NFL Labor Issues. *!@#$%

I couldn’t sleep last night, up again struggling with one of the most confusing issues known to man. One that has been studied by think tanks all over the world. Why does Goofy get to walk on his hind legs, wear clothes and talk while Pluto has to act like a dog? Hey, let’s admit it, that’s about as deep as I and those of you reading this get.

What does Disney’s unexplained act have to do with sports? Not much actually. I’d just rather contemplate that than the **** I was watching on Sportscenter at 2am about the NFL. I know you are probably tired of hearing me talk about keeping sports in perspective but damn it if it doesn’t keep coming up.

What struck me like a 2x4 last night was the contrasting stories I was watching. Billionaire owners and millionaire players who are too stupid to realize that they should be in a room divvying up their $9 BILLION and should be totally embarrassed that they are parading this in front of us. The contrasting stories?

Fennville High winning again, capturing their District Championship. Yes, I cried as the team had Wes Leonard’s little brother accept the trophy. Watching BYU’s Jimmer Fredette score as many points himself in the first half as Wisconsin could score in their entire game.  Jimmer ended up with a BYU record 52 points.

Emotions? I had them all. I was captured and involved in those stories, as  I was in watching highlights of the various college basketball conference tournaments. Joy and some sadness about Fennville.  The NFL? Oh, that brought emotions too.

Anger. Disgust. I watched as ESPN showed some action during the report of Ray Lewis strutting and screaming. Of other players making plays and celebrating like they had won the Super Bowl.  9 ****ing BILLION a year!!

You know what? Give me Jimmer and Fennville any day.

Ohio State and Coach Jim Tressel. Quite a show.

Great pieces of drama are said to have it all. They make you laugh, they make you cry.  They bring out a plethora of emotions. Yes, I used the word plethora. The recent drama at Ohio State certainly brings out multiple emotions. I’m laughing and I’m insulted, which makes me angry.

Seinfeld’s George Costanza put it best. “That is CA-MI-DEE!”.  OSU President Gordon Gee seems to have made the wrong career choice. Oh yeah, stand up might have been Gordon’s calling. Gee was asked if he would consider firing Coach  Jim Tressel. His response? Gee only hoped that Tressel wouldn’t fire him. That’s a statement on who is running the show, huh?

I hate being talked down to, patronized, treated like an idiot. With a passion. Why didn’t Tressel act on the information he had been given? Let’s understand that the “information” was an email from an attorney who notified Tressel that in the course of a federal investigation into the drug trafficking of a tattoo parlor owner, a lot of OSU football memorabilia was discovered. The attorney informed Tressel that his players, among them star QB Terrelle Pryor, apparently had sold the memorabilia to the tattoo parlor owner. This is not someone telling Tressel that his 4^th string nickel back was skipping some classes. This involved his star player and would be a clearcut and serious NCAA violation.

So why didn’t Tressel act? He didn’t know who to bring this information to. I know, you’re rubbing your eyes. You’re thinking you must need glasses or at least new ones. Nope. You read it right. I’ll repeat it. Ohio State Head Football Coach Jim Tressel would like us to believe that when told his star player and others might have committed a serious NCAA violation, he didn’t know who to bring that information to. So of course, he did nothing. ARE YOU KIDDING ME??!! On top of everything, you’re going to insult us like that?

OSU responded by suspending Tressel for the first two games of the 2011 season. I have no idea how the Buckeyes will manage to compete against Akron and Toledo without their head man. They fined him $250,000 also. What a joke. The players were suspended for the first five games.

Look I’m not saying Tressel is the devil. But here is a guy who is pushing his new book about faith and integrity and doing things the right way. Really? There were issues with the NCAA while he was not only coach but athletic director at Youngstown State. He brought in Maurice Clarett after reportedly being briefed extensively by Clarett’s high school coaches about his off field issues. Interesting that Clarett allegedly had his own apartment at OSU despite the school requiring freshmen to live in a dorm. Troy Smith was suspended for taking money from a booster. Again, nothing that isn’t found at most schools, but Tressel is supposed to be different.

Doesn’t seem different to me. If it looks like a duck and walks like a duck..........

Remembering Fennville's Wes Leonard. What sports can and should be.

I’ve been accused of being too serious. Of needing to lighten up. Sometimes I think that’s true. This isn’t one of those times.

I’ve been wanting to write about Wes Leonard, the high school basketball player from Fennville, MI who died March 4 just minutes after laying in the winning basket for his unbeaten Blackhawks. I didn’t know what to say, until today. Sports has become something that often times I don’t like. That too often now is given a priority that’s way out of whack. Everything that happened and was represented in a couple of hours last night inside DeVos Fieldhouse at Hope College is what sports should be about.

