Faith

I Will Never Win the Super Bowl or World Series

by Andrew Tuttle
02/18/21
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Imagine the joy the Tampa Bay Buccaneers felt winning the Super Bowl. Or, if I may indulge and take a trip to 2004, how the members of the Boston Red Sox felt winning the World Series ending a near interminable 86 year long drought.  

Both teams winning on their home turf, but Tampa Bay being the first football team ever to win the Super Bowl in their home stadium.

As much as fans felt in their joy, for the player nothing compares to winning the World Series. Or the Super Bowl. Or the Stanley Cup. Or whatever championship an athlete strives to accomplish. Winning the pinnacle of your sport brings with it a joy very few people can ever feel.

Seems unfair doesn’t it?

So, we mere mortals attempt to live vicariously through multimillionaires who have no idea we even exist.

I can remember earlier in my life imagining what it would be like to see the Red Sox win. As a once die-hard, they never did and I grew up feeling like I’d never experience that joy. I’d watch other teams win it all or you know what’s even more special - win it in the bottom of the 9^th.  Do you remember the 1986 World Series? I do! Same goes with football. I prayed that Dan Marino and the Dolphins would win that elusive ring. They never did.

When the Red Sox finally won it came on the heels of a much better win, if you can imagine that. Down 0-3 to the New York Yankees in the American League Championship Series only to win an historic four straight. But, I was older too. The 2004 World Series win didn’t provide the punch I thought winning in 1986 would have. At any rate, as I watch others experience events that bring overwhelming amount of joy to their lives I’ve often wondered how I can win the World Series or Super Bowl in my life. What realistically equates for me?

To be honest - I can’t quite answer that question. Win the Pulitzer Prize? Nah. Seems too political. Besides I’m not in the newspaper industry anymore.

Have this or any one of my blogs go viral? No. But then what? Pretty fleeting. What was the name of that lady who wrote that blog to her daughter about Miley Cyrus? I don’t remember either. Besides, all the inevitable hate comments targeted at whatever I wrote would simply reinforce to me the silliness of my hobby of trying to write something others might find inspiring or useful.

Win the lottery? Hmm, I think one of the reasons why it is so special for players to win a championship is the hard work it took to get there.

Nope, the best I’ll get probably comes from my boss telling me “good job!” or a project I’m working on gains traction and perhaps gives me a promotion as well as employment security. I was never good at baseball and never will be. Never played football. So, how do I experience the joy that fills stadiums at the final strike or the last second of the clock?

The bottom line is I won’t ever win the Super Bowl or the World Series. I will never experience the highest of highs at least in terms of a professional career or accomplishment. (Nothing I assume can compare to learning your loved one at war has returned safely. But in order to experience that you must endure something unimaginable. The same goes with a miraculous health cure.)

Though not all of us experience the highest of highs, we all no matter our race, creed, color or ability to win a championship, experience the lowest of lows. Eventually a loved one dies or a loved one gets hurt. We pace, fret, worry and pray to delay the inevitable. We get untimely phone calls. Worse than expected diagnosis. Eventually we die and all we are is dust in the wind.

The World Series, Super Bowl or viral post eventually means nothing. Who won the World Series eight years ago? Oh, that’s right the Red Sox! But outside Boston, I bet most can’t answer that question. Not even Tom Brady was content with three Super Bowl rings. (Isn’t there more than this, he told 60 minutes in 2005.) Now he has seven. I wonder if his perspective has changed. I suppose when you’re only as good as the players around you, perhaps doubt tends to creep in on just how good you think you are or at least how others think you are.

As I’ve gotten older and experienced and witnessed first-hand family, friends and loved ones grow ill, fight illness and succumb to the inevitability of life on this earth my mind tends to wander. Matthew 6:34 quotes Jesus as saying “So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” So true. So hard.

Can’t I at least experience the joy of winning a World Series? Just once?

Despite our current government trying it’s hardest to play god and provide for everybody’s needs and equalize the masses, the one thing no government has been able to accomplish is giving everybody the joy of winning the World Series or Super Bowl. It’s sad to think that so many experience that type of joy in life comes from a “free” government hand-out.

As much as I’d like to win the World Series, I won’t. It’s never going to happen. And, if Mr. Brady isn’t content with his life of fame, fortune and unwarranted adulation, then perhaps winning the Super Bowl proves just as fleeting as getting all the lights green on the way home. A moment of temporary joy until the next time life puts you in a traffic jam.

I think my World Series and yours (if you follow Jesus Christ) comes later. After this life. Where unrelenting joy lives, no death or sickness exists and the fleeting moments of this life get replaced by endless blocks of time.

“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea. ² And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, made ready as a bride adorned for her husband. ³ And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is among men, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them, ⁴ and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.” Revelation 21:1-4

Someday I’m going to win the World Series. But it’s not going to be easy.