C
charley
Guest
The Sports sections of newspapers often double as crime sheets,
itemizing the rapes, domestic beatings, strip-club melees, cocaine
busts and so forth implicating professional athletes. After last
Friday night's riot in Auburn Hills, Michigan, NBA executives are
engaging in yet another phony round of navel-gazing. Why, they wonder,
are our athletes acting like criminals? Because many of your athletes
are criminals.
Forty percent of NBA players have criminal records, according to Jeff
Benedict, author of Out of Bounds: Inside the NBA's Culture of Rape,
Violence & Crime. Yet NBA executives constantly make excuses for them,
often relying on political correctness in one form or another to
rationalize the rise of the criminal-athlete. Next to these
"respectable" sports executives, Jerry Tarkanian looks honest. The
former UNLV coach would straightforwardly recruit ex-felons but at
least had the decency not to fake up a pious liberal reason for doing
it or present his motives as progressive.
The league has joined forces with tenured frauds like USC professor
Todd Boyd, author of Young, Black, Rich and Famous: The Rise of the
NBA, the Hip Hop Invasion and the Transformation of American Culture,
to promote a culture of rebelliousness that has made them very rich
while allowing them to pose as progressive. For reasons of raw
business, they were willing to bring a culture of lawless behavior
into the NBA, licensing NBA gear to hip-hop companies, presenting the
vulgarity-spewing, showboating stunts of their stars to impressionable
children not as bad behavior but as an authentic and "real" culture
even as black parents, such as Bill Cosby, were trying to discourage
their children from embracing this emptiness.
Only now as the effects of that hip-hop culture become more vivid and
startling to the public does the NBA take dramatic action. In
professional sports, the punishment isn't proportioned to the misdeed,
but to the public's reaction to the misdeed. A horrified reaction?
Well, then we'll have to act very outraged, the executives conclude.
We'll have to feign shock and hand down severe punishments. A few of
them described the brawl in Detroit as surreal. Come on. How is that
any more surreal than letting your stars play while standing trial for
rape. Given the number of their players with criminal records, the
only thing that should surprise them is that these brawls don't break
out more often.
Jeff Benedict checked the backgrounds of 177 players from the
2001-2002 season and found 40% of them had been arrested for crimes
ranging from rape to armed robbery to domestic violence. While Kobe
Bryant was on trial, writes Benedict, "25 law enforcement agencies in
13 cities in the United States and Canada were simultaneously
proceeding with arrest warrants, indictments, plea-agreement
proceedings or trials involving more than a dozen other players." He
found 33 criminal charges of domestic violence against NBA-ers. "For
many players, encounters with law-enforcement officials represent the
rare instance of someone telling them no," writes Benedict.
The NBA increasingly looks like a glorified men's league for ex-cons.
But as long as the bucks keep flowing its cynical organizers are happy
to indulge these spoiled and dangerous stars. From time to time they
will go through the rigmarole of sending them off to "anger
management" or to sports psychiatrists, but basically they don't care
about their misbehavior as long as it doesn't eat it into their
pocketbooks or cause them too much public relations backlash. Sports
executives are like indulgent parents who let their child get away
with all manner of nonsense until the child embarrasses them at a
dinner party before their friends and then they call a "timeout."
This week, Sports Illustrated reports that among professional
athletes out-of-wedlock births are epidemic. And of athletes in the
major sports leagues, those in the NBA appear to have the greatest
number of cases. According to SI, one of the NBA's top agents says he
spends more time dealing with paternity claims than he does
negotiating contracts. The agent tells the magazine that there might
be more kids out of wedlock than there are players in the NBA.
According to Sports Illustrated, Larry Johnson of the Knicks is
supporting five children by four women, including two he has with his
wife, and Shawn Kemp of the Cavaliers, who is not married, has
fathered seven children. Other NBA players who have been the subject
of paternity-related lawsuits include Patrick Ewing, Juwan Howard,
Scottie Pippen, Jason Kidd, Stephon Marbury, Hakeem Olajuwon and Gary
Payton, as well as Larry Bird, who is now the coach of the Pacers, and
current NBC game analyst Isiah Thomas.
WHAT HAS CHANGED THE COMPLEXION ! THE ATTITUDES ? THE BEHAVIOR ? THE
LACK OF ANY MORALS !