Last night’s state regional playoff game was supposed to be played at Lawrence High School. Once Fennville decided to play the game, Lawrence offered to move it to nearby Hope College to accommodate everyone that would want to be there. Class. 3472 people showed up. The combined population of Fennville and Lawrence is about 2300.

The game became about community and being together to grieve and honor Wes Leonard.   Players from both teams wore warm up shirts that said NEVER TO BE FORGOTTEN on the front and Leonard 35 on the back. As Wes’ parents came into the gym, it fell silent out of courtesy to them as they took their seats. When the starting lineups were announced, only four players were introduced and came onto the court for Fennville.  After a few moments, the fifth player was announced and came onto the court.  Fennville won and will play Bangor High Wednesday night at their new home at Hope College.

It’s easy to forget how therapeutic sports can be. How rooting for the local team can help with the healing that needs to take place in Fennville.  One of the Fennville parents said she really hasn’t seen her son since Wes’ death because the players have all been together at Coach Ryan Klingler’s house. Like 13 brothers. All eating together and consoling each other.

This is the power of sports. The importance of sports. It’s okay to immerse yourself in fantasy leagues. It’s okay to enjoy big time college and professional sports. But don’t lose sight of the real priority. The vast majority of players never get to that level. So keep youth and high school sports in perspective for what they can give us.  What they can teach us. That should be the priority. Not 3 NBA players strutting and preening before they had even practiced together. Not big time college football coaches perhaps covering up violations by his players. When I remember the priority, I love sports.

BYU Suspends Brandon Davies for?

Wow. I’m pretty sure that I have never seen a story like this in the twenty…. thirty….  ok ok FORTY plus years that I have been following sports. Stop laughing, most of you are there with me.

BYU basketball player Brandon Davies has been suspended for the rest of the season for breaking the student honor code of the university. His transgression? Admitting to having sex with his girlfriend. Wow. A leading player on the 3^rd ranked team in the country. A team having a magical, once in a lifetime season. Wow.

My first reaction is that I do feel bad for Davies and the rest of the Cougars. BYU is not a team that will reload and have another Jimmer Fredette next year. However, I can’t blame BYU for enforcing their code of conduct. It’s something that is front and center and made clear to every potential student of the university. It’s not something that is a surprise to students or forced on them. They know the deal going in.

While 99% of college students would not be able to live up to the code, BYU makes no bones about the fact that their university is for the 1% who can. I give them credit for having their standards. That’s not a bad thing and something that our kids could benefit from more of.

I hope that Davies learns that when he agrees to something, it’s something to live up to. I can tell you from my experience that many kids nod their heads a lot agreeing to something and really don’t grasp the magnitude. Hopefully for Davies, lesson learned. 

Please pay attention to former Bear Dave Duerson

I’m sure the Coliseum rocked watching the underdog Gladiators take on the Lions. My violence in sports project in college featured a newspaper picture of a hockey fight right up against the glass. The shear joy on the faces of the fans was remarkable. The 17 car pile up in this year’s Daytona 500 is what many race fans are hoping for. A video of the NFL’s most violent hits is always a huge seller. Let’s face it. Violence sells.

The issue of whether or not kids are influenced by watching or listening to TV, video games, movies and music has been debated for decades. Not so surprisingly, as I have gotten older my stance has shifted to now being concerned about the effects of these media on youth. I heard a psychologist say the issue is that the violence seen isn’t actually taken far enough. You see someone killed for example but never see the consequences of that. You never see the impact on family and friends. The grieving. The fact that the person is actually gone. You see this person die and then the game or show or movie moves on. 

This past week we saw yet another consequence of the violence that attracts so many to the NFL. Former Bears DB Dave Duerson took his own life. He left a note saying he wouldn’t shoot himself in the head because he wanted someone to look at his brain to figure out why he was in such pain and misery. Duerson was 50 years old. Colin Cowherd on ESPN said there is a study that showed that the career with the shortest life expectancy among American males is that of professional football player. Shockingly he cited the study as saying that former professional football players die at an average age of 54 compared to the average male who dies at the age of 75. While I do find it hard to believe that the average age of death of every former football player is 54, there is no questioning the severity of this issue.

NFL players will tell you that game day is like being in a car crash. Most find it difficult to walk until Wednesday or Thursday. Former lineman Mark Schlereth had 29 surgeries during his career. When he hears people say how they would give anything to have played in the NFL, he says no you wouldn’t. It’s a struggle for him to get going every day. Pain every day. I know that this comes as no surprise to the players and that they make the choice to play. Very true.

But I do think that the league needs to be concerned about long term effects of its game on the players. Dave Duerson is not the first player to have this happen Former Steeler Mike Webster’s post career problems have been well documented. Watching the effects of multiple hits to the head on Muhammed Ali is painful for those of us old enough to remember him in his youth.

