[On July 24, 1847, a weary group of about 150 migrants founded Salt Lake City. So for the city’s 175th birthday, this week I’ll AmericanStudy Utah histories, leading up to a special weekend post on that founding community!]
On ambiguities
in both sports and the state revealed by three of its most beloved teams.
1)
Real Salt
Lake (RSL): In many ways, the MLS franchise RSL reveals some of the
fundamental complexities
of how soccer has developed in America. Even the name is an echo of a famous Spanish team, but (presumably)
pronounced by most fans and commentators with the English version of the first
word, making the whole thing sound a little silly. And of course the overarching
idea of a professional soccer team in one of the whitest states in the
US is itself a reflection of the sport’s complex relationship to many local
communities. But at the same time, the franchise has over its 15+ years in
existence been fully embraced by that community, as embodied by the team anthem “Believe,”
written by the drummer for the band Rancid as a fan tribute and now played
before every game. Soccer might not ever fully be the national pastime, but it
can most definitely be on the short list, as RSL nicely illustrates.
2)
The Utah
Jazz: The Jazz present an interestingly similar ambiguity to RSL, one that
reminds us that the fraught sides of sports aren’t limited to soccer by any
means. The franchise started in New Orleans as an expansion team in the
1974-75 season, and of course the team name makes all the sense in the
world for a team in the Big Easy. When original owner Sam
Battistone decided to move
them to Salt Lake City after the 1978-79 season (due to financial struggles
but also, as usual when teams move, greed for a better deal), he wanted to change
the name as well, but there was not time before the new season started. So the Jazz
they remained (keeping the team’s Mardi Gras-themed colors in the process),
and the Jazz they’ve been ever since, in a city and state that could not be
less associated with jazz music. But as with soccer in the city and state, the
past and existing associations can’t and shouldn’t limit how communities evolve—and
the Utah Jazz have certainly become a Salt Lake City landmark, name and all.
3)
The University
of Utah Utes: To a significant degree this most popular college sports
program in the state—and certainly the most popular football team as well,
since there’s no professional franchise—bleeds into the subject for my weekend
post, as the University of Utah was founded
by the Mormon church as the University of Desert in 1850 (just three years
after Salt Lake City’s founding) and has been influenced by that powerful
entity (probably the most
powerful in the state still) ever since. But at the same time, the
University of Utah is a public institution of higher education, and so those enduring
Mormon influences, present as they undeniably are, are overtly opposed by both
public funding and ideas of academic freedom and diversity. I can’t speak to
what that combination might mean for either athletes on or fans of the Utes,
but they’re undoubtedly there, one more sports and state ambiguity.
Special
post this weekend,
Ben
PS. What
do you think? Other Utah histories or stories you’d highlight?
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