PARIS—One year ago, when The Walrus accidentally gave me permission to write about the wide world of sports on their website, I announced a set of goals for the upcoming season.
Now, every good sports writer knows that revisiting one’s archived opinions and predictions is the recipe for a healthy serving of humble pie, with a generous scoop of regret-flavoured ice cream. It’s trouble, is what reflection is (who was it that picked the 63-99 Padres to win the Series? Oh, right).
Fortunately for you and me both, I’ve never been considered a good sportswriter, so:
And now, for self-motivation and posterity, here are my pre-season goals for this column:
1. Win a championship
2. See goal #1
If the Sportstrotter is all about winning, how does my 2007-08 season measure up? Truth be told, I can’t say for sure whether I brought home a title this year or not. I see no 1.5-karat, 10-table diamond ring on my finger, so I didn’t win the Super Bowl. The Stanley Cup is nowhere to be found in my tiny Parisian apartment – trust me, I’ve looked everywhere. And peeking inside my closet, there’s nary a Green Jacket.
But even if I didn’t get to announce that triumphant trip to Disney World, it’s still been a pretty decent season here at Camp Sportstrotter. The stats never lie: fifty-two posts, datelines from eight countries, nearly 100,000 words. I’ve definitely won more than I’ve lost.
Yes, it’s been what my man Frankie would call a very good year. Looking back on twelve months of sports and travel, I have to pinch myself to make sure I’m not dreaming (and pinching’s a better test than the old football-to-the-groin method). I’ve been lucky enough to report from the Las Vegas Hilton’s sportsbook and behind the Tour de France barriers along the Champs-Elysees. I’ve watched rugby in South Africa and played golf on Christmas Day on Vancouver Island.
My new hometown of Paris has been very good to me — I’ve seen grand chelem tennis matches at Roland Garros and Ligue 1 football at the Parc des Princes. I was also kicked out of the Jardin des Plantes by security for pouring champagne on my own head.
Parked in front of television screens in Berlin, Mozambique, Toronto, Saint-Emilion and Soweto, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed this sporting year’s instant-classic encounters, from Lil’ Manning winning one of the greatest Super Bowls of all time to Petr Cech stopping Nicky Anelka’s penalty to win the Champions League Final.
But it hasn’t all been big matches: there was that college wrestling tournament in Vegas, the breakfast with elephants in Kruger National Park, serving as a judge in the CBC’s search for a new Hockey Night in Canada anthem, and almost beating the Kenyans at the Dublin marathon. Oh, and Euro 2008. I seem to recall getting a little carried away with that tourney, once upon a time.
It’s been a pretty cool year for me — far cooler than I deserve. And being able to share that with my six readers in this secret little venue, every week (or thereabouts)… well, I sometimes feel like an NFL head coach ordering up a two-point conversion, on the road in the fourth quarter, when I’m already up 27 points: it seems a bit like rubbing it in, but god damn son, it just feels so good!
Two experiences from this year stand out. The first is the evening of June 29, watching Spain beat the Germans at a cerveceria in Nou Barris to win the Euro, and then partying on the streets of Barcelona until dawn. Those are the sorts of nights when you look around you and think to yourself: I could write about this stuff for a million years and never be able to adequately explain why sports matters this much to this many people, and I could still die a very happy man.
The second? That would be two months after victory in Spain, and a quiet little ceremony in BC, where my first-reader and sidekick in globetrotting, a certain Mademoiselle Trotter, and I exchanged our own championship rings. I guess we won a title this year, after all. If you liked it then you shoulda put a ring on it, indeed.
So that’s it. Year one of the Sportstrotter is in the record books. Thanks for reading, and I hope you’ll all renew your season’s tickets for season two. Who knows, one of these days I might even get around to writing that story about pétanque…
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