The Agony of Defeat

If you've never lived in Memphis, you probably don't get it.

You think you do, especially if you're a sports fan. You are fanatically committed to your team, you are thrilled when they win and crushed when they lose, their triumphs are your triumphs and their defeats are your defeats. You will reschedule your own wedding so as not to miss a game. You wake in a cold sweat from nightmare replays of catastrophic moments: fumbles, errors, last-minute three-pointers from the other team (sigh). You'll forget your ordinary shyness and bust a move through a preposterous celebratory dance, and kiss a blushing stranger, in a crowded bar when they score the winning touchdown, the winning basket, the winning run.

I grew up in Boston, so I'm familiar with the type, although I never was and still am not the type. But I heard endlessly about the Curse of the Bambino and I watched my friends crumble to the ground in despair as the Sox snatched defeat yet again from the jaws of victory, to the tune of thousands of jeering Yankees fans. In California, I made sure to spend plenty of time with my baseball fanatic friends during the off-season, because I knew they would soon disappear into the alternate universe of Oakland A's fanaticism. I even remember the feeling of a dagger in my own heart, ever so briefly, when that ball rolled between Bill Buckner's legs and the Mets won Game 6....and soon Game 7. Maybe that dagger was too much for my nine year old heart, because I'm pretty sure I never paid attention to sports again. Sure, I enjoy going to baseball games, and I can have fun watching the Superbowl with friends, but I just could never be bothered to really give a damn.

Until now.

It's not because I've suddenly found my inner sports fan, though. I haven't. I'm going to return immediately to my previous life of blissful sports ignorance. Hell, just a few weeks ago, my friend had to explain to me what brackets were. Rather, it's because this game was different. It meant something different, for the city of Memphis, than all those other games. And no matter how much you've despaired at your team losing, no matter how much sleep you've lost over bad plays or unfair calls or what-might-have-been, I don't think you really get it unless you understand Memphis. And I don't think many people understand Memphis unless they've lived in Memphis.

As I watched people rally around the Tigers for the past few weeks, as I drove past the countless "Go Tigers" banners hanging from businesses, I realized that Memphis suddenly felt different. The air changed. People interacted in a different way. It wasn't just the ordinary excitement that builds as your city's sports team claws its way toward the national championships/world series/superbowl/whatever. It was the first time, literally the first time, since I've moved here, that people seemed proud of their city. It was the first time that people didn't talk about Memphis with an air of apology, or disappointment, or shame, or regret. It was Memphis' chance to prove itself - yes, to the outside world, to the naysayers and snobs and elitists who scorn the city's capacity to do anything right - but also, and more importantly, to itself. Imagine the headline that was not to be: "Memphis is #1" - it's an almost unfathomable headline. This city still bears the solemn weight of too many other headlines, too many sadder headlines: "Martin Luther King Jr. assassinated" is only at the top of a long and crushing list. As I started to realize what this meant to the city of Memphis, I started to get swept into the drama. It felt like the city itself was approaching a turning point. It sounds unbelievably cheesy, and it's much much too simplistic, but it literally felt like the fractures and the wounds of the city were starting to fade, that the city was starting to come together, to rally around the basketball team, but also around their own damn worth and pride and accomplishments.

And then there were the missed free throws, and the last-minute (nay, last-second) three-pointer, and Joey Dorsey fouling out, and the sea of cheering Tiger Blue at the Young Avenue Deli suddenly turning morose. I wouldn't dream of commenting on the game itself, on who screwed up or what should have been done differently - there are three year olds who know more about basketball than I do. All I know is that the collapse felt like so much more than the collapse of a sports team. It's the only way I can explain to myself how thoroughly heartbroken I actually felt last night. It's the only way I can explain to myself why I stayed up until 2 a.m. reading the biographies of the players, why this article almost made me cry, why I wanted to rip the racist asshole's head off who left this comment on the Memphis Flyer article about the game:

It all comes down to thuginess. When you screw around at bars, starting fights or beating girlfriends, instead of practicing freethrows, or talking about yourself as the best rather than your team, you're going to lose in the end. It was so gratifying to see my team win. And I'm glad I'm not a tiger.

Well, I've only lived here for a year and 8 months now, but I'm glad I am a Tiger. I'm glad I watched the game at the Deli last night, where I watched strangers hugging and high-fiving and commiserating together. I'm glad I got to watch street entrepreneurs on Lamar selling Final Four t-shirts out of the back of a truck. I'm glad I got to bond with bank tellers and café baristas and trolley drivers and strangers in line at the post office, people I would probably never have had more than a perfunctory conversation with, over the Tigers. Yes, the defeat was agonizing, and all too Memphis, but the city shouldn't abandon the pride and the unity that a little sports competition fostered. If you're not from Memphis, you probably don't understand how much that means to this city.