I am a fan of the X-games. No clever introduction for this entry, I love the X-games. I stayed up every night this week to watch almost every event. I count down the days of my summer until the X-games start. I watched the first X-games when I was about 10 years old. After watching, I went out and bought a skateboard. I never mastered the board because of my fear of breaking bones against concrete. Because of my love of the X-games, I want to give some quick thoughts on the X-games.
Amazing Athletes
Allen Iverson is a warrior. He goes in against men twice his size and keeps playing every night. The athletes in the X-games make Allen Iverson and Bret Favre look like T-mac. These athletes risk LIFE every time they attempt a jump. 
For example, right now I’m watching the Skateboard big air. Sorry, BIG AIR! These skateboarders are taking off a r
a
mp that is six floors up at an almost 90-degree angle. After they take off, they do some insane trick over a gap that is about 60 feet wide. Wait, there is more. After you land, you go up on another ramp and fly about 25 feet without any safety nets. These athletes are brave. These guys define superb athletes. They play hurt, change their sport and do it for the love of the sport.
If the Big Air example did not convince you that these guys are athletes, maybe this one will. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iFrKpR6QOA) Travis Pastrana landed the first double back flip in the history of the motocross best trick competition. 
If you have not seen a motocross bike, look at the picture. The bikes weight between 200 and 250 pounds. Pastrana, and every other rider, go 30 feet in the air with a 200 pound bike over them or under them. One wrong move and that bike can land on them or they can fly off the bike onto concrete hard dirt. Look at this picture; I know its going to send chills down your back.
Sure, these guys aren’t competing against a defense or a blitz package, but they are against other riders and death.
Growth of the Game
I’m not going to pull up TV ratings or anything like that to talk about this point. When the X-games first started back in 1995, most people thought it would fail. ESPN took a bold risk of putting the sport on mainstream cable even though most consider it illegal and for punks. Even though ESPN has grown to a powerful media conglomerate that can support any type of programming it wants, it does not have to support the X-games. Any business will pull the plug on something that will not make them money. The X-games has grown into the premier extreme sports competition in the world. During the first X-games I remember only a few events were on TV. Now, every event is on and ESPN has even started to put some on pay-per-view. Yes, people are willing to pay to watch the X-games.
The X-games started to become accepted in mainstream media when Tony Hawk landed the first ever 900 during the skateboard best trick competition. After that, ESPN held the games in major cities but never the home of extreme sports, LA. When the X-games went to LA in 2003, the ratings were off the charts for ESPN. I was in LA a few days before the X-games started in 2003. I have never seen so many people excited about a sport that should have been dead by now.
Athletes and Drugs
Extreme sports athletes have a stereotype surrounding them that all of them are dopeheads. I mean yes, you have to be high on something to do some of the crazy things they do but in reality they are not all crackheads. Here is a test for you doubters. NAME FIVE EXTREME ATHLETES WHO HAVE BEEN IN TROUBLE WITH THE LAW FOR DRUGS. GO! GIVE UP? Now, name five NBA players. How about five NFL players? I bet you can name more than five for both sports. I’m sure some of those athletes light up a joint once in a while, just like athltes in every other league, but at least they aren’t stupid about it. I can’t name one extreme sports athlete who was an addict or pulled a Damon Stoudemire. Drugs in sports is as common as an NBA player having more than four unknown kids on each coast.
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