remnant of the Vince Lombardi/Bart Starr glory days of the 1960s, and came to adulthood during the awful 1970s and 1980s, when a succession of mediocre teams stumbled around blindly. Then came the 1990s, the Brett Favre era. History will record that Favre's first appearance with the Packers in 1992 resulted in a stunning comeback win. We started believing in the impossible then, and in years to come we saw it again and again. We saw it again last Monday, when Favre, grieving the loss of his father Irv just the day before, put on one of his greatest statistical performances in a game that would be the stuff of legend were Favre's legend not already so stuffed.
And we saw it again yesterday--as a friend put it, "Irv Favre won us another one"--and what is most amazing about it this time, most likely to linger after this season is over, is the communal nature of it. I am willing to bet that telephone use in the state spiked in the minutes following the game, as we made phone calls to distant friends to exult in the improbable. Whether we came right out and said it or merely felt it, we all shared the same thought--the beauty of this is not so much the result of the games but the way the experience pulls us all together, how it's so much bigger than each of us, bigger than all of us, more magical than we can imagine. How it captures the essence of why we watch sports, which is one of the only things in life that is capable of connecting us now and then to--and I don't think this is much of an exaggeration--a spark of the divine.
Well, now it's time for me to take a deep breath and get on with my work, much as the multitudes who went to their churches yesterday are going on with their work today, shriven of their sins, fortified by their faith, looking forward to their reward in Heaven, as I look forward to my reward next Sunday, when the rhythm rocks on.
Yes, the sky seems a little brighter and the world much more benign on a day such as this. Strangers speak to each other in coffee shops and convenience stores where on other days, they'd keep their eyes straight ahead and their minds on their own business. Hangover from the Christmas season? Nope. This is how it feels up here in Wisconsin this morning, to be a football fan, to bask in the the Green Bay Packers' improbable capture of an NFL playoff berth yesterday.
The 16-game NFL regular season is such that every game matters, unlike the NBA and NHL, whose bloated playoffs render their regular seasons almost entirely meaningless, and even major-league baseball, where there's always another game tomorrow. The rhythms of the football season--a game every Sunday, post-game autopsy Monday, looking forward to the next one starting Tuesday, are as comfortable as an old sweater. Beyond that, the NFL has cunningly constructed its playoff system so that several teams have something significant to play for right down to the last game. So it was with the Packers yesterday, needing a win over Denver and a Minnesota loss to Arizona to qualify for the playoffs. Leading up to the late-afternoon kickoffs of both games, the math looked grim. Even if the Packers beat Denver, which had already secured a playoff berth and looked great doing it, they had to depend on Arizona, one of the four worst teams in the league, to pull an upset. What gave Packer fans hope was Minnesota's dismal performance in the last two-thirds of the season--after starting with six straight wins, the Vikings had lost seven of their next nine. The Packers were taking care of their business, rolling to an easy win. But when the Vikings took a 17-6 lead with two minutes to go in their game, Packer fans began contemplating the end. With bad news from Arizona, we would be left only with memories of two spectacular plays--Ahman Green's 98-yard touchdown run, the second longest TD run from scrimmage in NFL history, followed immediately by another Packer touchdown when the Broncos fumbled the next kickoff--to get us through the spring and summer.
When the season comes to an end, particularly in disappointment, the sense of disruption is almost painful. Suddenly there's no game next week--no game until August--and while we try to fill the void with other things, the rhythm of our days feels a little bit off all the while. But we have felt it before, and we know how to prepare for it. And so the preparations began.
But then, a break in the gloom. Arizona scored and it was 17-12. Then we heard that they recovered the next kickoff. Then we heard that they were inside the Minnesota 10-yard line with 30 seconds to go. Then our game went to commercial, and we waited. During the break, my brother said to me, "I have faith in the Cardinals. They're doing it. They're doing it right now." And they were. Back from the break, the first thing we saw on-screen was "Arizona 18, Minnesota 17." It turned out that Arizona had scored on fourth-and-24, the last play of the game, with no time left on the clock. Our living room erupted. Lambeau Field, where the score of the Minnesota game had been neither posted nor announced all day, erupted. The whole state erupted. Improbably, the Packers had made the playoffs--and our most hated rival (yes, hated more than the Chicago Bears) had suffered the most painful sort of defeat there is--from playoff contender to spectator, a once-promising season lost, on nothing less than a miracle play.
To understand how it feels up here this morning, you need to understand more than just the rhythms of the season or the details of what happened yesterday. You also have to understand how we grow in our Packer fandom here. It's like a church, really. We are in the pew every Sunday, even when there is no evidence that what we are worshipping reciprocates our devotion at all. And it's a nearly universal church--my brother, for example, who has never been much of a sports fan, continually surprises me with his Packer devotion--that brings us together in a way nothing else does. While younger fans are fired with the enthusiasm of the newly converted, untempered by disappointment, we older fans know that the road of faith is neither straight nor smooth. My generation grew up on the fading remnant of the Vince Lombardi/Bart Starr glory days of the 1960s, and came to adulthood during the awful 1970s and 1980s, when a succession of mediocre teams stumbled around blindly. Then came the 1990s, the Brett Favre era. History will record that Favre's first appearance with the Packers in 1992 resulted in a stunning comeback win. We started believing in the impossible then, and in years to come we saw it again and again. We saw it again last Monday, when Favre, grieving the loss of his father Irv just the day before, put on one of his greatest statistical performances in a game that would be the stuff of legend were Favre's legend not already so stuffed.
And we saw it again yesterday--as a friend put it, "Irv Favre won us another one"--and what is most amazing about it this time, most likely to linger after this season is over, is the communal nature of it. I am willing to bet that telephone use in the state spiked in the minutes following the game, as we made phone calls to distant friends to exult in the improbable. Whether we came right out and said it or merely felt it, we all shared the same thought--the beauty of this is not so much the result of the games but the way the experience pulls us all together, how it's so much bigger than each of us, bigger than all of us, more magical than we can imagine. How it captures the essence of why we watch sports, which is one of the only things in life that is capable of connecting us now and then to--and I don't think this is much of an exaggeration--a spark of the divine.
Well, now it's time for me to take a deep breath and get on with my work, much as the multitudes who went to their churches yesterday are going on with their work today, shriven of their sins, fortified by their faith, looking forward to their reward in Heaven, as I look forward to my reward next Sunday, when the rhythm rocks on.
