Occasionally in the Toy Department, a Sun sports writer will take a moment to offer his or her Endorsement of something they feel passionately about. There are no rules, and the subject can be as broad, or as narrow, as the writer chooses. This week, Kevin Van Valkenburg explains why it's OK to say that, with all due respect, you really do hate your closest rival.
It's Ravens-Steelers week, which means the usual cliches about hatred and respect are being trotted out in the media and in the locker room. The game Sunday night is being described as another chapter in the best rivalry in the NFL, at least in part, because the players and fan bases don't really like one another. Those feelings might even rise to the level of "hate" which is a bit like the seasoning for a good steak. It makes it taste that much better in victory. Haloti Ngata joked that, as a rookie, he didn't understand much about the rivalry before he arrived in Baltimore, but he quickly picked up on the fact that, if nothing else, "we're supposed to hate them."
LeBron James is also making his return to Cleveland tonight, which has SI.com Michael Rosenberg trying to explain "Why LeBron inspires such hatred" and ESPN's Wright Thompson (in what is simply an outstanding piece of journalism) serving as our guide on a quest through Cleveland's past and present, where he finds there is a little more nuance to the simplistic idea that the city "hates" LeBron James simply for leaving the Cavs and going to Miami.
All of it has me thinking a lot about "hatred," in general, and whether it's a good, healthy emotion to have as a sports fan. The pat, condescending answer is, or course, that it's not healthy. Hate is too strong of a word, someone might tell you in a scolding manner. It's ridiculous to claim you hate a professional sports franchise, or an athlete, just because they're geographic or emotional rivals of your own favorite team or athlete.
But life is not an etiquette seminar. I sort of enjoy how closely intertwined love and hatred are in the context of sports, because if you can't cast someone as the foil, how can you really cast someone else as the hero?
I hear all the time from fans in Baltimore about how much they hate the Yankees, the Red Sox or the Duke Blue Devils. They hate Hines Ward and hate Tom Brady, even though deep down in places they don't want to talk about, they concede that if either were Ravens, those feelings would be much closer to love.
To hate, in the heat of the moment, feels good, even if it's irrational. The word "hate," in fact, gets a bit of a bad rap because it's too closely connected to violence and crimes. That's not hatred, when you commit violence against someone else. That's fear and ignorance and rage, none of which are healthy. But to hate your rival -- to swear that you'd never, under any circumstances, cheer for them because of the betrayal it would represent -- is kind of fun.
Sports hate is different. Just because the word is similar to the phrase "hate crimes" doesn't mean it is the same thing. In sports, you can't properly hate without a little bit of affection involved.
One of my favorite sports books ever written is Will Blythe's "To Hate Like This Is To Be Happy Forever" about the North Carolina-Duke basketball rivalry. Blythe, once the literary editor for Esquire Magazine, can't stand the Blue Devils and spent a year grieving over the death of his father by moving back to North Carolina to write about how his obsession with Tar Heels basketball shaped his life in many respects, and how good it felt to dislike the arrogance and aristocracy of the Duke basketball program.
He made me think a lot about Ravens fans near the end of the book, however, when he comes to realize that Duke played an important role in shaping who he was too. Hating Duke was comfortable. Familiar. And a part of his DNA. But only because he could contrast it with the warmth he felt toward the Tar Heels. He could still hate Duke and their fans, but understand on some level it wasn't because they were bad people. They just weren't his people.
Think about that when you watch the Ravens-Steelers play on Sunday night. Don't let anyone tell you it's immature or irrational or stupid to feel disdain every time Ward busts out his Cheshire cat grin after a borderline block, or if the Steelers get a favorable call from the referees. Because somewhere in Pittsburgh, there's a fan grinding his teeth over Ray Lewis' pre-game dance, or Terrell Suggs' sack celebration.
On some level, neither side would feel complete without the other.