The United States Little League champions, the team representing Chicago's Jackie Robinson Little League, were stripped of their title earlier today. The league was found to have altered their boarders to include players on the all star team that did not live within the unaltered league boundaries.
I have very strong opinions of very few things. This is one of those things, however.
This news angers me for so many reasons, it's hard to know where to begin.
I suppose the easiest place to start is by simply saying it's anger-inducing because, at the very, very minimum, it disparages the name of a man who did so much for baseball and African Americans in general.
Likewise, it undermines the success, accolades and joy the kids from Jackie Robinson garnered for themselves, their community and for so many people not affiliated in any way with Chicago, Little League or anything else associated with the team.
The message to these kids now is, "hey, remember all that great stuff you accomplished over the summer? Just kidding!" That you would set up a bunch of kids to take a fall like that is inexcusable to me.
Likewise, there were a number of other legitimately constructed teams that lost to this one, missing out on their own story of joy and achievement. True, Robinson might have won anyway, but we'll never know. The underhanded actions of adults robbed the Robinson players of their achievement but also stole the opportunity for the same from numerous other deserving teams.
What angers me the most, however, is what the actions of these deplorable adults have done to youth across Chicago and to the perception of African Americans in baseball.
It's fitting, of course, that the Jackie Robinson players were all black and the team's mere presence in Williamsport was a major milestone that appealed to those wanting a better and brighter future for African Americans in general and, for people like me, grateful that the game is starting to, once again, have an appeal to young, black players.
Prior to Jackie Robinson, of course, Major League Baseball had zero black players. By the time I was a kid, black players were about 25% of the league, compared to just 12% of the country's population. A few years ago, three MLB teams had no black players. Many of the other players of color were Dominican or Cuban, not African American. Historically black colleges, in fact, have started heavily recruiting white players because there simply aren't enough black players to fill every roster.
I was happy, at long last, that young players of color were starting to re-discover the game I love and, more importantly, starting to take advantage of the opportunities afforded to them through the misery endured by people like Jackie Robinson .
More important still, was the fact of what these kids represented to other kids in Chicago just like them. In Chicago, more than maybe any other city in this country, being young and black means your future very certainly involves a prison, a gun or a fatal bullet wound.
The crush of this hopelessness is greater in Chicago than nearly anywhere else in America.
And then these Robinson kids came along and denied all of that. They were able to stand up and show that you can achieve, you can win, you can be a black kid from Chicago and rise above the adversity you face in your daily lives, you can crush the forces pushing you down, earn your way out of Chicago, if only for two weeks in idyllic, rural Pennsylvania, stand shoulder to shoulder with the most talented kids in this country, from Mexico, from Venezuela, from Japan and many other places that routinely turn out top level baseball talent, that you can be from the most difficult of circumstances and still be among the best in the world. They proved that. They made the template for others to follow.
And unthinking, selfish and unscrupulous adults ruined all of that.
As is so often the case, everything great in youth sports was ruined by adults. And what greater crime is there than that?
Selfishness is what it all boils down to. What can I get out of Jackie Robinson's legacy? What can I gain from the success of a pack of 12-year-old kids?
Here's a solution for youth leagues everywhere: put the equipment out on the field and just let the kids play and have fun. Tell the adults to get lost. Kids are fun experts. They don't need adult intervention.
And for the adults, if you really want a trophy that badly, just go to the awards shop and buy one. Or if you don't want to do that, do what these adults did and rob a trophy from someone else.
Wednesday, February 11, 2015
Sunday, February 8, 2015
Mr. Smith goes
I awoke this morning to terrible news. The first piece of information that entered my brain this morning was that former North Carolina basketball coach Dean Smith had died.
I've been a long-time fan of Tar Heel basketball and that love was born within me largely because of my admiration of Dean Smith as a coach. In those early years, I had no idea that I would grow up and coach teams of my own.
Looking back, satisfied that I have done the best I could for my teams and players over the years, I can only be thankful I had Dean Smith as a template. Anyone who knows even a little bit about coach Smith knows his players speak with him with reverence and how they credit him with the positive influence he had on their lives. What many people might not know is that coach Smith had a positive influence on a number of people he never met, myself included.
It was financially inhibiting for me to attend the University of North Carolina, but I have always considered myself part of the Tar Heel family because of the important role coach Smith played in my life. I don't know what kind of weird kid you have to be to have a coach as your sports hero, rather than a player, but I valued everything coach Smith did and everything he represented.
It's easy to say he broke what some thought was an unbreakable wins record, went to a ridiculous number of NCAA tournaments, Final Fours or how he coached Michael Jordan or planted a coaching tree that includes the likes of George Karl, Larry Brown and Roy Williams.
But that's not what I admired about coach Smith. Sure, I like winning, but that's not why coach Smith impacted me so strongly. As a kid, you hear about concepts like class and integrity. You know they are good things but it never settled into my brain fully until I started to learn more and more about coach Smith and his approach to life.