It’s ignorant to talk about how the game has always been violent and should be played the way it always has been. The people playing football today are incredibly bigger, stronger and faster than players of the past. Cam Newton is about to begin his professional career at 6’6” 260 lbs. That’s three inches taller and 15 lbs heavier than Jerry Kramer. So what? Cam Newton is a quarterback in 2011. Jerry Kramer was a right guard in 1967. The human body is not meant to withstand the violent impact of crashes with men this fast and strong.

I’ve written about my daughter’s battle with the after effects of her four concussions. I’ve seen the consequences. Three years later and she still isn’t cleared to play “contact sports”. Fortunately today she only suffers from the loss of her softball career. She’s great academically and suffers very few symptoms anymore.  I know you can’t legislate the violence out of football. But let’s make it as safe as it can be made within the context of the game.

Cardinals and Pujols. Can it keep going?

It’s so hard to relate to contracts in sports.  I have a contract but in no way can relate to the contract issues of Albert Pujols.

Albert’s contract expires after this season. There is no question that he is the best player in baseball. But how do you structure his contract? How much longer will he be able to put up the numbers that he has in the past? There is evidence that he is already slowing down. So we look at Alex Rodriguez’ $27 million per and begin there. If Rodriguez gets $27 million than Albert has to get more. Really? Albert is 31… or 33…… or 35, hell no one is really sure.

Reportedly he is asking for 10 years and $300 million total. He thinks that the $30 million per is about right. Wow.  Pujols has about 3-4 years left of big numbers and then they will put him in the lower part of the top ten in the game very quickly. And the Cards would still be on the hook for $30 million per? Ridiculous.

I don’t understand why these players think they should be paid forever for performance in the past.  In baseball the union pushes players to get every penny they can out of every negotiation. They don’t want the bar being lowered. Supposedly they were never happy with Tony Gwynn taking less than he could have gotten if he had left San Diego. Most people forget that Alex Rodriguez agreed to be traded from Texas to Boston before he signed a big free agent contract with the Yankees. The union wouldn’t allow it because he would have actually taken less money than he was being paid at the time by the Rangers.

Just because one team overpays for a player doesn’t mean that every team after that has to use that contract as a benchmark. At some point the demands will be such that there will be no bidders. Orioles’ GM Andy MacPhail put it best when he recently said that it’s a game of musical chairs and at some point the music will stop and some player will not have a seat.

SU struggling. Boeheim was right again.

He’s been saying it all season. At 5-0. At 12-0. At 18-0. At that point, his message was drowned out by the big #3 next to Syracuse in the national rankings. We should have listened to him. After all, his name is on the court.

When it comes to all matters basketball, I will defer to Jim Boeheim. He tried to tell us that his Orange weren’t as good as their record. Clearly at 18-0, he was right. What’s happened since? 2-6 and quite a drop in the rankings. Is it the tougher schedule? I don’t think it’s that simple.

The workings of a team are very intricate. It’s much more complicated than looking at the talent of the players. We hear talk of chemistry and intangibles. Sometimes when a team does better or worse than expected, it’s because the “experts” missed on what should have been expected.  In 1969 the Colts were favored by 17 over the Jets in Super Bowl III. After the Jets won it was clear that they were greatly undervalued by the “experts”. So was it really a big upset? The same with the Jets beating the Patriots in this year’s playoffs. Upon further examination, it looks the Patriots might only have advantage over the Jets at head coach and quarterback.

Trying to evaluate college teams depends on the performance of 19-21 year olds. It’s not just that their play can be inconsistent, it’s also that we’re forecasting on potential more than we are performance. Case in point is SU freshman Fab Melo. He was chosen as Big East pre-season freshman of the year and can barely get off the Orange bench.  

On the court, this year’s Orange were relying on three players new to their situation We just discussed Fab Melo’s struggles. Last year Kris Joseph was national sixth man of the year. While he has had a decent season, he has found out that it’s different when the focus is on you. I’ve watched Brandon Triche since he was in third grade. He has always been a distributor, even though he could have scored virtually at will. This year he is asked to play shooting guard and be a little more selfish. While he is really coming on, there have been times that he has needed to look for his shot a little more.

The bigger issue with this year’s Orange might be what was such a strength of last year’s team. Chemistry and intangibles.  Leadership. Something seems off with this year’s team. From day one they have struggled offensively and now the defense has been porous. Defense is effort and that’s been lacking. We’ve seen issues with Dion Waiters, James Southerland and now Fab Melo as far as losing playing time. Does this year’s team get along as well as last year’s? Having never been in the same room as these guys, I can’t say. But something seems off.

Can this be turned around? Sure. Who knows, the Hall of Famer might just have us all where he wants us.