THE BACK AND FORTH:
POLITICS OR SPORTS?

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Who ya got tonight?

Tonight, Redskins vs. Giants kicks off at 7pm. It was actually an adjusted kickoff because of the final night of the GOP Convention, and it should get finished before McCain reaches the podium. Still, it raises an interesting query: what's grander theater, sports or politics? Do you opt for 'Bama-Clemson or a searing political debate? A rousing stump speech or Jon Gruden mic'ed up by NFL Films? To get both sides, we recruited two experts: senior ESPN The Magazine writer Luke Cyphers—who loves writing about the intersection of sports and politics—and Charles Pierce, a Boston-area writer who knows tons about everything. Luke says sports, Pierce says politics. Let's get it on.

CYPHERS:
Let's get this out of the way first. I love politics. Always have. Probably has something to do with observing it from a safe distance, the way I enjoy "Shark Week" every year. But I fall in and out of love with sports, to the point where I've been accused, at times correctly, of being a "hata." Probably has something to do with seeing the sausage being made.

And yet, Sports is better theater than politics, and it has been for most of my lifetime (which started 10 days before JFK was killed, for anyone keeping score).

The proof? Politicians flock to sports fandom like sportswriters to a free buffet, but sports figures don't reciprocate. Like a lot of voters, they're turned off by politics. Politicians are not turned off by sports.

How else do you explain why political figures supplicate themselves at the, er, feet of sports figures, like this guy does? Or why pols go on about their own athletic feats, like this guy, whose finest hour seems to be the time he beat Raymond Felton at H.O.R.S.E.?

And how else can you explain the fact that people on the lower rungs of the sports media, like this guy and that gal rise rapidly to the top when their fancy turns to politics?

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What if you play sports AND participate in politics? Hmmm.

(By the way, my VP of choice is my esteemed debate opponent.)

It says something about our times, I suppose, that sports is a tougher arena to conquer. I'm not saying this is a good thing or a bad thing—OK, yes I am; it's a bad thing—but just look at the last month. Who better mastered the art of stagecraft? Zhang Yimou and Michael Phelps? Or the American political parties?

CHARLES PIERCE:
Once upon a time, in a class on "Editorial Persuasion" in journalism school, we had to read Aristotle's Rhetoric. (If you're keeping score at home, that meant that my J school believed there hadn't been a better text on writing editorials produced in over 3,000 years. Aristotle, a truly veteran scribe, argued that one must study the other side closely in order to refute the argument. So let me say, for the record, that Luke is absolutely correct in what he just wrote. Both sports and politics suffer from the relentless modern impulse to squeeze the spontaneity out of every major public event.

Sports, however, has an inherent advantage in that, generally, in games not officiated by, say Tim Donaghy, the outcome remains unknown. That once was the case in American politics, at least at the presidential level. It used to be possible to affect a "game-changing" moment without hiring a former point-guard from Alaska with a sweet-tooth for guns and a taste for disunion. (The party of Lincoln now nominates a secesh. History comes full circle and runs over its own feet.) It used to be that you could stampede a convention with ONE SPEECH.

Presidential campaigns used to be such full-service hooleys that one of them gave us our most popular synonym for alcoholic beverages. Alas, you don't have those on the highest level of politics any more than you have Grover Cleveland Alexander wavering under a gallon of hooch on the mound or Bobby Layne drawing up plays in the dirt. Civilization marches on, leaving fun under its boots as it does.

That said, it should be noted that, when spontaneity hits politics, it does so in a loud, clanging, vastly more entertaining way. The vice-president of the United States shot his friend in the face. It was in politics that such innovative ground was broken in the production of new alibis. And let's not even discuss politics as it relates to impromptu humidors. What does sports have to throw up against those? The Giants over the Patriots? Please.

LUKE CYPHERS:
Well-played! Aristotle and the J-school prof would be would proud. Seriously. And yes, Pierce, you're absolutely correct about those golden, upper-case moments of spontaneity in politics. But your choice of examples shows just how few and far between those golden moments are of late, and how far we are from a political golden age. From just the past year, I can offer as counter-examples a litany of dramatic moments, even in our most suffocatingly scripted sporting events (and, I'm sorry, but Giants over the Patriots is one of them):

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This was fairly compelling.

Manning to Tyree. Tom Brady was thisclose to perfection.