He crafted his life on the foundation of a specific set of ideals, call them values, if you'd like. Here are the things I believe in, that I hold true. Coach Smith allowed those values to shape his actions, never acting in a way that contradicted those values, even if it diminished him in some way--like, he'd never violate one of his values just to land a prized recruit. If it didn't fit his value structure, it didn't fit his life. Period.
I later learned that Aristotle set up this same framework as the only true path to what he called self-mastery, becoming the best human you could possibly be.
Guided by values, coach Smith coached to a process. His wasn't a method of 'here's how we'll win this game,' rather, it was a method of 'here's how we're going to do things.' Coach Smith believed that there was a proper way to do things and that the process of doing things properly was the path to success, that defending the proper way, using the right technique for screens and passes, these things cause defensive stops and rebounds and made shots and those things cause winning.
I've tried, to whatever extent possible, to implement these principles into my own life. I try not to focus on results more than process, I try to value the people in my life as much as I can and as long as I can, and I try to let my own values guide my actions.
I only know how great a man coach Smith is, all these years after being exposed to him for the first time as a 12-year-old, by understanding how difficult it is to remain committed to this approach to life. Cutting corners is easy. Looking for shortcuts is easy. Quitting, after all, requires no effort, literally.
But coach Smith never did things the easy way. Instead, he created his own path, forged a new path for all of us and did things the Carolina Way.
A part of me died on Saturday morning. However, because I was smart enough, or lucky enough, to stitch that part of myself to coach Smith, in some very small way, a part of me will live on forever, as coach Smith will live on in us all.
I've been a long-time fan of Tar Heel basketball and that love was born within me largely because of my admiration of Dean Smith as a coach. In those early years, I had no idea that I would grow up and coach teams of my own.
Looking back, satisfied that I have done the best I could for my teams and players over the years, I can only be thankful I had Dean Smith as a template. Anyone who knows even a little bit about coach Smith knows his players speak with him with reverence and how they credit him with the positive influence he had on their lives. What many people might not know is that coach Smith had a positive influence on a number of people he never met, myself included.
It was financially inhibiting for me to attend the University of North Carolina, but I have always considered myself part of the Tar Heel family because of the important role coach Smith played in my life. I don't know what kind of weird kid you have to be to have a coach as your sports hero, rather than a player, but I valued everything coach Smith did and everything he represented.
It's easy to say he broke what some thought was an unbreakable wins record, went to a ridiculous number of NCAA tournaments, Final Fours or how he coached Michael Jordan or planted a coaching tree that includes the likes of George Karl, Larry Brown and Roy Williams.
But that's not what I admired about coach Smith. Sure, I like winning, but that's not why coach Smith impacted me so strongly. As a kid, you hear about concepts like class and integrity. You know they are good things but it never settled into my brain fully until I started to learn more and more about coach Smith and his approach to life.
He crafted his life on the foundation of a specific set of ideals, call them values, if you'd like. Here are the things I believe in, that I hold true. Coach Smith allowed those values to shape his actions, never acting in a way that contradicted those values, even if it diminished him in some way--like, he'd never violate one of his values just to land a prized recruit. If it didn't fit his value structure, it didn't fit his life. Period.
I later learned that Aristotle set up this same framework as the only true path to what he called self-mastery, becoming the best human you could possibly be.
Guided by values, coach Smith coached to a process. His wasn't a method of 'here's how we'll win this game,' rather, it was a method of 'here's how we're going to do things.' Coach Smith believed that there was a proper way to do things and that the process of doing things properly was the path to success, that defending the proper way, using the right technique for screens and passes, these things cause defensive stops and rebounds and made shots and those things cause winning.
I've tried, to whatever extent possible, to implement these principles into my own life. I try not to focus on results more than process, I try to value the people in my life as much as I can and as long as I can, and I try to let my own values guide my actions.
I only know how great a man coach Smith is, all these years after being exposed to him for the first time as a 12-year-old, by understanding how difficult it is to remain committed to this approach to life. Cutting corners is easy. Looking for shortcuts is easy. Quitting, after all, requires no effort, literally.
But coach Smith never did things the easy way. Instead, he created his own path, forged a new path for all of us and did things the Carolina Way.
A part of me died on Saturday morning. However, because I was smart enough, or lucky enough, to stitch that part of myself to coach Smith, in some very small way, a part of me will live on forever, as coach Smith will live on in us all.
Thursday, January 8, 2015
J'suis Charlie
Whenever there is a tragic event with a large loss of life, it's always horrifying. When a plane goes into the ocean, when a tsunami hits a small island or when gunmen go on a rampage like they did yesterday in Paris, it's always a difficult piece of news to digest.
The shootings yesterday at the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris were particularly troubling for me as a journalist. Journalists can very often be the target of anger and hostilities, which is understandable. Being the targets for violence is not understandable. But this isn't what was so troubling about the news from Paris to me.
The shootings in Paris weren't an attack by the insulted against the insulter, they were an attack on free speech. The purpose of any news product is, in part, to disseminate information. The greater purpose, however, is to provoke thought. The only way news organizations can do this is through protected freedom of speech. The absence of free speech creates room for oppression and tyranny. Think about it like this: as Americans, the very first act we did to push ourselves into independence was to write down our complaints and send them to King George.