WHY ATHLETES CAN'T HAVE REAL JOBS:
Chicago Cubs outfielder Andre Dawson on being a role model: "I wan
all them kids to do what I do, to look up to me. I wan all the kids
to copulate me."
New Orleans Saint RB George Rogers when asked about the upcoming
season: "I want to rush for 1,000 or 1,500 yards, whichever comes
first."
And, upon hearing Joe Jacobi of the 'Skins say: "I'd run over my own
mother to win the Super Bowl", Matt Millen of the Raiders said: "To
win, I'd run over Joe's Mom, too."
Torrin Polk, University of Houston receiver, on his coach, John
Jenkins: "He treats us like men. He lets us wear earrings."
Football commentator and former player Joe Theismann, 1996: "Nobody
in football should be called a genius. A genius is a guy like Norman
Einstein."
Senior basketball player at the University of Pit tsburgh: "I'm going
to graduate on time, no matter how long it takes."
Bill Peterson, a FloridaState football coach: "You guys line up
alphabetically by height." And "You guys pair up in groups of three,
then line up in a circle."
Boxing promoter Dan Duva on Mike Tyson hooking up again with
promoter Don King: "Why would anyone expect him to come out smarter?
He went to prison for three years, not Princeton."
Stu Grimson, Chicago Blackhawks left wing, explaining why he keeps a
color photo of himself above his locker: "That's so when I forget
how to spell my name, I can still find my clothes."
Lou Duva, veteran boxing trainer, on the Spartan training regime of
heavyweight Andrew Golota: "He's a guy who gets up at six o'clock
in the morning regardless of what time it is."
Chuck Nevitt, North Carolina State basketball player, explaining to
Coach Jim Valvano why he appeared nervous at practice: "My sister's
expecting a baby, and I don't know if I'm going to be an uncle or an
aunt."
Frank Layden, Utah Jazz president, on a former player: "I told
him,'Son, what is it with you? Is it ignorance or apathy?' He
said, 'Coach, I don't know and I don't care.'"
Shelby Metcalf, basketball coach at Texas A&M, recounting what he
told a player who received four F's and one D: "Son, looks to me
like you're spending too much time on one subject."
Oiler coach Bum Phillips when asked by Bob Costas why he takes his
wife on all the road trips, Phillips responded: "Because she is too
dadgum ugly to kiss good-bye."
itemizing the rapes, domestic beatings, strip-club melees, cocaine
busts and so forth implicating professional athletes. After last
Friday night's riot in Auburn Hills, Michigan, NBA executives are
engaging in yet another phony round of navel-gazing. Why, they wonder,
are our athletes acting like criminals? Because many of your athletes
are criminals.
Forty percent of NBA players have criminal records, according to Jeff
Benedict, author of Out of Bounds: Inside the NBA's Culture of Rape,
Violence & Crime. Yet NBA executives constantly make excuses for them,
often relying on political correctness in one form or another to
rationalize the rise of the criminal-athlete. Next to these
"respectable" sports executives, Jerry Tarkanian looks honest. The
former UNLV coach would straightforwardly recruit ex-felons but at
least had the decency not to fake up a pious liberal reason for doing
it or present his motives as progressive.
The league has joined forces with tenured frauds like USC professor
Todd Boyd, author of Young, Black, Rich and Famous: The Rise of the
NBA, the Hip Hop Invasion and the Transformation of American Culture,
to promote a culture of rebelliousness that has made them very rich
while allowing them to pose as progressive. For reasons of raw
business, they were willing to bring a culture of lawless behavior
into the NBA, licensing NBA gear to hip-hop companies, presenting the
vulgarity-spewing, showboating stunts of their stars to impressionable
children not as bad behavior but as an authentic and "real" culture
even as black parents, such as Bill Cosby, were trying to discourage
their children from embracing this emptiness.
Only now as the effects of that hip-hop culture become more vivid and
startling to the public does the NBA take dramatic action. In
professional sports, the punishment isn't proportioned to the misdeed,
but to the public's reaction to the misdeed. A horrified reaction?
Well, then we'll have to act very outraged, the executives conclude.
We'll have to feign shock and hand down severe punishments. A few of
them described the brawl in Detroit as surreal. Come on. How is that
any more surreal than letting your stars play while standing trial for
rape. Given the number of their players with criminal records, the
only thing that should surprise them is that these brawls don't break
out more often.
