Monday, August 30, 2004
Potpourri
I'd like to take a second to recognize the fine grounds crew at Shea Stadium in Flushing, Queens. Realizing their stadium is one of the worst in baseball, they've decided to splat some makeup on 'ol Shea by carving elaborate designs in the outfield grass. I first noticed them make a giant "NY" Mets logo in center field during the Subway Series early in the season and thought it was just a proud stamp of pride. Then I caught a game recently and saw some sort of star-shaped pattern carried throughout the entire outfield. If I had never been to Shea Stadium before, these marvels of mowing might lead me to believe it was a decent ballpark. Unfortunately, I've seen the true Shea and was not impressed by the window dressing. It's like putting a spoiler and spoke wheels on an '84 Corolla; you're not going to fool anybody into believing it's a hot car. The good news is, with The Vet abandoned in Philadelphia and Olympic Stadium soon to be left behind in Montreal, the Mets are close to having sole possession of the throne for The Worst Ballpark in Baseball.
Everyone knows the Mike Williams Ruling is completely heinous. The NCAA might as well drop Common Sense 101 because, at this point, they could ace the final and they'd still fail. However, it's unfair to blame the NCAA for Mike Williams not being allowed to play this season. All the NCAA did was uphold its own rules which have been in place longer than Mike Williams has been alive. Yes, they should have probably adapted to these special circumstances, but their refusal to make an exception is not ultimately to blame; Mike Williams is. He knew exactly what he was doing when he left USC for the NFL. He had to realize that the Maurice Clarett ruling was going to be appealed yet he still chose to sacrifice his college eligibility. Why couldn't he have waited for the appeal process to play itself out before signing up with an agent and taking money? What was the rush? Even if he did want to put all his proverbial eggs in one basket, he could have just worked out and gotten ready for the draft without an agent. There was no chance he was going to be drafted number one overall so it's not as if there was a contract to be negotiated before Draft Day. He could have easily stayed in limbo until the legality of his NFL career was etched in stone. The choice he made to jump start his career in this way is the sole reason we will not be in uniform this season--for any team.
Backtracking to the Games of the 28th Olympiad, Spain basketball coach Mario Pesquera is a complete hypocrite. Let's assume that he was just in his criticism of USA coach Larry Brown's late timeout with the US leading by eleven. How are you going to take shots at someone's sportsmanship and then put yours in your pocket by refusing to shake their hand after the game? Absence of your opponent's sportsmanship is no excuse to forget your own. If Pesquera really wanted to call attention to Brown's error, he should have done so like a gentlemen. Instead, he practically started a fight on the court and pouted like a child in the ensuing press conference. Sounds like a great model for foreign relations, doesn't it? While his point of calling Brown a sore winner is not entirely lost, it's certainly diluted by his own behavior as a sore loser.
How cool was Rulon Gardner's traditional farewell gesture of leaving his shoes in the ring after winning the bronze medal? I get chills just visualizing it. I think the so-called major sports should adopt similar traditions. Can you picture Michael Jordan hitting the go-ahead bucket over Bryon Russell, playing out the clock, and then leaving the shoes that already bear his silhouette at half court? How beautifully poignant would that be? That image would be the cover of every sports magazine, not to mention Newsweek and Time, and would deck the walls of game rooms across America for decades to come. Bob Costas would go Walt Whitman with this. The only thing that detracts from this image is that of Jordan returning to the Delta Center eighteen months later and asking for his shoes back. Roger Clemens might have to pull his from George Steinbrenner's fireplace. Seriously though, it's such a moving symbol of an athlete saying farewell to the game that I'd like to see more of it.
That's all for today, folks. Unless, of course, Jason Whitlock's next column comes out...
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Everyone knows the Mike Williams Ruling is completely heinous. The NCAA might as well drop Common Sense 101 because, at this point, they could ace the final and they'd still fail. However, it's unfair to blame the NCAA for Mike Williams not being allowed to play this season. All the NCAA did was uphold its own rules which have been in place longer than Mike Williams has been alive. Yes, they should have probably adapted to these special circumstances, but their refusal to make an exception is not ultimately to blame; Mike Williams is. He knew exactly what he was doing when he left USC for the NFL. He had to realize that the Maurice Clarett ruling was going to be appealed yet he still chose to sacrifice his college eligibility. Why couldn't he have waited for the appeal process to play itself out before signing up with an agent and taking money? What was the rush? Even if he did want to put all his proverbial eggs in one basket, he could have just worked out and gotten ready for the draft without an agent. There was no chance he was going to be drafted number one overall so it's not as if there was a contract to be negotiated before Draft Day. He could have easily stayed in limbo until the legality of his NFL career was etched in stone. The choice he made to jump start his career in this way is the sole reason we will not be in uniform this season--for any team.
Backtracking to the Games of the 28th Olympiad, Spain basketball coach Mario Pesquera is a complete hypocrite. Let's assume that he was just in his criticism of USA coach Larry Brown's late timeout with the US leading by eleven. How are you going to take shots at someone's sportsmanship and then put yours in your pocket by refusing to shake their hand after the game? Absence of your opponent's sportsmanship is no excuse to forget your own. If Pesquera really wanted to call attention to Brown's error, he should have done so like a gentlemen. Instead, he practically started a fight on the court and pouted like a child in the ensuing press conference. Sounds like a great model for foreign relations, doesn't it? While his point of calling Brown a sore winner is not entirely lost, it's certainly diluted by his own behavior as a sore loser.
How cool was Rulon Gardner's traditional farewell gesture of leaving his shoes in the ring after winning the bronze medal? I get chills just visualizing it. I think the so-called major sports should adopt similar traditions. Can you picture Michael Jordan hitting the go-ahead bucket over Bryon Russell, playing out the clock, and then leaving the shoes that already bear his silhouette at half court? How beautifully poignant would that be? That image would be the cover of every sports magazine, not to mention Newsweek and Time, and would deck the walls of game rooms across America for decades to come. Bob Costas would go Walt Whitman with this. The only thing that detracts from this image is that of Jordan returning to the Delta Center eighteen months later and asking for his shoes back. Roger Clemens might have to pull his from George Steinbrenner's fireplace. Seriously though, it's such a moving symbol of an athlete saying farewell to the game that I'd like to see more of it.
That's all for today, folks. Unless, of course, Jason Whitlock's next column comes out...
# posted by j.h.k. @ 1:31 PM 