Free speech is the foundation of our liberty. The concepts that define us as Americans - liberty, freedom, independence- all stem from free speech. Think of it a different way: Recently, there have been protests across the country against police brutality. What being truly free is about is your ability to protest against the police while being protected by the police. Part of what the police "serve and protect" are the people who distrust or otherwise dislike the police. Certainly it seems unfair from the police perspective, but that whole notion is what freedom is really about. As a journalist, my defense of free speech means I gladly allow your right to write an angry letter calling me the worst person who ever lived. I'm glad people take that measure. I want them to want a voice, to have an opinion. But at the threshold of violence, that right ends.
These killings are personal to me, as a fellow journalist to my colleagues in Paris. They should be personal to you as an American, too. When you try to stop free speech, you're stomping on American ideals. Free speech is independence, it is liberty. Those things can't exist without it.
Certainly I understand that France and the U.S. haven't always had the rosiest of relationships -cite: 'Freedom' fries. But even a superficial examination of American history reveals that the United States isn't what it is without France. The French aided us greatly during the Revolution, they sold us nearly half of our entire country in the Louisiana Purchase and, as a way to thank us for laying out the template for their own Revolution against tyranny, they gifted us the Statue of Liberty, which is, aside from the flag itself, our most visible and enduring symbol of freedom. So journalist or not, freedom fries lover or not, we should never forget that, on par, our relationship with France has been strong and beneficial to both nations. This attack on Parisian soil should be viewed by us the same way an attack in Washington DC, New York or Los Angeles would be viewed.
If ever something good can come from a tragedy like this, it did my heart good to see the response the French had in the wake of the shootings. Throngs of French took to the streets of Paris last night, candles in hand. The movement wasn't necessarily a vigil for those killed. Rather, it was a statement to the gunmen and those like them that the French are not scared, won't be intimidated and will continue to satire what they want, how they want for all of their days to come.
While free speech is the foundation of liberty, the determination to not be bullied, intimidated or silenced in any way is the foundation of free speech. To borrow (with a slight twist) from Martin Luther King, a threat to free speech anywhere is a threat to free speech everywhere.
To put it in a simpler way, the remainder of our rights are pointless without free speech. Our right to bear arms exists as a means of protecting our right to free speech. Other Constitution rights that protect us from the government and its forces, its systems and conventions, afford us fair treatment and equality are all meaningless in a world without free speech. The right to speak out against the empowered is what really keeps you protected; that your voice is the same as mine is real equality; being able to express an opinion in the manner you see fit is the real way you protect yourself from lawless actions of government forces.
So when you think of these attacks in Paris, express yourself. Say something. Do something. Say or do anything. We have in this country the right to remain silent. In this case, don't use it. If we remain silent, then we are all victims of those gunmen.
The shootings yesterday at the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris were particularly troubling for me as a journalist. Journalists can very often be the target of anger and hostilities, which is understandable. Being the targets for violence is not understandable. But this isn't what was so troubling about the news from Paris to me.
The shootings in Paris weren't an attack by the insulted against the insulter, they were an attack on free speech. The purpose of any news product is, in part, to disseminate information. The greater purpose, however, is to provoke thought. The only way news organizations can do this is through protected freedom of speech. The absence of free speech creates room for oppression and tyranny. Think about it like this: as Americans, the very first act we did to push ourselves into independence was to write down our complaints and send them to King George.
Free speech is the foundation of our liberty. The concepts that define us as Americans - liberty, freedom, independence- all stem from free speech. Think of it a different way: Recently, there have been protests across the country against police brutality. What being truly free is about is your ability to protest against the police while being protected by the police. Part of what the police "serve and protect" are the people who distrust or otherwise dislike the police. Certainly it seems unfair from the police perspective, but that whole notion is what freedom is really about. As a journalist, my defense of free speech means I gladly allow your right to write an angry letter calling me the worst person who ever lived. I'm glad people take that measure. I want them to want a voice, to have an opinion. But at the threshold of violence, that right ends.
These killings are personal to me, as a fellow journalist to my colleagues in Paris. They should be personal to you as an American, too. When you try to stop free speech, you're stomping on American ideals. Free speech is independence, it is liberty. Those things can't exist without it.
Certainly I understand that France and the U.S. haven't always had the rosiest of relationships -cite: 'Freedom' fries. But even a superficial examination of American history reveals that the United States isn't what it is without France. The French aided us greatly during the Revolution, they sold us nearly half of our entire country in the Louisiana Purchase and, as a way to thank us for laying out the template for their own Revolution against tyranny, they gifted us the Statue of Liberty, which is, aside from the flag itself, our most visible and enduring symbol of freedom. So journalist or not, freedom fries lover or not, we should never forget that, on par, our relationship with France has been strong and beneficial to both nations. This attack on Parisian soil should be viewed by us the same way an attack in Washington DC, New York or Los Angeles would be viewed.
