What Really Matters?
Time to rethink our team sports enthusiasm
What Really Matters?
by Andrew Meblin
As I write this the final game of the National Basketball Association is being played. The emotion exuded by people in the audience is intense. This is Game 7 of the series, so the winner is the national champion. Residents of the city in which the winning team plays half their games will rejoice, whilst people who root for the losing team will (hopefully) say, “Oh well, maybe next time.” Hopefully.
Why “hopefully”? Because it really means nothing if the professional players bearing the name of your city don’t win. Unless, of course, you’re a betting person, and then there may be monetary rewards. But in the wider scope of things, with American B2 Spirit bombers flying thirty-seven hour sorties to Iran and back, the outcome of a basketball game truly affects very few of us.
Sure, it is fun to watch. In 2020 the Meblins drove from Truckee to Eugene, Oregon to watch the second-to-last game of Sabrina Ionescu, the star player at the time, for the University of Oregon Ducks. Sabrina was a product of the Bay Area, and played for the school my daughter Juliet attended. And Juliet even played one season of basketball at that school, Miramonte High School. So, yeah, boo-yah!
Sabrina is an outstanding example of humility and prowess. She is a top-level basketball player, and an articulate person who appears to be very kind. Her basketball skills are such that she achieved an NCAA record of 2,000 points, 1,000 rebounds, and 1,000 assists. No other player had achieved that—male or female.
The game was stupendous. Winning it clinched the Pac 12 championship for the Oregon Ducks woman’s team. But more than that, Sabrina’s eulogy at the memorial for Kobe Bryant was shown. Yeah, a college player—mentored by Kobe—was asked to speak at that funeral.
In 2025, Juliet and I bought tickets to watch an exhibition game between the New York Liberty and the Toyota Antelopes. If you’re confused, good. So was I. The Toyota Antelope are a women basketball team from Nagoya, Japan. Jokes about Japanese women being short can just get out now. Many of the Antelope players are tall, like maybe 6’2”, but the two dynamos of the team seemed tiny when standing next to the New York Liberty women. Two players stood out as they mercilessly drove toward the hoop, time after time.
It was all for naught. The Liberty steadily pulled away in points. One thing I noted was that the Antelope players did not have the endurance level necessary to remain competitive. After the third quarter they just wore out.
No hard feelings, though! The Antelope players were obviously very enthusiastic about the opportunity to play versus the New York Liberty and Sabrina Ionescu. After the game Antelope players mobbed #20 for autographs on jerseys and shoes. Hugs and selfies for the next ten minutes.
The Antelopes play in Nagoya, Japan, which lies between Tokyo and Osaka, and is the capital for Japanese carmakers, which is why they are the Toyota Antelopes and not the Nagoya Antelopes. Did they start as a factory team? Google it. I did and couldn’t find much, but then…that’s just me.
The important thing is the Antelope players were not devastated to lose to a WNBA team from a major American city, one with a couple of GOATs, in Sabrina, or Breanna Stewart. Sabrina even challenged Steph Curry in a 3-point shootout in 2024. Steph won by shooting 29 to Sabrina’s 26, which she shot from the NBA (men’s) 3-point line! So lose to her team? No shame.
But why do we place so much weight on how “our” sports team does in a match-up. It is supposed to be a game, not a battle-to-the-death. One Super Bowl Sunday I saw a television news segment on the horrible incidence of spousal abuse (wife beating is what they called it back then) following a loss in the Super Bowl. These were men physically assaulting women because “their” team lost. Yes, alcohol has a lot to do with it, but still. Why? Unless one has bet heavily on a sporting event outcome, a team to which you are not affiliated losing or winning truly means nothing.
What is important is that it looks like, for now, that Iran will not, or cannot, continue to shoot missiles at Israel, and Israel will cease taking out Iranian air defenses, top generals, and nuclear scientists. We know not if the USA will be a site for a terrorist attack by “Iranian sleeper cells” composed of individuals who perhaps crossed our southern border in recent times. Let us all band together and adopt vigilance in order to protect ourselves.
So, for now, enjoy life, be kind to animals, help other people—even/especially strangers— and thank God every day for our WWW, Wonderful Whirling, World.
Amen