There's no intrinsic value or meaning to sports. Sports are fluff. Fluff can be nice. We all need some fluff now and then, but we should keep in mind that fluff doesn't feed the hungry, cure the sick, or elevate humanity in any real sense. It's just a few people chasing a ball, throwing a ball, kicking a ball, and millions of people sitting on their butts watching the ball go back and forth.
Sports are values-neutral, in and of themselves.
They can bring out the best in us, or just as easily, the worst. Sports can be a vehicle to health and fitness, or they can destroy a person utterly. My father badly damaged his joints playing high school football. He played part of a season on a broken ankle. He was in pursuit of his only way out of the Depression, hoping for a football scholarship.