"I don't know that this applies specifically to Chomsky, but I think that a lot of this leftie anti-sports attitude comes from the following:" (intellectual geekdom, fear of atheletes, envy of mass appeal of sports)
From where I stand, this reflects more of a sterotype than a reality. In my experience, most of the "lefties" I have known have been in relatively good shape. While they tend to gravitate toward the more solitary sports: swimming, cycling, running, hiking, tennis, they DO move about and are physically fit. A lot of the high-school jocks, on the other hand, tend to run to fat and flab in later years. What I find interesting about this discussion, is that a lot of physical activity is not recognized as "sport" and a lot of non-physical activity (like watching sports on TV) is identified as sport. Thus I, who dance/swim/play tennis every single day, but do not consume TV sports, am deemed "anti-sport," while a beer guzzling, pot-bellied "average" american who waddles between the couch and the fridge, IS judged to be a normative "sports-lover."
So when we talk about sports, what are we talking about? Could we, maybe distinguish TV sport and sport-as-spectacle from sport? Could we acknowledge the fact that as TV sport draws more and more people and more and more money, many schools can no longer afford to provide physical education classes or P.E. teachers to their students? Can we talk about the fact that children can no-longer roam neighborhoods and just "kick the ball around"...because their parents cannot trust in the safety of their own neighborhood? Can we talk about how the normal human desire for playful and physical activity is continually turned into "a race to the top" and cannot be assimilated or allowed to be otherwise?
There's lots of interesting things to talk about as leftists when we talk about sports, once we can disentangle the spectacle from the deed.
Joanna