Recently Elgin Baylor, a famous basketballer from the Lakers, started a sentence with 'for those that like competing, basketball is...' and I was struck silent and didn't even hear the rest of what he was saying. You mean there are people who don't like competing? And a memory came to me of a weeks conference I was once at where there was a tabletennis table, and this guy and I would spend half an hour every day hitting to and fro. We had some great rallies, but every time I suggested we play a game, he turned me down, seven days in a row. I thought he was just afraid to lose. But maybe he genuinely didn't like competing. I never considered that as an option as I usually hang out with people who love competing... see who can throw furthest, hit furthest, catch more, you name it, as kids my brother and I would turn everything into a competition. Why?

Well, winning feels like achieving something and you get a dopamine rush that reduces the need for other drugs for at least half an hour (with the possible exception of a celebratory cold beer). But there is more, there is the heightened experience when you focus in order to compete, when you manage to draw on more resources than you normally do and hence in a way become a better (bigger, faster, cleverer) person, a better version of you for a minute or two - or however long you are competing at peak performance level. There is also the communal effect, nothing binds men together like a common enemy. In the days that one tribe took on another, the brotherhood of men was invented.

And hey, capitalism beat communism hands down and thus competition is such a winner that it never needs to be questioned. But maybe there are different types of competing, different shades, ranging from ultra-competitive to.... to what? What is the least competitive form of competing that can still be called competing?

Well, take the VOC4-ACC4 game last sunday (you were probably wondering when I would get around to that). After the game as a social experiment I told the dressingroom that I had some news that would make them feel either good or bad. The news was that this game that VOC had just won, was there first win of the entire season. How did that make our boys feel? Did they feel extra bad cause they had just lost to the bunnies of our league, or did they feel good for the pleasure they had brought eleven guys who had been without game-induced dopamine for the whole season?

Well as you probably expect, not many felt any better for knowing that. We are competitors not Santa Claus. But at the same time winning is not everything. Personally I would prefer to lose a close game than win by a country mile. Except of course when the stakes are high, when its the final of a tournament or a relegation game or maybe when we're playing people we don't like. But at VOC only fun and honour were at stake, could we feel good for our victors? I think you can be happy for the others if you can somehow include them in your tribe. We know the VOC guys, have had great times with them in the past, and hence can derive some pleasure, even if only consolatory, in their feeling good. Maybe thats the beauty of social cricket, we all dress up in white, in a sense we are on the same team, we play for the love of the game. And like last Sunday if cricket is the winner, we all get some dopamine, just not equal portions.

VOC4 208 for 6 in 30 overs
ACC4 197 a.o. (with eight balls to go) Nagesh 52, Haans 4-25 in 6

http://ecricket.nl/pub/2011/ZoMi_poule_1/10_30.htm

Robert