It's not difficult to understand our desire for athletes to be heroes. On the surface, at

least, athletes display a vital and indomitable spirit; they are gloriously alive【B1】their bodies. And sports do allow us to【B2】acts that can legitimately be described as【B3】, thrilling, beautiful, even noble. In (a)an【B4】complicated and disorderly world, sports are still an arena in which we can regularly witness a certain kind of【B5】.

Yet there's something of a【B6】here, for the very qualities a society【B7】to seek in its heroes-selflessness,【B8】consciousness, and the like—are precisely the【B9】of those which are needed to【B10】a talented but otherwise unremarkable neighborhood kid into a Michael Jordan. To become a star athlete, you have to have an extremely competitive【B11】and you have to be totally focused on the development of your own physical skills. These qualities【B12】well make a great athlete,【B13】they don't necessarily make a great person. On top of this, our society reinforces these【B14】by the system it has created to produce athletes—a system characterized by【B15】responsibility and enormous privilege.

The athletes themselves suffer the【B16】of this system. Trained to measure themselves perpetually【B17】the achievements of those a round them, many young athletes develop a sense of what sociologist Walter Schafer has【B18】"conditional self-worth". They learn very quickly that they will be accepted by the important figures in their lives—parents, coaches and peers as long as they are【B19】as "winner". Unfortunately they become【B20】and behave as if their athletic success will last forever.

【B1】

A．outside

B．inside

C．besides

D．with