In the aftermath of a fan of a fan of a sports fan, there is this little time during which all the emotion passes on their face. The characteristics are twisted or frozen in place. The eyes are wide open and look at the empty space where something wonderful has just happened for someone else. The mouth is open right enough, perhaps because a cry of ecstasy had been ready to escape, if only the blows of the fan at the gate of the ecstatic had been answered.
A reliable place to attend these moments is basketball broadcasts on television. I sometimes think of the camera person whose work consists in looking for anyone in the crowd most intensely carries their sorrow on their face. There are classic moments in this sub-genre of deflated Fandom, those you may have seen before, even if you do not like or do not pay much attention to sports. Take, for example, the case of Roxanne Chalifoux, a Piccolo player in the Villanova group who, in 2015, was immortalized during the madness of MarchWhen NC State succeeded in an upheaval of its beloved Wildcats, 71–68. Even with the reality of the defeat of his team that sets in, even after the final whistle denounced, his group had to do his job. There was a joyful noise even in defeat, even if the noise manufacturers did not feel emotionally in the task, even if they were, as Chalifoux was, in the middle of the crying. This is how a singular photo was born. If there was a museum (or, at least, a coffee table book) collecting examples of this very specific form of evil, Chalifoux would make a worthy blanket – a close -up of his face, in the middle of the rows of his compatriots, Piccolo always opposed his lips, playing through tears.
It’s not funny, exactly, even if I would lie if I said that I did not take pleasure in these low challenges. There is beauty for me in the moments of sorrow of the sports fan, and there is also, to a certain extent, relief. It is only for the grace of God that I am not the fan in question, two hands on his head, the elbows, sinking into my own universe of pain. It is only for the grace of God that I am not the individual alone seated in a sea of standing fans and encouraging an opposing team, a camera has zoomed for me, friends sent to tell me that they saw me on television, although not in my best time.
Such a poor soul was televised two weeks ago, after a NBA match between the Chicago Bulls and the Los Angeles Lakers came to what could have been the most absurd end that I had ever witnessed. At the end of the fourth quarter, the game seemed somewhat in hand for the Lakers. With 12.6 seconds to do, the team was up five points – not the safest advance, although probably sufficiently safe to win a victory. Then Chicago struck a three -point pointer and the Lakers’ advance was reduced to two. However, all that Los Angeles had to do was by surrounding the ball and making free throws. But wait! LeBron James launched an incoming bad pass, stolen by Josh Giddey, who went to Coby White, who struck a three -point pointer, and now the Lakers were somehow, in a few seconds, at one point. But! There was Austin Reaves at the rescue, leading to the basket after a dead time and obtaining a lay-up. The Lakers were again in place, with only three seconds to play, and the Bulls had no dead time. Certainly NOW A victory was in hand. And yet! Giddey raised a Mary hail from the mid-haul area, and his prayer was granted. The ball slipped properly through the net when time expired, and the Chicago arena took place. A crowd was formed around Giddey. Fans jumped from their seats on the ground. And then the camera found it: a fan of Lone Laker, still standing in the middle of waves of jump and joyful gesticulation, wearing a yellow jersey and a hat of purple Lakers.
Man’s face belongs to my favorite sub-genre of devastated sports expressions. He looked almost at mid-Milieu, but it was not a smile of joy. It was a stained smile of disbelief and a little disdain, the kind of smile that you could find yourself doing if someone should insult you with an unfavorable offer, or enter your home and hurt your children’s work of art decorating the refrigerator, a smile that seemed to point out that the wearer could, in a moment, lose his head. Man’s eyes seemed vacant, as if they could still look at the net that the ball had crossed a few moments earlier. His disbelief was hardly won. There were so few ways for the Lakers to lose this match, and yet they had managed to find them all.
I cherish this fan of sad laker because I cherish what is under so many of these defeated expressions, beyond the visceral immediacy of tears or shouting or falling into pieces. The moment of a pain fan is also a moment of fan in admiration. I went there, watch my team losing improbably. I do not tweet a lot anymore, but I remember a persistent leaf tweet that I published about my beloved Columbus team, the major football team of my city, which I have loved since its creation, in the 90s, and which, in recent seasons, has become notorious to breathe tracks or links incredibly late in matches. Dying-moles of-stopping-time late. Nothing-Else-to-Do-et-Nowhere-to-go but late-house. The tweet is read as follows: “Edgar Allan Poe was haunted and tormented by the word” Nevermore “, I will live the rest of my days haunted by the words” another late goal abandoned by Columbus “. “I tweeted it in June 2023. I remember the moment because I was in a match, in the stadium, where the crew of Columbus held out until the opposing team marked in the last minutes of the match, which led to equality. While the stands were emptied, I stayed standing, fixing the nets which are removed from the goals, as if more time could materialize to correct the betrayal of the universe. Then, I collapsed in my seat, I laughed a little and I typed a few words in my phone, words that I have thought in time since, each time I watch a Columbus crew game and another late lens is conceded. The loss could bring me to the edge of madness, but it is a madness tinged with a kind of pleasure to the fact that I saw a miracle, even if it was a miracle for someone else.
This is how it happens. Yes, with the naked eye of the camera, there is a devastation, but through another lens, you can see someone, your mouth slightly open or slightly crossed, saying, without tongue, Can you believe it? ♦