Are MLC athletes obsessive-compulsive? According to the DSM-IV-TR (the fourth edition of the diagnostic and statistic manual used by the American Psychiatric Association to classify mental disorders), obsessions are defined by: 1) recurrent and persistent thoughts, images, or impulses that are experienced and cause anxiety and 2) the person attempts to ignore, suppress, or neutralize the thoughts, images, or impulses with some other thought or action. So also, compulsions are defined by: 1) repetitive behaviors or mental acts that the person feels driven to perform in response to an obsession and 2) the behaviors or events are aimed at preventing or reducing some dreaded event or action. With this in mind, how would you explain the rituals, or if I may a more bold term, superstitious actions, that MLC athletes often go through before a game/event or during a season? I’ve heard athletes go as far as saying that they will not perform to their potential or feel “incomplete” unless they do certain things before that game or event. Along with those notions exists the idea that doing certain things brings “good luck.”

I believe that these rituals can be classified into three categories: rituals involving dress or appearance, rituals involving food, and rituals involving music or movies. You may think this is crazy, but here are a few things that athletes on this campus have done involving these rituals. Some of these are rather humorous; others border on being obsessive-compulsive.

Concerning the first category of apparel, some male members of a certain soccer team enjoy wearing wrestling singlets as Under Armour. Other athletes insist on dressing in the same way every time, that is, by putting their shirt over their right arm first or their shorts over their right leg first, etc. I personally cannot verify this next one, but there has even been talk about female athletes not shaving their legs for extended periods of time. Still, other athletes go with the “no wash method” in which they will not wash certain items of clothing because they fear that it might take away “their winning powers.” And although this next one seems to be something only a Mormon would do, I’ve even heard talk of “special underwear.”

Concerning food, the second category, a certain Luther Prep football superstar, the one and only TJ Herlich, told me that his pre-game meal had to include Captain Crunch cereal. He put it to me this way, “You and the captain make it happen.” Yet another football player insisted that you need Wheaties, “The Breakfast of Champions,” in order to play well. I even know some runners demand pasta cooked with the right kind of noodles in the right kind of sauce before their big race. (Another sub-category of this that will not be dealt with in this article is how MLC athletes deal with certain “bowel matters” before an event.)

Concerning the third category, you’ll find a wide variety of music and movies. A female cross-country runner told me that before every race she ran, she had to listen to the Dixie Chick’s “Ready to Run.” A certain member on the football team told me that he has a special mix that he likes to listen to before the game, but he always likes to end with the Foo Fighters’ “Hero.” I’ve also been informed that last year’s men’s basketball team pumped up with some highlights of Michael Jordan.

Now do all these examples prove that MLC athletes are obsessive-compulsive? Let me quickly summarize in my own words the definition of obsessive-compulsive behaviors. They are repetitive and done to suppress or ignore anxiety, and they are aimed at reducing some dreaded event or action. If we view the anxiety as the nervousness that one experiences before a game/event and the dreaded event or action as the fear of losing, I think one could plead a case for this. In the end, I will leave the obsessive-compulsive question up to you the readers to decide. But it is rather interesting to consider how weird MLC athletes are.

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