If ever something good can come from a tragedy like this, it did my heart good to see the response the French had in the wake of the shootings. Throngs of French took to the streets of Paris last night, candles in hand. The movement wasn't necessarily a vigil for those killed. Rather, it was a statement to the gunmen and those like them that the French are not scared, won't be intimidated and will continue to satire what they want, how they want for all of their days to come.
While free speech is the foundation of liberty, the determination to not be bullied, intimidated or silenced in any way is the foundation of free speech. To borrow (with a slight twist) from Martin Luther King, a threat to free speech anywhere is a threat to free speech everywhere.
To put it in a simpler way, the remainder of our rights are pointless without free speech. Our right to bear arms exists as a means of protecting our right to free speech. Other Constitution rights that protect us from the government and its forces, its systems and conventions, afford us fair treatment and equality are all meaningless in a world without free speech. The right to speak out against the empowered is what really keeps you protected; that your voice is the same as mine is real equality; being able to express an opinion in the manner you see fit is the real way you protect yourself from lawless actions of government forces.
So when you think of these attacks in Paris, express yourself. Say something. Do something. Say or do anything. We have in this country the right to remain silent. In this case, don't use it. If we remain silent, then we are all victims of those gunmen.
Tuesday, November 25, 2014
Soccer to me
As an American, I have to admit to only a passing interest in soccer. Like most Americans, my interest peaks during the World Cup and wanes greatly thereafter. However, my American-ness means I am also greatly interested in freedom, liberty and the like. Global events, like the World Cup and the Olympics, allow me to express my love for sports and my passion for the aforementioned American ideals. I am certain I am not alone in this. Americans, as a whole, like to cheer for our teams, be they soccer, hockey, gymnastics or any of various other sports we care about greatly every four years (kinda like our feelings towards elections). We also like to cheer for countries like Iraq, places tormented by war, oppression, terror and whatever else yet resilient enough to place a team on a global stage. These countries, huddled masses expressing their yearning to be free, always seem to hit a soft spot in our hearts.
Consider then, fellow Americans, the venues for the next two Wold Cup tournaments. The 2018 tournament will be held in Russia and the 2022 tournament will be held in Qatar.
First, let's understand the situation in Russia. Russia recently hosted the Olympics. Not long after, they either invaded (depending on whose story you listen to) or greatly assisted with the occupation of a portion of Ukraine.
Unless my global history is incorrect, the only other country to pull off the rare "host the Olympics, invade a neighboring country" feat was Germany in the 1930s...and I understand things went downhill pretty quickly thereafter.
Think about that for a second. The last and only country to do what Russia has recently done was Germany under Hitler. That's like throwing your name right up there with Charles Manson. And what happened to Russia as a result? They get to host the world's largest sporting event. Boy, that's teach them a lesson they'll not soon forget.
Now, FIFA awarded the event to Russia prior to said invasion, but let us not forget that Hitler earned a nomination for the Nobel Prize for Peace, which, in retrospect, seems like a reasonably poor choice.
Still, the situation with Russia is nothing compared to the circumstances surrounding Qatar.
Let's never mind for a minute that half of the eligible FIFA voters selected Qatar as their top choice despite the fact Qatar didn't have, at the time of the vote, so much as a single soccer stadium. Had the Cup been played immediately in Qatar, the event would have come off like a youth soccer event, with games being played whilst fans cheered from their nearby lawn chairs.
Qatar has since made some construction progress, which is where the issues concerning Americans come in. While Russia's freedom and liberty issues are more ambiguous and muddled by geo-political concerns, the freedom issues in Qatar are more literal. Like, literally literal. See, by a number of different accounts, Qatar is making headway towards building a sufficient number of stadiums to host the Cup in 2022 largely through the use of slave labor.
Certainly Egypt established the benefits of using slave labor to pull off large-scale construction projects, but that was several thousand years and an uncertain number of divinely concocted plagues ago. Even the United States changed its tune on slavery some time back.
The allegations of corruption and labor irregularities have been enough to prompt Germany to threaten a boycott of the event. It's a pretty big statement of how bad things are when the current world champions are threatening to boycott an event taking place eight years from now!
Perhaps the Germans have simply gotten wind of the fact that Qatar also plans to ban alcohol consumption. I might guess that Budweiser, one of the Cup's biggest sponsors, would object when the day draws closer. Others might object that Qatar has also suggested that gays will not be tolerated at the event, either--which is where they reach a common ground with Russia, so hey, that's something.
To summarize, for Qatar it's gays not ok, beer not ok, slavery and corruption, just fine.
That said, we as Americans, with our love of sports and liberty, should not stand idle as these injustices to freedom and sport are allowed to carry on unopposed. In this country, you're either for us or you're a'gin us...and if we're not a'gin the Cup being in Russia and Qatar, then we're for their policies of oppression and intimidation. And to me, that's un-American.
Consider then, fellow Americans, the venues for the next two Wold Cup tournaments. The 2018 tournament will be held in Russia and the 2022 tournament will be held in Qatar.
First, let's understand the situation in Russia. Russia recently hosted the Olympics. Not long after, they either invaded (depending on whose story you listen to) or greatly assisted with the occupation of a portion of Ukraine.
