Football season

Exactly what constitutes “football season” has become a moving target for me. This old dog is learning some new tricks.

I am on a journey from being a fan of football to becoming a fan of football. Or, to be more precise, moving from American football to association football, which I have always known as “soccer.”

My football fandom began in my childhood in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex where the Cowboys were larger than life heroes coached by the legendary, fedora-wearing, be-suited Tom Landry. Here’s why my middle age has brought me to a new appreciation – if not understanding – of soccer.

My fondness for American football began slipping a few years ago when I gave up my fantasy football addiction. In five leagues and running three, I had become obsessed to the point that fantasy football was taking time I didn’t have to give.

Throw in the ongoing research into chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a neurodegenerative disease linked to repeated trauma to the head that afflicts many current and former football players, and American football began to feel more and more like blood sport. An episode of Malcolm Gladwell’s podcast, Revisionist History, called “Burden of Proof” particularly challenged me on this point.

Because Barron, our oldest, was in the Redcoat marching band at the University of Georgia, we watched the Dawgs each week in hopes of catching a glimpse of our favorite trumpet player. And, yes, during his time in the band they just so happened to win back-to-back national championships, but the connection of my own child aside, I really could take or leave college football.

At the same time my commitment to American football began to wane, though, my older two boys fell in love with the sport. When they were small and I wanted to watch college football on a Saturday, all I heard was complaining about Dad “hogging the TV” and watching “boring old football.” Just when I began to develop mixed feelings about the sport, their high school band experience and Friday nights in the Big Orange Jungle at Parkview instilled a love of football. I was not about to abandon football just when it gave me opportunities to bond with my boys.

My unease with American football coincided with an exposure to soccer, specifically the English Premier League, through my friends, Brian and Bob, who were fans. For the past few years, we’ve had an ongoing text chat, and they shared an interest in English football. Brian spent time in Wales and has the most soccer knowledge. Bob is a former professional sportswriter and takes that approach to various forms of competition, both amateur and professional.

Brian also has 71 children who play a soccer match every 14.3 seconds. He coaches 45 teams and when he is not on an actual soccer field somewhere, he has a game on his tele at home.

Our texting repartee usually went like this: Bob would weigh in asking if Brian was watching the Liverpool game (Brian is a big fan of the “Reds” as they are known in the world of soccer.) Brian would reply he was recording the game and would watch it later when he got home at 2 a.m. from his daughter’s tournament in Maine or somewhere. Then I would cast aspersions on the whole enterprise by mocking some aspect of soccer I didn’t understand… “Yeah, I’ll bet it’s a zero to zero tie, ha, ha, ha.”

They tried to evangelize me into liking soccer, but it just made me double down. I made all the usual American arguments: it’s boring, there’s not enough scoring, the rules don’t make sense, with the possibility of ties the outcomes have no meaning, etc., etc.

I’m sure they grew quite frustrated with me. I even went through a phase of looking up basic soccer facts and inserting those into our text conversations as if I were some sort of soccer AI chatbot trying to pretend to be human. They caught on pretty fast. It did not help our friendship.

My relationship to soccer changed when Carla and I finally succumbed to the phenomenon that is “Ted Lasso.” The TV show streams on Apple TV Plus, and I was assured by Bob and Brian that I didn’t have to possess any actual soccer knowledge to enjoy the show. In the same way that “Friday Night Lights” purported to be about high school football in Texas but was actually a soap opera, the multiple-Emmy-award winning “Ted Lasso” was a much richer story that dealt with relationships, trauma and hope.

It took me a minute to adjust to the tone of the show. I had expected more of what the NBC commercials portrayed in their English Premier League ads in 2013 and 2014. I related to the clueless American football coach trying to coach a sport he knew nothing about because I, like Ted, had very little experience with the international version of “football.”

But the germ of an idea in the commercials became a fully fleshed out story by the television series, and the focus was less on Ted’s bungling ignorance and more on his unrelenting optimism.

The turning point for me was the introduction of Ted’s and his wife, Michelle’s, marriage therapist, Dr. Jake. A weasel of the worst sort, he was a soccer critic, often voicing many of the tired jokes and complaints against soccer I had. I saw myself in Dr. Jake, and I didn’t like it. (From a sports standpoint only, not from an unethical, philandering marriage therapist standpoint, just to be clear.)

That’s when I officially repented of my soccer mockery (say that five times fast) and converted to soccer fandom. Since then, Brian and Bob have happily tolerated my questions and have been my guides on my quest to understand the “Beautiful Game.”

I did have some experience to build on. Our youngest son, Carlton, played youth soccer for two seasons when he was much younger, and I now work at a college that not only plays soccer but is very good at it. (The Oglethorpe Stormy Petrels men’s team made the national NCAA Division III tournament last year and are expected to win their conference again this year.)

I’m willing to do the work. I’ve watched games both with Brian and on my own. Last weekend when the new season of the EPL started, I discovered that there are a slew of games on the USA, NBC and Peacock channels that I never knew about. I’m listening to Roger Bennett on the Men In Blazers podcast, and even though there is a heavy amount of specific glossary to that universe, I’m picking up more each week. Bennett’s enthusiasm is infectious, and I love his signature sign off, “Courage.”

So if you hear me talking about “football” these days, there’s a good chance I’m actually talking about soccer. I still haven’t picked an EPL team to support, but I have been leaning heavily toward Aston Villa, especially since I watched their 2-nil dismantling of Arsenal last April, knocking the Gunners out of the three-way tie at the top of the table and assuring Manchester City a fourth consecutive premier league title.

I’m still learning and enjoying the discovery. Last week after having football on the tele all morning on the NBC family of channels, I flipped by soccer on ABC and found out about something called “La Liga.” Brian said it was the Spanish league. Of course with Atlanta United here in our backyard I know about MLS, but Brian explained about Serie A in Italy, Bundesliga in Germany, Eredivisie in the Netherlands and Ligue 1 in France. My head exploded.

I don’t know if you know this, but soccer is very popular in other countries.

College football officially begins today at noon Eastern when Georgia Tech meets Florida State in the Aer Lingus College Football Classic in Dublin, Ireland. Over the next week the college football season will overtake us with hundreds of games. On Thursday, Sept. 5, the Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs will open the NFL season by hosting the Baltimore Ravens.

Barron graduated from Georgia and will no longer appear for microseconds on their football telecasts, so I don’t feel the same need to watch Dawgs’ games as closely. And, sorry, Harris, but as a Dallas Cowboys fan, I have to have something better to watch than the just-good-enough-to-break-your-heart product they’ve been putting on the field for the past 30 years.

This old dog is learning some new sports tricks, but don’t expect me to be able to correctly identify offsides any time soon.