Columns

There has always been talk that American sports are over-hyped and too glitzy. Sports such as rugby and cricket are the sports of gentlemen and true sports fans love the sport for what it is, not for the cheerleaders at halftime. It is easy for the bright lights of American sports to blind the actual competition, but that doesn’t mean the athleticism on show is not world-class.

The NBA has to be one of the greatest sporting spectacles on the planet, due to both the great entertainment and athleticism of basketball and the players. It is the epitome of modern day sport; you will never feel you have left a basketball game disappointed by not seeing enough goals.
   You might, in fact, feel you saw too many, such is the way the game is played. 
   The NBA has also produced the biggest sporting stars in the world, Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant, and of course Michael Jordan, who could not only make a jump shot to win a game in the dying seconds of a game, but he also probably makes more money a second than the whole of our fair little nation. 
   The other two American sports seem a little harder for many to swallow. American Football may have big hits but it also takes a bullshit long time and it doesn’t have anywhere near the global reach of basketball. There’s not a lot to say about baseball except that it’s like cricket except they cut out all the interesting stuff and just try and hit the ball out of the stadium. 
   What also turns away a lot of people is the way the teams seem to run like businesses: if your team doesn’t get much support or the owner runs out of money and sells the franchise, the whole team can be changed to a different city and a new set of fans. I’m not so sure Adam Smith thought about professional sports teams when he imagined the free market at work, but what the hell it’s all about the benjamins – or rutherfords, depending on what currency you deal in. 
   With all the talk about how American sport is trash compared to our sports, the number one complaint that you will get from talkback callers is the ‘Americanising’ of our beloved sports, whether it’s the New Zealand cricket team being named the Black Caps or the introduction of new uniforms every year. 
   The thing is, we probably should get used to it. It’s the way of the future. You can blame Generation X, Y, or Z but really it’s nobody’s fault except our own and our insatiable appetite for top quality entertainment – that and Dan Carter in his penis huggers. 
   For all our whining about American sports, they really don’t give a thought to the sports we partake in. Most Americans still think the All Blacks are the ones who voted for Barack Obama, and that cricket is that lovely Mexican immigrant who mows their lawn for two bucks an hour.