Unless my global history is incorrect, the only other country to pull off the rare "host the Olympics, invade a neighboring country" feat was Germany in the 1930s...and I understand things went downhill pretty quickly thereafter.
Think about that for a second. The last and only country to do what Russia has recently done was Germany under Hitler. That's like throwing your name right up there with Charles Manson. And what happened to Russia as a result? They get to host the world's largest sporting event. Boy, that's teach them a lesson they'll not soon forget.
Now, FIFA awarded the event to Russia prior to said invasion, but let us not forget that Hitler earned a nomination for the Nobel Prize for Peace, which, in retrospect, seems like a reasonably poor choice.
Still, the situation with Russia is nothing compared to the circumstances surrounding Qatar.
Let's never mind for a minute that half of the eligible FIFA voters selected Qatar as their top choice despite the fact Qatar didn't have, at the time of the vote, so much as a single soccer stadium. Had the Cup been played immediately in Qatar, the event would have come off like a youth soccer event, with games being played whilst fans cheered from their nearby lawn chairs.
Qatar has since made some construction progress, which is where the issues concerning Americans come in. While Russia's freedom and liberty issues are more ambiguous and muddled by geo-political concerns, the freedom issues in Qatar are more literal. Like, literally literal. See, by a number of different accounts, Qatar is making headway towards building a sufficient number of stadiums to host the Cup in 2022 largely through the use of slave labor.
Certainly Egypt established the benefits of using slave labor to pull off large-scale construction projects, but that was several thousand years and an uncertain number of divinely concocted plagues ago. Even the United States changed its tune on slavery some time back.
The allegations of corruption and labor irregularities have been enough to prompt Germany to threaten a boycott of the event. It's a pretty big statement of how bad things are when the current world champions are threatening to boycott an event taking place eight years from now!
Perhaps the Germans have simply gotten wind of the fact that Qatar also plans to ban alcohol consumption. I might guess that Budweiser, one of the Cup's biggest sponsors, would object when the day draws closer. Others might object that Qatar has also suggested that gays will not be tolerated at the event, either--which is where they reach a common ground with Russia, so hey, that's something.
To summarize, for Qatar it's gays not ok, beer not ok, slavery and corruption, just fine.
That said, we as Americans, with our love of sports and liberty, should not stand idle as these injustices to freedom and sport are allowed to carry on unopposed. In this country, you're either for us or you're a'gin us...and if we're not a'gin the Cup being in Russia and Qatar, then we're for their policies of oppression and intimidation. And to me, that's un-American.
Thursday, November 6, 2014
Designed to Kill
I used to experience something as a sports writer that I've experienced again following the recent World Series victory by the San Francisco Giants.
Often in the world of sports, it's bothersome to people when one team wins so many titles in a short period of time. It's understandable. Everyone wants to win but when one team is doing the lion's share of winning, it becomes annoying for others.
But the experience I'm talking about isn't rooted in that. In fact, I'm not really sure what it's rooted in because I don't understand the logic behind it. That's probably because there is no logic behind it. The idea I'm talking about is one that has been expressed by some in baseball and by a few sports writers around the country, which is the notion that the best team didn't win the World Series this year. Sometimes I'd hear fans express the same thing at games I covered. The best team didn't win. Further, the idea, as it relates specifically to the World Series this season, doesn't apply to the San Francisco Giants alone. The reason this idea has gained any traction at all is people seem to think it's true even if the Royals had won the World Series. The Giants and Royals, after all, were wild card teams and, thus, barely got into the playoffs to begin with.
So is it true? Did the best team win the World Series? The simple answer is yes. And here's how I know: the best team always wins the World Series...or the Super Bowl or any other game in question. Figuring out which team is better is 100% of the reason games are played. People can throw all the "yeah, but..." scenarios they want to at the question, the answer remains the same. The best team always wins.
But look at the ERA or the batting average, but what about the home runs or the...
It's meaningless. Statistics only tell you what has happened, not what will happen. Fantasy sports are just that, a fantasy. Who has the best this, that or anything else is irrelevant in the real world. The Giants faced more "no team has done (X) since..." scenarios than I can remember. But they did it this year. The only stat that matters and the only one that ever, ever matters is the final score. Oh, but think of all the breaks, the lucky bounces, the bloopers, the walks, the errors by the other team. OK. Think about it. And think about fumbles and penalties and injuries and technical fouls and muscle cramps. Think about all of it, because it's all part of the game and it all counts. The Royals were nearly eliminated in the wild card game. Nearly...but they weren't.
And that's the whole point. Championships aren't the ascension of the great over mediocrity through the will, desire and effort of individual components. Championships are now, have always been and always will be about perseverance and survival.
The regular season is about reaching the playoffs. Once a team gets to the playoffs, they are destined to lose their final game of the year. Only one team will win their final game of the season. Only one team survives the injuries, the mistakes, the success of the other team, bad calls, bad weather, bad breaks. Only one team survives it all. How in the world could you not consider any team that lives through a process designed to kill all anything other than a champion?
