A day with no sports section

Almost every day of the year, something is going on in sports. A baseball game is being played in Cincinnati. A basketball game is tipping off in Los Angeles. A football game is at halftime in Green Bay – with the score knotted at 21.

But there is one day of the year when newspapers can practically forget about printing their daily sports section and ESPN may not even need to air SportsCenter. Today is that day – the day after baseball’s All-Star Game.

There is really no reason to check ESPN.com for scores, no reason to dial 1-800-555-TELL (a sports score resource) to get updates on games. That’s because nothing is going on. And this rings true even louder this year in the midst of both the NFL and NBA lockouts.

The biggest event going on in sports right now is the women’s World Cup. Forgive me if I offend anyone, but soccer is just not a sport I have ever been interested in as a fan. It’s not one of the big four leagues in this country and probably will never become the fifth. Although I might feel slightly more patriotic knowing that the USA team has played quite well in this tournament, it is hard to get excited about it.

So what do us sports enthusiasts do on a day of no sports? The simple answer is to turn off your fandom for 24 hours. Give it a rest. Then focus on something besides athletics for once, like your significant other – or video games. Hey, why not pop in Madden or an NBA game to get your fix? Or instead of rooting for your favorite team, root for the calendar to turn to tomorrow. It will be here before you can put on your Rays hat.