How To: Fake sports knowledge

“Hey, did you catch the game last night?”

“Oh, uh, yeah! Wow.”

“I know! I’m just glad Philly beat Tampa after that stupid call last time.”

“Yeah, who do the Bucs think they are? Good to see the Pirates get their due. So when’s the championship game?”

“Yeah, I’m gonna go over there now. If the wrong person sees me talking to you, I’m socially-obligated to beat you up.”

Was this your day?

If so, then it’s obvious that you don’t watch sports at all, which is fine, you know, since you were so busy with that manga marathon. Read on to learn how to fake sports knowledge (before some coworker beats you up in front of your boss).

Tools:

1) Don’t use team names.

Look, every major city has at least two professional-level sports teams. You’re not going to keep them straight if you don’t even know which game is being discussed.

Always talk about the local city positively, and deride any of the following team names: the Yankees, the Cowboys and the Bengals. In fact, whenever the Cincinnati Bengals come up, snort and say, “Ocho cinco!” This will sound like an indecipherable alpha-numeric-Spanish code. It is.

And especially do not attempt to use team nicknames if you’re don’t use them every day. You know which MLB (sigh, “Major League Baseball”) team is called the Washington Natties? None of them. Besides, you might be talking to a Republican.

2) Watch SportsCenter in the morning.

You know how you always turn on the TV in the morning and drown out old Night Court reruns? Turn on SportsCenter, instead.

You’ll only glean about 20% of the information, but that’s better than the 0% you’ve got now. That 20% will consist of nothing but highlights, which are the only important parts of the game.

Chances are also good that you’ll see some cool bloopers and injuries to entertain you.

3) Don’t get in over your head.

Since you’re a poindexter, you might have some harebrained scheme to read a couple sports trivia books. The Guys would never discourage anyone from reading; reading is good for you … and fun, too!

However, you should never use any of that knowledge without watching the game you’re about to discuss. Doing so will only steer the conversation into more and more obscure sports facts. Sure, you know who the current interception record holder is (Brett Favre), but do you know who held it before him?

Stick to game details. This is all foreign to you, anyway.

4) Do not, for the love of God, bring up non-American sports.

You might be thinking to yourself at this point, “Hey, I watch some sports! I love soccer and men’s tennis and Indy racing!”

Yes, we know what you mean, but no, those are not recognized American sports.

Though there may or may not still be Major League Soccer in the U.S., nobody cares. And if you’re one of those American fans of European soccer, then you might as well talk about famous physicists: nobody’s gonna know, either way. Finally, you’ll just come across as one of the pretentious twits that went to Europe for a week and came back with a United scarf.

Nobody knows about men’s tennis players except male tennis players. Not only is this knowledge obscure, but you’re not talking about hot lady tennis players. In some bars, that leads to banishment. The only male tennis player that may be mentioned is John McEnroe, but only because he’s funny.

Half of America thinks NASCAR is for subhuman retards who wear shirts that always smell like beer. All of America doesn’t watch Indy Car racing. Your odds on impressing anyone with this topic suck more than Gus Frerrotte’s touchdown celebrations.

(Use that last reference.)

5) Just keep it simple.

Don’t lie and say you watched the whole game: that rarely happens with actual sports fans. Just talk about what you saw on SportsCenter (or read in Eat My Sports). And if they bring up something that wasn’t highlight worthy, just say you were drinking, which is always an acceptable answer.

And if you freeze up, just agree with whatever they say. Chances are they’re just looking for a sympathetic ear, anyway.

“Hey, did you catch the game last night?”

“The series? Yeah, it was nice to see Philly win.”

“No kidding, especially after that lousy call the game before. Allowing the Rays to tie it up in the top of the sixth when it had already been raining for a half hour and not allowing Philly to play the bottom? What kind of crap is that?”

“Crappy crap, I’d say.”

“No kidding, man. No kidding. Oh, there’s Percy. He watches soccer. Wanna go beat him up?”

4 thoughts on “How To: Fake sports knowledge”

  1. I actually have a whole site that is dedicated to this exact idea. It’s called How About Them Sports and has daily updates with News and potential conversation starters “similar to the ones that you give. Perhaps we can work together, or at least link to each other’s pages.

Comments are closed.