The Conflicting Excellences of Oppositional Sports

ABSTRACT

In this article I develop my argument for a shallow interpretivist theory of sport by showing that whereas it applies to all oppositional sports, the standard theory of sport for the past twenty years or so, broad internalism, does not. Using Scott Kretchmar’s distinction between tests and contests I argue that contrary to Kretchmar’s view, whereas contests in test-based games are derived from some foundational test, the converse is true for oppositional games. The tests of oppositional games and sports are derived from the contest, and more specifically from opposing competitors. This means that there are no foundational tests in oppositional sports because the excellences necessary for success necessarily conflict. Since broad internalism is marked by the sort of essentialism underlying the test-based conception of sport, and its corresponding privileging of some consistent and foundational set of skills and abilities, it therefore follows that broad internalism does not apply to oppositional sports. Instead we must look to shallow interpretivism to understand the nature of test-based and oppositional sports.

KEYWORDS:

• Oppositional sports
• test-based sports
• excellence simpliciter
• comparative excellence
• broad internalism

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions. Any remaining errors and shortcomings are, of course, mine.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. This is not a new distinction in the philosophy of sport but I have drawn it from social psychology where it is expressed more generally in terms of means-independent (sometimes referred to as ‘parallel’) versus means-interdependent interaction. The earliest source for this that I have found is Thomas (1957).

2. I do not mean to suggest that the skills employed in oppositional sports are opposite (whatever that might mean); rather participants employ non-identical skills in the pursuit of conflicting goals. The similarities and differences among these skills vary across the different oppositional sports. Thanks to two anonymous reviewers for drawing my attention to this omission in an earlier draft.

3. In a more recent article Kretchmar acknowledges the distinction between test-based sports and oppositional ones (2014, 31) but insists that a defining feature of all contests is that there must be ‘comparability’—that is, in order to assess for superiority contestants must all be ranked relative to a common test that they all take. He claims that where there is no common test, contestants nevertheless are still engaged in common ‘projects’ (2014, 29–31). However, his reasoning here is convoluted and confused. Rather than insist on this condition of comparability we should instead recognize that contests are norm-governed social practices designed to reveal either what I refer to below as excellence simpliciter or comparative excellence. Competitors who pursue rivalrous goods through oppositional games and sports are engaged in contests, just as those participating in test-based games and sports. For more on this topic see Macrae (2018).

4. For more on this point see Sigmund Loland (2001).

5. However, one difference is that the reduction in on-ice players is now limited to four-versus-four players (plus a goaltender) so that now in the event of the calling of a second set of coincidental minor penalties, substitutions are made. For a more detailed account of the rule see the NHL Rulebook, Rule 19, available here http://www.nhl.com/nhl/en/v3/ext/rules/2018-2019-NHL-rulebook.pdf. For some of the history of the changes to NHL rules, including those discussed here, see https://records.nhl.com/history/historical-rule-changes.

6. Russell makes a similar point about the nature of baseball in his analysis of his case ‘Helping Out at Home’ (1999, 38).