"If you want to destroy my sweater, pull this thread as I walk away." -Weezer
For someone who is let down every time "MFA" turns out to be "Museum of Fine Arts" instead of "Museum of Furry Animals," writing about arts is sometimes a tall order. I wanted to write a sports article today, but that would put my editors in a rather hairy situation - perhaps not quite enough so to make it into my furry animal museum, but hairy nonetheless. To that end, if I can't bring art to my topic, I'll bring my topic to an art - fashion. Sweaters, specifically.
You may be wondering what sweaters have to do with sports at all. Well, more than you may realize. In fact, sweaters may be the single most important determining factor in a sport's legitimacy.
There are plenty of pseudo-sports out there striving for recognition as real sports: dodgeball, croquet, horseshoes, even poker. Where do we draw the line? Are we forever doomed to arguments between badminton players and those of us that don't belong to country clubs? Between those of us that don't game hunt and those that are Ted Nugent? Between NASCAR fans and... everyone else? What's to determine what is a sport and what is a game? Enter art. Enter sweaters.
I call it the "Sweater Rule," and it takes out all the guesswork. If you ever find yourself wondering whether what you're playing is a sport or not, ask yourself if you could be doing it wearing a sweater. If so, it's a game. If not, it's a sport. Now, I'm not trying to upset anyone here, because I'm sure there are some very sensitive croquet aficionados out there. And lord knows I don't need to be making any vengeful, mallet wielding enemies after only two articles. But sorry, croquet fans, you're out.
The Sweater Rule works in virtually all cases. Basketball, swimming, boxing? Sports. Croquet, darts, shuffle puck? Games. Pretty easy. In fact, I'm pretty sure some of those last ones might even require sweaters, now that I think of it. For the most part, the Sweater Rule is as infallibly successful as a freshman's fake ID at El Guapo. Apply it to anything and everything. Bowling? Out. Mud wrestling? In. Sweaters haven't wielded so much influence since The Cosby Show.
Perhaps the greatest thing about the Sweater Rule is that it elevates baseball above cricket. Sorry, Commonwealth cricketers, but you didn't stand a ferret batsman's chance against a googly nipbacker on a sticky wicket in this one. Not only does that cricket lexicon make everyone sound like sweater-loving Ned Flanders anyway, but the national team uniform of England is a sweater.
The one that may be hardest to swallow for some of you is that golf too falls under "game." I'm not trying to say that golf isn't incredibly difficult or that Tiger Woods isn't incredibly talented. All I'm saying is show me a golfer who doesn't own a sweater and I'll show you Happy Gilmore.
Sorry, Tiger. Putting a Nike swoosh on your sweater doesn't make it a jersey - it's still a sweater. You play a game. I mean, because he plays golf for recreation, could anyone still call Charles Barkley an "athlete" anymore? I think not. At least not as long as Pizza Hut is still beating out Dwayne Wade for a spot in his Fave 5.
But don't worry, golfers - the Sweater Rule isn't everything. I mean, even though divers get to call their activity a sport and you don't, it's not like anyone is ever going to make a "Caddyshack" about a swim team. So you got that going for you ... which is nice.
Ari Goldberg is a senior majoring in history. He can be reached at Ari.Goldberg@tufts.edu.