Every team starts in the same spot. They all follow their own path throughout the season. Most fail. Some reach the playoffs and the one that do earned it, whether they are a wild card, went 7-9 in a weak division or stumbled backwards into the post season, some how, some way, they earned their spot. From there, the champion obeys the one and only rule: don't die. And when there is one and only one survivor left, what is the point of measuring how they were able to live? They won. That's how they lived. Everything else is meaningless.
Often in the world of sports, it's bothersome to people when one team wins so many titles in a short period of time. It's understandable. Everyone wants to win but when one team is doing the lion's share of winning, it becomes annoying for others.
But the experience I'm talking about isn't rooted in that. In fact, I'm not really sure what it's rooted in because I don't understand the logic behind it. That's probably because there is no logic behind it. The idea I'm talking about is one that has been expressed by some in baseball and by a few sports writers around the country, which is the notion that the best team didn't win the World Series this year. Sometimes I'd hear fans express the same thing at games I covered. The best team didn't win. Further, the idea, as it relates specifically to the World Series this season, doesn't apply to the San Francisco Giants alone. The reason this idea has gained any traction at all is people seem to think it's true even if the Royals had won the World Series. The Giants and Royals, after all, were wild card teams and, thus, barely got into the playoffs to begin with.
So is it true? Did the best team win the World Series? The simple answer is yes. And here's how I know: the best team always wins the World Series...or the Super Bowl or any other game in question. Figuring out which team is better is 100% of the reason games are played. People can throw all the "yeah, but..." scenarios they want to at the question, the answer remains the same. The best team always wins.
But look at the ERA or the batting average, but what about the home runs or the...
It's meaningless. Statistics only tell you what has happened, not what will happen. Fantasy sports are just that, a fantasy. Who has the best this, that or anything else is irrelevant in the real world. The Giants faced more "no team has done (X) since..." scenarios than I can remember. But they did it this year. The only stat that matters and the only one that ever, ever matters is the final score. Oh, but think of all the breaks, the lucky bounces, the bloopers, the walks, the errors by the other team. OK. Think about it. And think about fumbles and penalties and injuries and technical fouls and muscle cramps. Think about all of it, because it's all part of the game and it all counts. The Royals were nearly eliminated in the wild card game. Nearly...but they weren't.
And that's the whole point. Championships aren't the ascension of the great over mediocrity through the will, desire and effort of individual components. Championships are now, have always been and always will be about perseverance and survival.
The regular season is about reaching the playoffs. Once a team gets to the playoffs, they are destined to lose their final game of the year. Only one team will win their final game of the season. Only one team survives the injuries, the mistakes, the success of the other team, bad calls, bad weather, bad breaks. Only one team survives it all. How in the world could you not consider any team that lives through a process designed to kill all anything other than a champion?
Every team starts in the same spot. They all follow their own path throughout the season. Most fail. Some reach the playoffs and the one that do earned it, whether they are a wild card, went 7-9 in a weak division or stumbled backwards into the post season, some how, some way, they earned their spot. From there, the champion obeys the one and only rule: don't die. And when there is one and only one survivor left, what is the point of measuring how they were able to live? They won. That's how they lived. Everything else is meaningless.
Sunday, October 19, 2014
5 More Sports Things That Need to Change
I've had an aggravating week in sports and I've compiled a short list of things that would ease that aggravation if they went away.
1. Seeing Red: Like many people, I watched the Notre Dame/Florida State football game this weekend. Like so few things in life, it promised one thing and then actually delivered on that thing. Of course, I couldn't help but notice the Florida State fans and their incessant "Chop" chant. The Atlanta Braves fans do the same thing and each group swears the other stole it. I have just a small issue with the "Chop" (as pictured):
As a self-described "White Man," I find it painful, on behalf of Native Americans, to watch a crowd of mostly white folks swing their arms, or better yet, foam Tomahawks, whilst some decidedly inauthentic "Native" music plays in an effort to conjure some unjustified help from Cree or something to that effect. The "white people got a lotta nerve" element isn't what bothers me most about the Chop. What bothers me most is that there is an outrage over the name Washington Redskins whilst the Chop gets a free ride. Can we either decide that none of this stuff proper and stop doing all of it or stop pretending that we have some sort of moral compass that guides our interactions with Native peoples, concede that we have no respect for them as people, their traditions and cultures and move on?
By the by, as a person of Irish decent, I said nothing about Notre Dame being "the Irish"or the multitude of other Irish-related mascots of other schools. So if we're having the discussion, let's not leave groups out, OK?
2. Running Interference: Will the NFL finally just come out and admit that nobody associated with the league knows what pass interference is? Normally, I might be upset that the call was made against my team in some way. My point here, however, is the rule doesn't seem to be enforced consistently. Different officiating crews seem to have ranging interpretations of the rule. I suspect this is because pass interference is unbelievably vague. Good rules are unambiguous. If the ball hits on this side of the line, it's foul; it it hits the line or on that side, it's fair. Brilliant rule. With pass interference we go from "well, he did make contact" to "that's just two guys playing football right there" from play to play. Here's a challenge: find 10 people working in the NFL-coach, player, official, league admin.-and have them define, in as much detail as possible, what pass interference is. My guarantee is you get 10 different answers. That is the very definition of a horrible rule. Yet, how can a rule that has such an affect on the outcomes of games be one of the worst rules in your sport?
