[EricH]

Originally Posted by highlander

1. I never said anything about Golf not being a sport, sorry if you misunderstood.

Saying that "all of the above are competitions" (referring to three items including GOLF) "but that doesn't necessarily mean they're sports" sure comes close to saying they aren't sports.

2. ESPN and other sporting networks are not bound by any means to show exclusively sporting events. ESPN shows whatever brings in the most value for them. In those cases, dramatizing competitions is not a far cry from sports, and doesn't stray from their target market too much, so they broadcast those events. I can't buy your logic in saying that ESPN declares which events are 'sports', and which aren't.

Let me rephrase that a little bit for you: If those sports networks are showing things that are not sports, and claiming to be sports networks/sports channels, then you, the consumer, have every right to bring a "false advertising" claim. Yes? OK, so they're showing what we think are non-sports competitions. So they think that those events qualify as sports under whatever definition they happen to be using, which I'm pretty sure isn't quite the same as ours.

3. In my personal opinion, I wouldn't define any of the examples I listed as sports. However, I was simply rebutting the point and since you are the proponent of the original argument, the impetus is on you to define where you draw the line.

As a matter of fact, I was simply rebutting YOUR point, so I'm afraid you get to draw the line. But, seeing as you went there: Marching band could be a sport: physical exertion, there are competitions involved, there are winners, there is training. Competitive eating is a little more far-fetched--but you still have those same four elements, so I can see the case. Math competitions and the lottery don't really have any physical exertion, so I have a hard time with those. Juggling I'm not even sure has competitions... Chess I'd try the (lack of) physical exertion argument on but I've already been shown that that's recognized as a sport.

I loosely draw the line as follows: some sort of physical exertion, training, and competition with winner(s). If you don't have all of those, the best you can do is "sport of the mind".

Ya know, there's a really easy way to get robotics recognized as a sport. Anybody wanna petition the IOC?