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I don’t watch any talking heads on tv. I hear the Dan Patrick show, Rome or the Huge show sometimes in my work van. All of my sports intake comes from reading online.
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Every time i turn them on and then just as quickly turn them off.
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They are speaking on the level that most fans understand the game of football. So when people who have a higher level of knowledge see them (like us), we are turned off because we know their commentary lacks substance. Most fans do not know how much substance is lacking because they do not know the sport well enough. It dawned on me recently that I am that type of low information fan when it comes to basketball or baseball.
Whenever I think I can have a football discussion with someone in real life who seems to watch alot of games, I quickly realize the distance between my understanding of the game and their understanding is a bridge too far. So I tend to back out of football discussions very quickly in real life. In particular because they don’t seem willing to learn or have an open discussion. They are set in the way they see things and will say their uninformed opinions forcefully and confidently. The Dunning-Kruger effect helps explain why that is. The more you know about something…the more you know what you don’t know. So when you lack knowledge on a subject, it also means you know even less about what you don’t know. Which can lead to an overconfidence on a subject.
I have brought up this example in the past. QB X can throw the game losing interception and the talking head media will use it as an excuse to crush the guy on air. Low information fans hear that commentary and run with. Next thing you know I am having a conversation with that person who watched the same game I did. Their takeaway is that the interception happened because “QB X is a choke artist that can’t win when it matters!” I happen to know that the play design was not optimal for the situation but QB X made the correct adjustments at the line, made the correct read and made the correct throw. He just couldn’t quite get enough juice on the throw because the RG was pushed back into his feet. The defensive player also made one hell of a read, trusted his eyes and made an incredible play on the ball. I can’t continue a conversation when the response to my analysis is “yeah whatever, he always chokes like that. He’s a bum and they need to get rid of him.” Yeah - I’m out!
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this has been the era of the soundbite. you can lie your ass off about anything and major media outlets will just throw it to the wind.
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So true.
I’d say most people I talk football with have little understanding outside of the headlines—and yet they’ll engage with me specifically because they think they know. It becomes apparent one minute into the conversation. “Why didn’t the Lions sign a cornerback in the offseason??!?”
Of course there are levels to this.
There are plenty here who know eons more than I do about the Xs and Os, or at least do a fantastic job faking it.
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Here is a visual representation of The Dunning-Kruger Effect that I saw someone online put together (I made this graphic, I am just copying the concept). And it is brilliant in how it explains it. The person on the far left has the least amount of knowledge on the subject of the 3 people represented here. However, look at the yellow ring around their knowledge. That represents what someone knows that they don’t know. You have enough knowledge on a subject that things that are just outside of what you know start to emerge. The line can barely be seen, so to that person they see very few things that they know that they don’t know. So it can give the illusion of mastering a subject matter, which leads to overconfidence on the subject.
The second person has gained more knowledge, and you will also notice their yellow ring of things they know they don’t know has grown. Not only is there more circumference but the depth of the ring has expanded. This person has not only gained more knowledge on the subject, they have gained better perspective on how much they don’t know. This is why sometimes really smart people who know alot about a subject will be less confident or bold about their knowledge. Because they have enough knowledge to get a feel for how much more there is to know.
The third person has the most knowledge on the subject. Once again it came with an expanded view of knowing even more about how much they don’t know on the subject. There is also something that happens that I labeled here as the “donut hole of knowledge.” This is when you have been doing something for so long or have SO much knowledge on the subject, it becomes part of your core and is second nature to you. So you don’t even think of it as knowledge. And you can sometimes think that other people naturally have that core bit of knowledge as well and don’t even think about the fact that you once had to acquire that knowledge as well. When a really experienced and knowledgeable person tries to describe everything they know about something, often times they will skip over things that are in the donut hole without even realizing it. Its like brushing their teeth to them. If I am training you for a new position, why would I start with such an obvious detail?
Here is another one I found online. This one makes more sense when coupled with the 3 circles way of explaining it. This is why teenagers are so damn stupid and overconfident about it. They have often times reached the peak of having knowledge about life but with a mostly non-existent yellow ring around it.
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Who did Dunning Kruger play for?
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Great point. The fans that drive me the most crazy are the ones that don’t even watch the games and just Parrot anything the TV tells them. I’ve worked with several of these types. Come in to work making fun of the Lions but have zero idea what happened in the game.
I used to get worked up by then… now I just laugh and don’t waste my time. It’s pretty amazing how many people live their life just repeating things they saw on TV or the news. Applies to so many topics… not just sports.
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dunning kruger with a side of cognitive dissonance.
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That’s not bad for me…because meh sports.
It’s when they do it with everything else in society.
I can literally know their next comment, every time. Because I’ve heard the exact propaganda blasted over and over.
As far as other sports go, when I listen to the guys talk about hockey or whatever…I don’t know much about it. But its generally easy to spot the dudes who know wtf is going on out there and the ones who are just talking out of their ass
90% of sports is just so guys who don’t know each other can hold down conversations when wives/gfs have a get together
Spots talk provides the talking points
I had one coworker… he was a nice guy for the most part but desperately wanted to be part of the sports talk group. He’d come in spewing hot takes but he often pronounced coaches names wrong. It was like he was memorizing a script… but didn’t know the correct pronunciations. It was pretty hilarious.
My favorite was when he used to talk about the legendary Coach Colon from the Giants. I’m like dude u mean Tom Coughlin? And he’s like yea…yea Coach Colon owns Bill Belichick. Lmao the poor guy tried so hard.
Just convince him if he wants to be cool, he has to start 5 Jared Goff chants a week. And has to record video evidence of it
It’s so we don’t have to think about our own mortality.
Like most of life’s distractions.
Might as well get a little enjoyment out of this place while we’re around.
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That could make a pretty good sketch tbh
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I have a brother-in-law like that. A few years back, he proceeded to tell me everything that was wrong with the Lions and then admitted that he hadn’t watched a single game all year. WTF?
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Yeah, I haven’t watched any this week. But I do love them when we win
I had another brother-in-law that was kind of like that. He watched the games and was a pretty big Lions fan, but man could he ■■■■ up a name like nobody’s business. I remember one time I was mentioning how many days I had left to work that year with the amount of vacation time I had remaining. He was already retired and said he was off 352 days a year. I said, they make you come in for two weeks? I’m still not sure it got through to him, but I laughed my ass off. In the end, my sister divorced him because he wasn’t bright enough for her (lol) but he’s one of the great people to hang around with to this day. I think he just sniffed too much paint or something in his youth.
Pretty wild. I guess they are just trying to fit in and or make conversation. Read a couple clickbait headlines and now all of a sudden ur an expert on the topic.
The best strategy is to laugh and then ask them questions to see how much BS they will attempt to spew. Lol how exactly is Coach Colon out smarting Bill!? Can u give me some examples. Haha and in my experience they will try to make something up and then ultimately change the subject to something else they heard on TV.
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