3. Zoning Out: This next thing isn't a problem in the same way the previous two are, it's just something that drives me crazy when I see it. Football teams can play two types of pass defense-zone and man-to-man. Man-to-man is easy to understand. This specific guy right here is the guy you are responsible for. You follow him everywhere and don't let him catch the ball. Zone, as the name implies, divides the field up into defensible areas, with each player responsible for a different zone. But please tell the defensive coaches in your life to coach defense the following way, as doing so will prevent me from wanting to throw a book through my TV scree: Think of a zone defense like a house. Each defender is responsible for a different room. One guy takes the living room, the other the kitchen, another the bedroom. Simple to understand. However, the message on the next step isn't getting through, as evidenced by the awful pass defense being played around this country in high school, college and the NFL. While you might be responsible for, say, the kitchen, your job as a defender isn't to guard the kitchen. Your job is to play man-to-man against anyone in the kitchen. You don't defend the sink, you defend the dude near the fridge. If he moves from the kitchen to the living room, he's not your man anymore and you let him go. IF there is nobody in the kitchen nor likely to be anyone in the kitchen BUT there is someone in the unguarded, adjoining dining room, THEN DEFEND THAT GUY! A zone has never caught a pass in the history of football. Air is the worst receiver in the last 100 years of the game. Receivers catch passes. Receivers need to be defended. Standing three yards away from a guy isn't defense, it's spectating. Here's some basic math: There are 11 dudes on offense or defense. Most teams have four guys rush the passer, maybe five. That leaves six pass defenders. The offense has five linemen and a quarterback. They can have a MAXIMUM of five receivers on any given play. So right now, as you're asking "but what if one zone has two guys in it," understand the math. One zone has two guys, one is empty. Empty zone guy, go help out. Pass defenders defend receivers, zone or not. Poached and scrambled aren't two different things, they different types of the same thing. It's not these "potent, high-powered" offenses that are taking over, it's shoddy defense.
4. Design flaw: OK, look...I'm all for being progressive and pushing things forward. But, uh...that's quite enough from the uniform designers for college football teams. It's one thing to have a different set of uniforms for each game, never wearing the same pattern of colors for two games in a row. There comes a point, however, when a thing gets taken too far. It's been taken too far. We gotta reel it back in.
For starters, chrome isn't a friggin' color. Unless you're designing a hot rod, chrome isn't for you.
1. Seeing Red: Like many people, I watched the Notre Dame/Florida State football game this weekend. Like so few things in life, it promised one thing and then actually delivered on that thing. Of course, I couldn't help but notice the Florida State fans and their incessant "Chop" chant. The Atlanta Braves fans do the same thing and each group swears the other stole it. I have just a small issue with the "Chop" (as pictured):
By the by, as a person of Irish decent, I said nothing about Notre Dame being "the Irish"or the multitude of other Irish-related mascots of other schools. So if we're having the discussion, let's not leave groups out, OK?
2. Running Interference: Will the NFL finally just come out and admit that nobody associated with the league knows what pass interference is? Normally, I might be upset that the call was made against my team in some way. My point here, however, is the rule doesn't seem to be enforced consistently. Different officiating crews seem to have ranging interpretations of the rule. I suspect this is because pass interference is unbelievably vague. Good rules are unambiguous. If the ball hits on this side of the line, it's foul; it it hits the line or on that side, it's fair. Brilliant rule. With pass interference we go from "well, he did make contact" to "that's just two guys playing football right there" from play to play. Here's a challenge: find 10 people working in the NFL-coach, player, official, league admin.-and have them define, in as much detail as possible, what pass interference is. My guarantee is you get 10 different answers. That is the very definition of a horrible rule. Yet, how can a rule that has such an affect on the outcomes of games be one of the worst rules in your sport?
3. Zoning Out: This next thing isn't a problem in the same way the previous two are, it's just something that drives me crazy when I see it. Football teams can play two types of pass defense-zone and man-to-man. Man-to-man is easy to understand. This specific guy right here is the guy you are responsible for. You follow him everywhere and don't let him catch the ball. Zone, as the name implies, divides the field up into defensible areas, with each player responsible for a different zone. But please tell the defensive coaches in your life to coach defense the following way, as doing so will prevent me from wanting to throw a book through my TV scree: Think of a zone defense like a house. Each defender is responsible for a different room. One guy takes the living room, the other the kitchen, another the bedroom. Simple to understand. However, the message on the next step isn't getting through, as evidenced by the awful pass defense being played around this country in high school, college and the NFL. While you might be responsible for, say, the kitchen, your job as a defender isn't to guard the kitchen. Your job is to play man-to-man against anyone in the kitchen. You don't defend the sink, you defend the dude near the fridge. If he moves from the kitchen to the living room, he's not your man anymore and you let him go. IF there is nobody in the kitchen nor likely to be anyone in the kitchen BUT there is someone in the unguarded, adjoining dining room, THEN DEFEND THAT GUY! A zone has never caught a pass in the history of football. Air is the worst receiver in the last 100 years of the game. Receivers catch passes. Receivers need to be defended. Standing three yards away from a guy isn't defense, it's spectating. Here's some basic math: There are 11 dudes on offense or defense. Most teams have four guys rush the passer, maybe five. That leaves six pass defenders. The offense has five linemen and a quarterback. They can have a MAXIMUM of five receivers on any given play. So right now, as you're asking "but what if one zone has two guys in it," understand the math. One zone has two guys, one is empty. Empty zone guy, go help out. Pass defenders defend receivers, zone or not. Poached and scrambled aren't two different things, they different types of the same thing. It's not these "potent, high-powered" offenses that are taking over, it's shoddy defense.
