Published: April 11, 2008 09:53 pm         

Shocking admission is coming up here

Diplomacy is important in my book, but sometimes it can go too far. At least, that’s how I feel when I read the yearly fuss (even up to a month later) about March Madness and the Big Dance.

I know it would be a whole lot wiser to just let all this basketball mania run its course. And more diplomatic, since both of my readers are basketball fans and if I offend them, I’m done. I worry too about my acquaintance with other columnists on this paper, all of whom I am very fond of, even the ones I don’t know. And, especially, in this case, the sports columnist, whom I have known since he was a young feller. For what I am about to say, I might even be asked to turn in my columnist’s badge, for goodness sake!

So I have to take a big breath, but I’m going to say it anyway: to me, March Madness is more like, well, March Monotony. SORRY! SORRY!

Nothing against you basketball fans or players! We each have our preferences and we can agree to disagree, right? You know, like the Democrats and the Republicans, with no hard feelings.

When our son played basketball, I faithfully attended each game and got excited and cheered, like any loyal parent. But, folks, unless you have a personal stake in it, like a relative or a bet, basketball is (really, I hate to say this) dull as dishwater.

Just think of it, for a minute. (If I’ve said this before, work with me.) You have two teams, right? And each one owns a basket. The point is to put the ball in your basket as many times as possible — or at least more times than the other team. (Or is it the other guy’s basket? Oh well, one of those. Anyway, you get points for it.)

Okay, great. So Team Yellow runs down and puts a ball in the basket. Wonderful. They get points. So Team Green runs the opposite way and puts the ball in the other basket. They get points too. Wow. Then Team Yellow runs the opposite way again and puts the ball in the basket, and gets points. Then Team Green runs the other way again, and put the ball in the basket and — you guessed it — gets points. Are you still with me?

Oh, yes, if you’re lucky, there’s a foul, and they get to line up and see if they can single-handedly put the ball in without any resistance from the other side. Another big deal is a three-point toss from far away, which I admit can be quite pretty the first few times you see it.

Don’t fall asleep on me now, because here’s where the excitement happens. Get ready for the adrenaline rush because, every once in a while, the team that has the ball FAILS to put it in the intended basket! Heavens to Betsy. Or, depending on which team you’re for, totally cool. Yippee, and all that.

And then, if you can stand it, sometimes they miss it again! Or else, maybe the other team misses. Now, considering the fact that practically all the players are about 10 feet tall, and the basket is only a few feet taller, this strikes me as a bit of carelessness on the job. But the players are often graceful enough, and the fact that they can run back and forth so hardily and so long, especially with those long shorts flapping in the breeze every step of the way, is certainly worthy of admiration.

They are fine athletes, and they know what to do with the ball. That’s certainly a matter of envy for someone like me, who was forced to play basketball for many years of required high school and college gym (girls’ rules) and never once in all that time ever (ever!) laid hands on the ball.

Still.

Baseball’s good, but as you may know, I am, relatively speaking, a football fan. Although I don’t go for violence, as such (as far as I know, anyway), there are so many more things that can happen on the way to the end zones that make the game lively. Watching football is like watching life, with its ups and downs, its diversions, its accidents, and its decisions. Watching basketball (and hockey and soccer) is like watching a sewing machine working on buttonholes.

You, or at least I, have to wonder how the crowd gets so hyped up at the same old thing, over and over again. I’d rather read Jane Austen.

(And wait for fall.)

Maude McDaniel is a Cumberland freelance writer. Her column appears on alternate Sundays in the Times-News.