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Thompson: Together Everyone Achieves More

tylerthompson
Ty Thompson
The State Press

As an avid athlete throughout my youth, I played on countless organized sports teams. From the Purple Panthers to the Angels, my adolescence was filled with team camaraderie and spirited companionship.

My first team played soccer. I remember running with my teammates in search of the ball; a pack of hungry Panda Bears falling over each other and skinning our knees. We kicked hard and ran fast, but didn't really know what we were doing. We didn't even keep score.

Soon, Little League baseball became the most popular sport, and we lived and died the miniature version of America's national pastime. As those of you who have watched ESPN and ABC's recent coverage of the Little League World Series have seen, Little League baseball has the emotion of a Super Bowl and the intimacy of a little-known Olympic sport. My teammates, head-first dives into second, snacks after the game and two White Sox city championships will always stay with me.

As will the two-a-day practices of my high school football team, the Eagles. Running the mile and getting hit for the first time made us quickly realize the need to gel as a team. We spent a week at a local summer camp where we could bond and the lineman could eat lots of pancakes. The team laid out season goals and we agreed to give our best effort throughout the season.

Now in college, my teams have changed. Instead of organized sports, I play intramural football where my teammates also double as drinking buddies. We have to buy and carry our own trophies, but now they're kegs.

But I feel like I've lost my true sense of team.

Over the past two weeks of Olympic competition I have missed being on a team more than ever. Watching the U. S. women's teams of basketball, softball, soccer and volleyball all win gold, I envy the special bonds those athletes have made with each other as a team.

Interestingly though, the American men's teams failed to medal in volleyball, soccer or softball's comparable sport, baseball. In fact, the baseball and soccer teams didn't even qualify for the Olympic Games.

How could American men not qualify a team in baseball and soccer? How could we win so many individual gold medals in Athens and lose so many team events? How could we fail so easily as a team?

Is it just me, or do all American men lose their sense of team as they get older?

After a loss to Puerto Rico in the qualifying rounds of competition, United States men's basketball player and former Valley high school standout Richard Jefferson said: "We still think we are the favorite team [for the gold medal]." Despite poor showings as a team, Jefferson believed the individual ability of the athletes would carry the U.S. team to a gold medal.

Instead of gold, the U.S. team took home a disappointing bronze. But it wasn't because of the effort of the athletes. It was because American men have lost their sense of team. We'd prefer to score 30 points in a basketball game and lose as a team than have an individual off night, but win.

But that doesn't make sense. We used to care about the team when we were little, so why don't we want to win as a team in adulthood?

I'm not sure where I lost my sense of team, but maybe it has something to do with hormones. I did seem to gradually lose my team camaraderie as I physically progressed. Maybe I lost my sense of team when, instead of playing a pick-up game of basketball with my guy friends, I went on a date with my girlfriend.

That's it. I'll just blame man's inability to join with other men as a team on women. As soon as men start thinking about women, we start to focus less on the team. Women instead focus on the team goal as opposed to the individual goal.

We as men should learn from women and form embattled bonds on the playing field. We should win Olympic team gold medals. We should get back our sense of team. We should, but I'd rather watch the women.

Tyler Thompson is journalism sophomore. Reach him at tyler.thompson@asu.edu.


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