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Some of you kids might have seen the grainy highlight reels of the racehorse Secretariat at Belmont in 1973.
Secretariat was on a big winning streak that year, and going for the Triple Crown, of course, so the drama was obvious. But other horses have made their attempts to win the Triple Crown. This one was different.
The Belmont is known as the race that breaks hearts, the finish of the Triple Crown season, and the longest of the races at 1.5 miles. Many sprinters come into this race only to run out of gas at the 3/4 or 1 mile points, and Secretariat's rival Sham was considered a long-distance horse. They accused Secretariat of being a sprinter.
If you advance the video to the 1:50 or 1:55 point, this is where Sham's trainers were hoping for glory. Secretariat, they believed, was due to hit the wall here, while Sham tried to kick into an extra gear. What happened next --- > led Secretariat to be named "The Athlete of the Century" on some magazine's lists...
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In "100 Ways to Motivate Yourself," Steve Chandler reflects on what happened in the press box during the next 60 seconds. As Secretariat achieved the impossible, one of Chandler's friends (a racing journalist) looked down the press box and....
... saw a row full of horse race journalists, weeping unashamedly.
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Many people did cry. Myself, I sometimes get choked up, watching the footage, myself, and this 40 years later (as a child, I did watch the race live). Why should this be?
The next time you are fishing, or watching a ballgame during a pleasantly boring 5th inning, or meandering down I-405 in a commute, you might spend a half-hour meditating. What is there, about a sports event like Belmont 1973, that should strike such a deep chord in the human spirit?
I mean, it's just a horse, running. One horse was faster than the others. Why should a hard-bitten, crusty worldly old horse race journalist weep over the situation? He doesn't cry when a Lambourghini is faster than a Ferrari.
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Chandler speculates that it is because it reminds us of the fact that greatness exists.
He further speculates (and I doubt whether I agree with him) that it reminds us that we have failed to pursue our own greatness -- that we are weeping for the heights that we were capable of, but that we chose not to attain.
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In any case, there is a bit of ancient literature that, for me, helped to clarify the situation:
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Job 39:19 Hast thou given the horse strength? hast thou clothed his neck with thunder?
Job 39:20 Canst thou make him afraid as a grasshopper? the glory of his nostrils is terrible.
Job 39:21 He paweth in the valley, and rejoiceth in his strength: he goeth on to meet the armed men.
Job 39:22 He mocketh at fear, and is not affrighted; neither turneth he back from the sword.
Job 39:23 The quiver rattleth against him, the glittering spear and the shield.
Job 39:24 He swalloweth the ground with fierceness and rage: neither believeth he that it is the sound of the trumpet.
Job 39:25 He saith among the trumpets, Ha, ha; and he smelleth the battle afar off, the thunder of the captains, and the shouting.
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First thing: a horse breathes. His very nostrils are huge. In aikido, in hatha yoga, in Zen meditation, in swimming and in other sports, breathing is part of one's philosophy of life. To understand breathing is (quite literally) to undertand life.
In this breathing is intake and exhaust. A horse is not dead and it's not inert; it interacts with its environment. It is alive and vital. In the horse is life, energy, growth, reproduction.
As opposed to what the Seattle Mariners have often given us, on the field. They have chosen a static on-field product and a dynamic business model.
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Seattle Sports Insider breathes when Moethedog reacts to an article, volleying his understanding of the world against our own. As Gordon said, it's not pleasant to blog about the Mariners to oneself. A daily blog has the breath of life. It is no accident that the internet is where it is. The internet breathes!
Geoff Baker is in for a major challenge. He was uniquely good at reacting to his readers. His online "breathing" was a large part of what made him special. He's capable of being special in other ways also, but it will be a challenge.
Most sportswriters do not like to "breathe" with their readers, for whom they have mostly disdain. The same is true of the Mariners' front office. Lincoln and Armstrong do, it is true, like to "breathe" with customers whose focus is not on wins and losses.
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Second thing: when a warhorse is challenged, he responds with utter courage. As did Secretariat. He wasn't asking Sham for mercy, and wasn't giving any. It was a fight, with no bargaining, no pity, no remorse. In that is beauty, because of the courage involved, the willingness to suffer for a greater good.
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Third thing: Horses "drink" the ground. A stretch of running turf is there for them to consume, as though they are the only reason the ground exists.
My wife often comments on the wonderful design of horses for running, and their design which (in her view) makes it so convenient for human beings to ride them. Other animals fight in different ways. Horses fight by running. Secretariat's weapon was speed. He deployed it with utter ruthlessness.
When Ron Turcotte stood up slightly on Secretariat, looking back, and relaxing .. the horse himself seemed to run harder. It seemed that Secretariat was offended at the fact that Sham had challenged him, and 1.4 miles in -- with his heart about to burst -- Secretariat stomped the gas pedal to the floor. (Animals can be quite intelligent, after their fashion.)
