Why Mavericks Matter

MY TWO DAUGHTERS ARE LITTLE JOCKS-SOCCER, basketball, softball, hockey.

- Michael Sebastian

All their athletic ability comes from their mother and my wife, Sally, a former college soccer player who coaches our older daughter’s soccer team. My contribution is making them watch sports with me—the Chicago Bears and Cubs, sometimes the New York Knicks and New Jersey Devils—as well as classic sports movies: Hoosiers, Rudy, Field of Dreams, and, at Sally’s insistence, the 1983 made-for-TV film Quarterback Princess.

“Dad’s crying!” they shout after I’m brought to tears seeing Hickory beat South Bend Central, Rudy get carried off the field, or Ray Kinsella play catch with his dad. (Quarterback Princess has yet to induce waterworks.) “Dad never cries.”