I have never been a sports person. Despite having spent the first twenty-two years of my life in the Deep South, where football fandom is stitched into the very fabric of our existence, I could never convince myself to care much about it. I frankly resented being forced to play volleyball and soccer in middle school P.E., and I joined marching band in high school at least partly because it would get me out of taking any further gym classes. I did, however, spend a couple years in my early teens playing basketball (poorly) in a church league, and for…