Sports, stubbornness fit together like a glove

'm getting stubborn.

Chalk it up to aging, my personality or what have you, but it's getting more evident with each passing day.

No. I don't want to try Zumba.

That's okay, you can just tell me how you're new super-duper phone/tablet/microwave works. I don't have enough room in my pockets to house one like that anyway.

Have you seen this week's Dancing With the Stars? Sure haven't. Too busy watching reruns of The Office and screening Tommy Boy for the 4,337th time.

We're all set in our ways, I guess. I may get surly when it comes to my eating schedule, what I eat and how I eat it. Kind of like a senile man gets when he hasn't had his supper at 4:49 p.m. But it's whatever makes you happy I've always been told.

I've become completely set in my ways when it comes to sports.

The St. Louis Cardinals are the best professional baseball organization ever. There's no comparison. From top to bottom, they represent everything you could possibly want from a sports team.

Michael Jordan is the greatest basketball player of all-time. No doubt about it. Kobe-this and 'King' James-that all you want. The high-flying, tongue-wagging, bald headed No. 23 is where the conversation begins and ends.

The Notre Dame Fighting Irish are the end-all, be-all program when it comes to college football. The tradition, fan base, products on and off the field top all others.

So yeah, I just rambled off three of my favorite sports teams/players simply because I could. It also gave me the opportunity to present examples of sports fans being stubborn.

Stubbornness is the very definition of a sports fan, am I right?

No matter what the circumstance, your team or your player is the best. Bar none.

You can have the best argument against said player or team, but you're not budging.

If you think Zydrunas Ilgauskas is the best Lithuanian to ever play in the NBA, then there's probably nothing that's going to change your mind about that. Although, I'd give the slight edge to Arvydas Sabonis (Google him kids), but hey, we all have our preference.

What brings my attention to stubborn sports fans all of a sudden is the Class 4, District 1 semifinals football game against Sikeston and Cape Central, which will be played tonight.

There's no question, sports forums fuels some of the most absurd comments and opinions I've ever heard with anonymity allowing the wackiest of the wackos to sputter nonsense all over the computer screen without much consequence.

I've been known a time or two to relay my distain for the common fan.

To put it blankly, most sports fans are idiots.

Give this a try one night while you're sitting in the stands.

Just sit and listen.

Sit, listen and actually watch what goes on out there instead of relying on your emotions as soon as a call goes the other way. Listen to what's said by the loudmouths and I guarantee you, you'll know what I'm talking about.

If you're usually the one doing all the hooting and hollering, then there's no need in heeding my advice. You are, of course, a stubborn sports fan who is more than likely the biggest Steve Nash fan, when clearly Mark Price is the best free throw shooter of all-time. (I for one am loving the NBA name-dropping I'm doing here. Aren't you?)

Bottom line is, I love the passion sports fans have, but sometimes, it's just plain annoying.

I still listen and read what cockamamie things come spewing out, of course.

Most of them, with me probably being the biggest one, live and die by every play. We shout at the TV screen thinking we can change the way they're playing and I walk with a bit of a swagger when the Irish win on Saturday's. It's all in good fun.

Sports allows us to escape the stress and overall hardships we may face in life. I for one don't know what I would do without being able to take in a basketball game (like I'm doing at this very moment -- Heat v. Celtics) to just relax.

And if we're tagged as being stubborn, somehow, that's okay by me.

After all, Dwight Howard's move to LA has just turned me into a Laker fan. I guess, you could say, that I'm evolving and changing in my ways, surprisingly.

Oh well. Sabonis still wears the pants in the Lithuanian family. Ilgauskas just washes them.

Try and tell me otherwise...