Jeff Benedict checked the backgrounds of 177 players from the
2001-2002 season and found 40% of them had been arrested for crimes
ranging from rape to armed robbery to domestic violence. While Kobe
Bryant was on trial, writes Benedict, "25 law enforcement agencies in
13 cities in the United States and Canada were simultaneously
proceeding with arrest warrants, indictments, plea-agreement
proceedings or trials involving more than a dozen other players." He
found 33 criminal charges of domestic violence against NBA-ers. "For
many players, encounters with law-enforcement officials represent the
rare instance of someone telling them no," writes Benedict.
The NBA increasingly looks like a glorified men's league for ex-cons.
But as long as the bucks keep flowing its cynical organizers are happy
to indulge these spoiled and dangerous stars. From time to time they
will go through the rigmarole of sending them off to "anger
management" or to sports psychiatrists, but basically they don't care
about their misbehavior as long as it doesn't eat it into their
pocketbooks or cause them too much public relations backlash. Sports
executives are like indulgent parents who let their child get away
with all manner of nonsense until the child embarrasses them at a
dinner party before their friends and then they call a "timeout."
This week, Sports Illustrated reports that among professional
athletes out-of-wedlock births are epidemic. And of athletes in the
major sports leagues, those in the NBA appear to have the greatest
number of cases. According to SI, one of the NBA's top agents says he
spends more time dealing with paternity claims than he does
negotiating contracts. The agent tells the magazine that there might
be more kids out of wedlock than there are players in the NBA.
According to Sports Illustrated, Larry Johnson of the Knicks is
supporting five children by four women, including two he has with his
wife, and Shawn Kemp of the Cavaliers, who is not married, has
fathered seven children. Other NBA players who have been the subject
of paternity-related lawsuits include Patrick Ewing, Juwan Howard,
Scottie Pippen, Jason Kidd, Stephon Marbury, Hakeem Olajuwon and Gary
Payton, as well as Larry Bird, who is now the coach of the Pacers, and
current NBC game analyst Isiah Thomas.
WHAT HAS CHANGED THE COMPLEXION ! THE ATTITUDES ? THE BEHAVIOR ? THE
LACK OF ANY MORALS !
WHY ATHLETES CAN'T HAVE REAL JOBS:
Chicago Cubs outfielder Andre Dawson on being a role model: "I wan
all them kids to do what I do, to look up to me. I wan all the kids
to copulate me."
New Orleans Saint RB George Rogers when asked about the upcoming
season: "I want to rush for 1,000 or 1,500 yards, whichever comes
first."
And, upon hearing Joe Jacobi of the 'Skins say: "I'd run over my own
mother to win the Super Bowl", Matt Millen of the Raiders said: "To
win, I'd run over Joe's Mom, too."
Torrin Polk, University of Houston receiver, on his coach, John
Jenkins: "He treats us like men. He lets us wear earrings."
Football commentator and former player Joe Theismann, 1996: "Nobody
in football should be called a genius. A genius is a guy like Norman
Einstein."
Senior basketball player at the University of Pit tsburgh: "I'm going
to graduate on time, no matter how long it takes."
Bill Peterson, a FloridaState football coach: "You guys line up
alphabetically by height." And "You guys pair up in groups of three,
then line up in a circle."
Boxing promoter Dan Duva on Mike Tyson hooking up again with
promoter Don King: "Why would anyone expect him to come out smarter?
He went to prison for three years, not Princeton."
Stu Grimson, Chicago Blackhawks left wing, explaining why he keeps a
color photo of himself above his locker: "That's so when I forget
how to spell my name, I can still find my clothes."
Lou Duva, veteran boxing trainer, on the Spartan training regime of
heavyweight Andrew Golota: "He's a guy who gets up at six o'clock
in the morning regardless of what time it is."
Chuck Nevitt, North Carolina State basketball player, explaining to
Coach Jim Valvano why he appeared nervous at practice: "My sister's
expecting a baby, and I don't know if I'm going to be an uncle or an
aunt."
Frank Layden, Utah Jazz president, on a former player: "I told
him,'Son, what is it with you? Is it ignorance or apathy?' He
said, 'Coach, I don't know and I don't care.'"
Shelby Metcalf, basketball coach at Texas A&M, recounting what he
told a player who received four F's and one D: "Son, looks to me
like you're spending too much time on one subject."
Oiler coach Bum Phillips when asked by Bob Costas why he takes his
wife on all the road trips, Phillips responded: "Because she is too
dadgum ugly to kiss good-bye."