TTR: Sorry Not Sorry, Cheerleading isn’t a Sport...

Welcome to my first blog post. I’m going to be posting twice a week, Tuesday and Thursday. I’m going to navigate away from the sports scene as everyone here writes about sports. Instead, I’m going to talk about news, current events, etc. Tuesday’s blog will be called Twitter Trending Tuesday where I will examine a trending news story, person, hashtag etc. on Twitter for that day. Thursday though, will be called Temper Tantrum Thursday, where I will either make a bold claim about something, or I will talk about something that really pissed me off during the previous week. So without further ado, lets begin with our first Temper Tantrum Thursday!

I figure something that can really get a lot people going is the debate, is cheerleading a sport? Many people say it is, whether it be competitive or for school. I, on the other hand, don’t think it is at all and is a disgrace to all real sports to call cheerleading a sport.

Now the first thing many people say when I make this claim is, “But Chase, cheerleading, especially competitive is hard, really hard!” Yeah it is hard but just because something is difficult doesn’t make it a sport. Driving while blindfolded is hard but it’s not a sport (Bird Box reference). Despite what the actual definition of a sport is, I have my own that I think really hammers out why;

Any physical activity that 2 or more people, teams, or groups face off against each other to achieve a higher point tally is a sport except when there are separate humans that directly determine the score of this point tally.

This is my definition and by this definition cheerleading is not a sport because judges determine the points for each squad. In the other hand though, this makes other activities that people deem as “not sports” as a sport such as bass fishing, which it is, because the winner is determined by the biggest fish, total weight, etc.

My main reasoning for this is because a cheer squad or marching band can perform the exact same routine with the exact same mistakes 2 separate weeks and because the judges are different or they are looking in other places, they will receive different scores even though it was hypothetically the exact same.

In football, baseball, basketball, etc, there are definitive scores that determine the winner. Yes there are referees that keep the game going smoothly but they do not directly determine the score. Yes they can miss or make bad calls but everyone knows coming in that they have to shoot the ball through the hoop, get the ball in the end zone, touch all bases before touching home, etc. and whoever does this more is the winner.

I’d love to hear your guys point of view! Leave a comment below or contact me on Twitter @optimuscope_

Thanks!