Why Sports Matter [Podcast Series]
[:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Dr. Ethan Scheiner
Dr. Ethan Scheiner is author of Freedom to Win: A Cold War Story of the Courageous Hockey Team that Fought the Soviets for the Soul of Their People.
He is a Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Davis.
[1:18] Story inspiration
“I thought it would be fun to teach a class on politics and sports because I think, ultimately, sports actually plays a really big part in the way human beings interact and all sorts of important parts of politics.”
[8:43] Why sports matter
“A big one is just simply inspiration in a way that we often kind of forget about but, I mean, there are very few things that inspire us the way, inspire masses of people the way that sports do.”
[12:50] The freedom to win at sports
“So I talked to Martina Navratilova for this book. And she had this incredible line. She actually led to the title of the book. She said, the hockey, the hockey games went beyond sports, they gave people hope. And she said, ultimately, whether they won these games, that was going to help uncover whether they still had, and these are her words, the freedom to win, which is totally incredible and I immediately stole it and made it the title of the book.”
[19:06] Martina Navratilova and freedom
“You could just get a sense of how much the people there were hankering or hungering for freedom in the way that they cheered for Martina as she came back. And it's an incredible story.”
[20:33] Parents as coaches and critics
“it was horrifying that this father was saying this. But this kid was so proud that he had his picture in the newspaper and the father is like, ah, no big deal. You can tell me you know something when you've won the world championship.”
[21:58] Conditioning and the key to sporting success
“And the Soviet coaches actually took a very different view, which was, all humans are basically the same. Some of us are a little bit more talented than others. But, in the end, since all humans are basically the same, the key to sporting success is: one, you come up with really good strategies and tactics for games; and two, you just train more than everybody else, and you get way better in shape.”
[27:06] Writing the hockey scenes
“These matches meant so much to the people of the Czech Republic and Czechoslovakia and Slovakia. They still watch these matches and they still play them on…so Czech TV replayed these matches and got the key figures involved. And so the key figures did commentary during the game. So they then talked about what they were thinking during the game. And then I could put in the book, well, this person was thinking and feeling this at that moment, and so I could really talk about the emotion of the moment.”