I'm not sure that Howard Lincoln will ever understand the nature of sports. Or if he does, whether he will ever prioritize it. The good news for us is, men like Kyle Seager and Felix Hernandez and Lou Piniella, they do understand it.
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NEXT
Remember it well. I didn't quite weep....but knew I was seeing something rare. Real greatness is indeed a will of the wisp.....very hard to find, even harder to touch.
Thank goodness......Let me never become unappreciative of that kind of stuff.
moe.
The young man is a real physical specimen. No? He moves extremely well as evidenced in defending against the bunt. He borders the physical freak boundaries when compared to other pitchers. A GG defender on the mound? Perhaps.
My grandfather raised horses. Quarterhorses, not thoroughbreds. But he was at his happiest when around them, or at what passed for a racetrack where he lived. He is why I still watch the Triple Crown races, just to remember the feeling of closeness to him that I had as a boy.
The only emotion I can recall for sure about the 1973 Belmont is disbelief. That line in the movie during the race, where Pancho Martin, Sham's trainer looks at what's happening and says "that's impossible"; I was right there with him. I just couldn't fathom how far ahead he was - it was so unprecedented that I had no basis of comparison. I still, 40 years later, get a bit of a chill when I watch that race. Some people will downgrade the accomplishment because it wasn't done by a human being, but I think it is the most dominant athletic performance ever.
I watched it live in '73. As a 10 year old, I was impressed - but I didn't weep.
However, when watching the story replayed - yes, TODAY I weep.
That hints at me a contributing cause to the emotional impact that may not be obvious. To be THAT emotionally impacted by an event, humans MUST have some grasp of just how special that moment is.
As a baseball fan, I've watched hundreds of home runs. But, the biggest emotional impact on me was actually not Aaron breaking Babe's record. The bigger moment for me was Carlton Fisk's 12th inning shot in the '75 World Series.
I understand that what Aaron was doing was more important in an historical sense - (then and now). But, it was the culmination of 714 previous actions. That one action was in a fairly meaningless game in a meaningless situation - where everyone understood the inevitability. Aaron was GOING to break the record. It was only a question of on which day.
But, the context of Fisk's blast - the emotional toll that the '75 Series (to that point), and game 6 itself had already taken influences the emotional impact of the moment.
"It matters where you start".
The Secretariat Belmont is one of the biggest moments in my personal pantheon of great sports moments. But, it has grown more important in time, as my appreciation of the enormity of the moment has grown.
Jordan's jumper against Georgetown -- watching the Carolina Student Union - after turning to a complete stranger at half time of that game, (when Worth had been the dominant Carolina player), and saying with simple conviction - "Jordan is going to win it for us."
"Sid Slid" - sending the Braves to their first WS in my life time.
What is odd is that NLCS win to this day carries more emotional weight than the 1-0 win in game 6 of the 1995 World Series, when Atlanta actually won their single WS title of my life time.
And this, I think, is part and parcel to what makes those emotional time stamps. It is when circumstances ALL focus the true enormity of the event into our conciousness. This requires understanding. But, it also requires, (I believe), the moment to be "all of nothing". Sid Slid happened in game 7. The Braves' actual title happened in game 6. There's a difference. Perhaps there shouldn't be. But, there is.
I suspect this is why March Madness and the SuperBowl are so huge - while the NBA and MLB playoffs don't seem to carry the emotional weight - even for ardent fans of the latter two sports.
Secretariat's Belmont moment was a remarkable feat regardless of context. But, it HAD context. It was the third and final leg of the triple crown. There hadn't been a triple crown winner since Citation in 1948 when Secretariat came along. That was a 25 year drought.
I think you need the moment to be in context.
I think you need the understanding of how big the moment is.
And, the sad thing here is - The Mariners' 116 win season *should* be viewed with the kind of reverence that Secretarat's Belmont brings. The problem is - it isn't one moment. It's 116 moments. And it didn't culminate in a title - (though somebody wins a title every year - while teams win 116 games in a season once every century).
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Do I think we cry for sadness of not being great outselves? No. I think it more likely that we cry because somewhere deep we connect with those moments within our own lives where - for every so briefly - we brushed up against one of those moments of perfection.
I'm no athlete. But, to this day, I remember a game of 3-on-3 I played Freshman year at UNC, where for one day, I was truly in the flow and carried my team of "3 worst" players to an easy victory over the "3 best".
I'm a dreadfully awful soccer player --- but I can still revel in memories of the moment, when I chased down a long ball - did a fantastic turn to get by a defender, then lofted the ball perfectly over the head of the next defender for a point blank goal for a teammate.
