Today's episode reminded me of Ward's almost juvenile obsession with sports throughout the show. It seemed to be more important to him than just about anything else. I think that has to be his biggest flaw. I can understand being tough on the boys about schoolwork or the small jobs the boys had. But sports?? "Gimme a break", Nell Carter!! :rolleyes:

I felt bad for Beaver here too, as I was never good at basketball either! :lol:

I'm not great at sports either. Don't get me wrong, I like sports, but I seem to remember Ward pressuring Wally about Football too. I don't know if we were supposed to perceive this as a distinct characteristic of Ward's, or if this was the Zeitgeist of fathers during that era, (as I don't recall June or anyone else ever calling him out on this particular idiosyncrasy), but to me he seemed to act like a big baby when it came to his sons' athletic prowess. :crybaby:

Unfortunately,there are still plenty of dads out there just like this...why? I don't know!:confused:

Originally posted by Tonyd
I felt bad for Beaver here too, as I was never good at basketball either! :lol:


I was never good at it ethier.

The only thing Beaver was good at was getting snowed by his so called friends.

I don't think Ward has an "almost juvenile" obsession with sports. He was an athlete himself in his earlier years, as is referenced in several eps, and now all he has is his weekly golf and watching and encouraging his sons to play the sports they are interested in and that they are good at. In the meantime, he bacame obviously successful in his career field, whatever that is, and I think there is at least one ep where he mentions having gotten a scholarship. So Ward realizes as well as any parent that being young, agile, and vigorous is a wonderful thing that can do a lot for a young person. But it is also a short foundational phase in life; so he just wants them to take advantage of that while they can.

Originally posted by tdr
all he has is his weekly golf and watching and encouraging his sons to play the sports they are interested in and that they are good at. It seemed to me that he wanted the boys to be good whether they were or not, and they knew it.

It must have been really hard for Beaver to try to live up to both Wally and Ward! :D