2005年NPR美国国家公共电台四月-One March Madness Drawback: The Fans

In case you haven't been paying attention to sports, the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament begins in earnest tomorrow. College students, proud alumni and plain old fans will all be glued to television sets, rooting for their favorites. Commentator¹ Laura Lorson just wishes they would get a little more creative with their support.

I like watching college basketball as much as the next person, maybe a little bit more. I've actually attended 2 schools with very prestigious² college basketball programs. I live in a town where the inventor of the game coached, died and is now buried. I love watching a well-coached, well-played game. I love the annual NCAA Tournament. I love the way people stop what they are doing every March to watch the first-round games and how co-workers who normally could not identify the pick-and-roll of their lives to paint on it, stop by the water cooler and engage in complex discussions about the 8 9 10 seat matchups and the underrepresentation of mid³ major conferences. But there is one thing I absolutely don't like about the annual NCAA Basketball Tournament and that's the fans.

They show up, they yell. And if they happen to get in front of a television camera, they go nuts; it strikes me up a "Wow". Now in their defence, when you are on camera for only 5 or 10 seconds, there is not all much that they could actually say to express their admiration⁴ for their chosen team. But this is America. We sent a man to the moon. We can make a million Twinkies in an hour. We should be able to come up with something more compelling than shrieking⁵" Number 1, We'll hue⁶" and shaking our index fingers at the camera.

Everytime I'm watching a game and the camera pans the crowd, I start shaking my head. The common crazes of duke, "psh", How do these kids get in the duke. I always think if I were at that game, I'd try to work in something legitimately⁷ great about my school. Something like "Yeah, KU, the Chancellor⁸ of the University of Kansas is one of this nation's foremost scholars of hallam renaissance⁹ literature, Wow" , or maybe "Roucher Roucher Z. Doctor Catherine K at the KU English department has a particularly insightful analysis of gender¹⁰ politics and Irish literature, darb. Number one." Given the ratings of sports events, I sometimes wonder if maybe the "State of the Union" address would seem more exciting if Senators and Representatives did this sort of thing. The President mentioned social security reform. The Cspan caremas panned around for reaction and sat along Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. Sure now, he just nods and applauds. But how many more people would tune¹¹ in if he had painted his face Kentucky blue and looked at the camera and held up a phone over an index finger and mouth:"Number one, Kentucky number one!" or they pan over to Orrin Hatch and he is all, "Uts, Uts, number one Utah."

Analysts¹² say that people don't care enough about the president's policy speeches. I think this be a low rating to grubber. Who cares about the quorum¹³? The quorum is for people without cellphones who didn't go to schools with winning basketball programs. As a matter of fact, think of what the world would be like if we would have people act like college basketball fans all the time. "NPR, number one. Robert Seagull, Nydia Tumbler, Sniffer Cutch. Woo."

Laura Lorson is on the air at KANU in Laurans, Kansas. Her final four picks by the way are Kentucky, Oklahoma state, Kansas and Georgia Tech.

1 commentator   

n.注释者，解说者；实况广播评论员

参考例句：

• He is a good commentator because he can get across the game.他能简单地解说这场比赛，是个好的解说者。
• The commentator made a big mistake during the live broadcast.在直播节目中评论员犯了个大错误。

2 prestigious   

adj.有威望的，有声望的，受尊敬的

参考例句：

• The young man graduated from a prestigious university.这个年轻人毕业于一所名牌大学。
• You may even join a prestigious magazine as a contributing editor.甚至可能会加入一个知名杂志做编辑。

3 mid   

adj.中央的，中间的

参考例句：

• Our mid-term exam is pending.我们就要期中考试了。
• He switched over to teaching in mid-career.他在而立之年转入教学工作。

4 admiration   

n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕

参考例句：

• He was lost in admiration of the beauty of the scene.他对风景之美赞不绝口。
• We have a great admiration for the gold medalists.我们对金牌获得者极为敬佩。

5 shrieking   

v.尖叫( shriek的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• The boxers were goaded on by the shrieking crowd. 拳击运动员听见观众的喊叫就来劲儿了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They were all shrieking with laughter. 他们都发出了尖锐的笑声。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 hue   

n.色度；色调；样子

参考例句：

• The diamond shone with every hue under the sun.金刚石在阳光下放出五颜六色的光芒。
• The same hue will look different in different light.同一颜色在不同的光线下看起来会有所不同。

7 legitimately   

ad.合法地；正当地，合理地

参考例句：

• The radio is legitimately owned by the company. 该电台为这家公司所合法拥有。
• She looked for nothing save what might come legitimately and without the appearance of special favour. 她要的并不是男人们的额外恩赐，而是合法正当地得到的工作。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹

8 chancellor   

n.(英)大臣；法官；(德、奥)总理；大学校长

参考例句：

• They submitted their reports to the Chancellor yesterday.他们昨天向财政大臣递交了报告。
• He was regarded as the most successful Chancellor of modern times.他被认为是现代最成功的财政大臣。

9 renaissance   

n.复活，复兴，文艺复兴

参考例句：

• The Renaissance was an epoch of unparalleled cultural achievement.文艺复兴是一个文化上取得空前成就的时代。
• The theme of the conference is renaissance Europe.大会的主题是文艺复兴时期的欧洲。

10 gender   

n.（生理上的）性，（名词、代词等的）性

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns.法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。
• Women are sometimes denied opportunities solely because of their gender.妇女有时仅仅因为性别而无法获得种种机会。

11 tune   

n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整

参考例句：

• He'd written a tune,and played it to us on the piano.他写了一段曲子，并在钢琴上弹给我们听。
• The boy beat out a tune on a tin can.那男孩在易拉罐上敲出一首曲子。

12 analysts   

分析家，化验员( analyst的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• City analysts forecast huge profits this year. 伦敦金融分析家预测今年的利润非常丰厚。
• I was impressed by the high calibre of the researchers and analysts. 研究人员和分析人员的高素质给我留下了深刻印象。

13 quorum   

n.法定人数

参考例句：

• The meeting is adjourned since there is no quorum.因为没有法定人数会议休会。
• Three members shall constitute a quorum.三名成员可组成法定人数。