It is those MOMENTS of perfection that pay off the debt of hard work and sacrifice toil and sweat needed to make those moments possible.
I find as I grow older, I'm more prone to cry at these kinds of sports moments. Is it because I'm less emotionally stable? I don't think so. I think I simply understand more than I did when I was younger. And I've had more of those moments of perfection that I have experienced personally.
At 51, I know my days of sports-perfection-moments are waning. But, I still have many musical moments of perfection ahead.
I believe we are all both physical and spiritiual beings. And there is something about sports (and music) that breaks down the walls between those two dimensions of existence. I don't understand it. But, I am truly grateful to be able to experience and enjoy it.
On February 10, 1983, in a game against the University of Virginia played in Carmichael Auditorium, the Tar Heels trailed by sixteen with 8:30 left in the game. It was then that the Heels started a classic comeback. By the time there was only 1:20 left on the clock, the Virginia lead was down to three points. Then a Jordan put-back made it a one-point game at 63-62. With under a minute to go, Virginia’s Rick Carlisle had the ball and got past Jordan, but Michael came up from behind and stole the ball. Jordan drove to the hoop, making the famous basket that North Carolina author and sports historian Jim Sumner termed “the dunk for the ages.” Heels win 64-63.
Carlisle now coach of the Dallas Mavericks, of course.
Two of the best teams of all time, trading No. 1 and No. 2 all season, only to have the national championship won by the 5th-best team in their conference (N.C. State, the team of destiny). Not to mention that Houston had Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler ("Phi Slamma Jama"), and Georgetown still had Ewing.
That was my only time in Carmichael (in my first go-around as a sportswriter), and it was a terrible game on my end, but I loved the little hand-operated flip board in the corner, just like at a grade-school game at the Y, and, of course, the Jordan-Worthy-Perkins era was something to see.
We probably won't ever see college hoop like that again, with great teams facing each other multiple times over a two/three-year period..
On February 10, 1983, in a game against the University of Virginia played in Carmichael Auditorium, the Tar Heels trailed by sixteen with 8:30 left in the game. It was then that the Heels started a classic comeback. By the time there was only 1:20 left on the clock, the Virginia lead was down to three points. Then a Jordan put-back made it a one-point game at 63-62. With under a minute to go, Virginia’s Rick Carlisle had the ball and got past Jordan, but Michael came up from behind and stole the ball. Jordan drove to the hoop, making the famous basket that North Carolina author and sports historian Jim Sumner termed “the dunk for the ages.” Heels win 64-63. - See more at: http://blogs.lib.unc.edu/morton/index.php/2013/02/the-dunk-for-the-ages/...
On February 10, 1983, in a game against the University of Virginia played in Carmichael Auditorium, the Tar Heels trailed by sixteen with 8:30 left in the game. It was then that the Heels started a classic comeback. By the time there was only 1:20 left on the clock, the Virginia lead was down to three points. Then a Jordan put-back made it a one-point game at 63-62. With under a minute to go, Virginia’s Rick Carlisle had the ball and got past Jordan, but Michael came up from behind and stole the ball. Jordan drove to the hoop, making the famous basket that North Carolina author and sports historian Jim Sumner termed “the dunk for the ages.” Heels win 64-63.
... but I wasn't there. I actually attended few basketball games while at UNC -- (though it seemed every time I was there in person Matt Doherty went - IIRC, he set his personal best scoring night TWICE when I was there - but I digress).
Yes, that period was unreal for so many reasons. And Tar Heel or not - I was rooting like crazy for NCSU against Houston, (and just for the complete circle - my Dad actually lived and lives in Houston).
Funny thing - for all the hype of the Ralph Sampson era, my personal favorite Virginia team was years earlier - when Wally Walker was the star.
As much as I love baseball - (always driven by the stats for me) - growing up on Tobacco Road made basketball the central sports focus for most of my life. While my loyalty solidified with UNC once I went there in 1980 ... I pulled hard for the David Thompson Wolf Pack champion of '74 ... and the Phil Ford Heels ... and the Gminski / Spanarkle Duke teams of the late '70s. I learned to be a fan of excellence before I became a fan one specific team.
One of the odd "costs" of being the fan of a specific school is that I think it suppresses the ability to appreciate excellence elsewhere. While intellectually I can appreciate the brilliance of Coach K ... I could never truly appreciate the great Duke teams he had because of the rivalry.
Amazed at the energy at the Sounders game last night. Fans everywhere an hour and a half before the game. Wonder if Lincoln ever takes in a game to see what we M fans are missing. 66k plus fans buying merchandise and food everywhere. Things won't change until a nice day at the park is replaced with we will do anything to bring a world series to Seattle.