Mario Chalmers' shot. John Calipari was thisclose to a championship. (I could include Bill Self's contract negotiations as part of that shining moment, though that was a splendid farce all on its own9as befits anything involving T. Boone Pickens.)

The Passion of the Tiger. Thisclose to beatification?

Paul Pierce. Kobe was—well, he actually wasn't close at all.

Nadal-Federer. Nothing comes close. Bud Collins says so.

The 400 freestyle relay. Just plain close. And since we're fixated right now on running mates, memo to McCain: Jason Lezak for Veep. That, my friends, is a wingman!

I'll grant you, Pierce, that in the scheme of things, over 200-some years of American history, you're probably right. Politics has a grand past, and still has its moments. But that also applies to prize fighting, horse racing and the Astrodome. I'll also grant you ahead of time that my list, in comparison to yours, is trivial and quibbling, but in a pompous sort of way. But much as I don't like it, I live in this modern world of today, where quibbling over silly details, missing the bigger picture, and doing it with unmerited self-regard wins elections. That, and vote suppression.

CHARLES PIERCE:
It's not about the relative importance of things. If it were, then MSNBC's set in Denver wouldn't have so closely resembled the College GameDay crew whooping it up in Tuscaloosa. (And Lee Corso has never come as close to hitting Herbstreit with a chair as Chris Matthews came to doing it to Keith Olbermann last week.) The people in charge of televising our politics and the people in charge of televising our sports differ only in the fact that the former dress better and the latter have better music. I don't deny the compelling nature of any of the examples you cited. (Except for that 4x100 swimming relay. The end was exciting. Half of the competition took place underwater, for pity's sake.) But, this year, at least, political spectacle has taken some completely bizarre twists and turns . In fact, last December, the ultimate Democratic nominee was about where, say, Davidson was at the beginning of last season's tournament. There was an odds-on favorite who dropped a game she was supposed to win and never recovered. I'm telling you, in all things, the three-point shot makes all the difference.

LUKE CYPHERS:
I have to defend the 400 relay choice. As a non-swimmer, any time underwater is terrifying, and yet strangely compelling. So for me, that race was like "Shark Week," only with Frenchmen. Different strokes, I guess.
Otherwise, great points all. Thanks for the perspective. I'll agree with you that Herby never drummed up the kind of resentment KO does, not even in Ann Arbor. And I'll agree that politics has had a good year in '08. Teary candidates. Very serious journalistic discussions of weight-loss and hair-styling regimes. Comically navel-gazing New York-centered discussions of a Hillary-Rudy dream showdown. Semi-serious discussions of Appalachia and Mormonism. Hunks Dennis Kucinich and Karl Rove getting lots of air time. ON TELEVISION!

And except for the Doric columns—whose idea was that?—I'd even say that skinny basketball player looked pretty good on a football field. You almost had me. Then I watched Fred Thompson. I am ready for some football.

CHARLES PIERCE:
Wait a minute.

Don't ever bring the snark to me on Denny the K. Did you see the speech at the DNC? The man took a full freaking bow when he was done. Top that, Joe Horn. And, additionally, find me one punter in NFL history who so clearly outkicked his coverage as Congressman Kucinich so obviously has.

And if Chasing Sean Hannity And Raining Abuse On His Head were an Olympic event, tell me you wouldn't be glued to the set. I'd go into training tomorrow.

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Doric columns. Whose idea was that?

I can't defend some of the Twin Cities proceedings, although it was nice to see that Fred Thompson has survived the extensive carbon-14 dating testing that took him off the campaign trail. And what can we say about Joe Lieberman that can't be divined by watching a bowl of treacle go bad in the sun. Why, it was almost like watching the opening weekend of college football season, except without Michigan to liven things up by losing.

LUKE CYPHERS:
Clearly, I have committed the first gaffe of the debate, and did so by violating a cardinal rule of politics: Never appear to make fun of a person's appearance.

And now, in true "I-just-hung-a-stupid-quote-on-the-opponent's-bulletin-board" fashion, I will futilely try to walk it back. What I meant was how refreshing it is that politics allows DK and Rover to get tube time while Stone Phillips does not. Seriously. If I were really going after either one of them, I would have talked about UFOs and, well, just about anything from the last eight years of U.S. history.

Anyways, you're swinging me ever closer to your side, which is bad because I still think it's a loser. This must be how Rodney Harrison felt as he fell to earth in Phoenix. Thank heavens Belichick is about to take the stage again. The man is a genius of the theater, because, like the devil, he makes you think he isn't.

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