4. Design flaw: OK, look...I'm all for being progressive and pushing things forward. But, uh...that's quite enough from the uniform designers for college football teams. It's one thing to have a different set of uniforms for each game, never wearing the same pattern of colors for two games in a row. There comes a point, however, when a thing gets taken too far. It's been taken too far. We gotta reel it back in.
For starters, chrome isn't a friggin' color. Unless you're designing a hot rod, chrome isn't for you.
A lot of teams have this type of helmet now and it looks...what's the word I'm looking for here...ridiculous? Stupid? Like you pulled up to the game on a bus with spinning rims?
More significantly than that is this, uniform designers: generally, highlighter is used to draw attention to text, not as a color on your palette. What in the world about these uniforms made you think, yeah, that's what I bring to the table...
And football is supposed to be an exercise in toughness, grit, determination and sheer, old-fashioned manliness. Highlighters? These guys don't look like football players, they look like their trying to get home to see Miami Vice.
5. Two and oh no! Finally, I think it should be mandatory to immediately cut baseball players and ban them from the game for life for swinging at 2-0 pitches and not getting a hit. It has happened throughout my life but there seems to be a flat out epidemic going on in MLB right now. A 2-0 count is the first time in an at-bat when a hitter needs fewer balls to walk than he needs strikes to get out. Why does the 3-0 mentality seem to be, "hmm, one more ball and I walk, lemme take this one and see what happens," whereas the mentality in a 2-0 count is, "hmm, it's a hitter's count, I'm a hitter, better swing at this one!" Sure. Swing at it, if it's the exact, perfect pitch you want and not, say, a slider away, a curve ball in the dirt or a fastball across the shoulders. See, here's a baseball secret: if you take a 2-0 pitch and it's called a strike...you're STILL ahead in the count!! If you want to be a great hitter, you have to hit pitches that aren't where the pitcher wants them to be, i.e., a mistake. If you get a 2-0 mistake, swing. If not, don't. Worst case, you fall to 2-1 and you have at least two more chances for a mistake to come your way. Or maybe hitters should just start wearing chrome batting helmets to blind the pitchers. Either tactic will be successful, I think.
Sunday, October 12, 2014
Pink Pander
I've been noticing a lot of football teams wearing pink this month. October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and the pink-clad football players are just a piece of the pink tidal wave spilling across the country. I've known far more women who have been stricken by breast cancer than I'd like to, so any effort to raise awareness about breast cancer, early detection and fund research is appreciated.
But all this pink is troubling. If we cared as much about breast cancer as the abundance of pink products would suggest, breast cancer would have been eradicated ten times over years ago. But it hasn't been and the amount of products with pink ribbons on them increases year after year.
That leads me to a concept initiated by Breast Cancer Action they dubbed, "pink washing." Perhaps you've heard of white washing as it relates to Tom Sawyer? Pink washing is the same idea, splashing pink on products during October for the purposes of...well, that's just it. The purposes aren't always clear. Breast Cancer Action's "Think Before You Pink" campaign attempts to drive this point across.
The NFL, for instance, sells many of the pink-laced items online and donates the money to breast cancer research. Most of these pink-laden products promise the same and certainly money is raised and donated. Most people, like me and my family, like to do what we can to support breast cancer advocacy. Research in the past, after all, helped save the lives of some people we love. We'd like to think we're helping, in some small way, save the lives of many others in years to come. I have to believe we're not alone in that thought. And so we happily buy these pink products. And, in kind, companies donate some of the revenue to breast cancer research and advocacy groups. But how much? Some. Like roughly? A portion.
If I broke off a tiny crumb of a chocolate chip cookie and gave you the bulk of the cookie, that's a portion. But so is just a single chocolate chip. I can imagine which portion you might prefer.
Sure, every little bit helps, but does it seem appropriate that companies put these pink ribbons on their products, encourage consumers to buy them to support breast cancer causes and then take the bulk of the cookie and leave advocacy groups with mere crumbs?
So where does that leave consumers? Unfortunately, if consumers are serious about their desire to help eradicate breast cancer, they have to do a little work. Responsible companies--and there are some--will be able to easily answer some basic questions. First and most obvious is, what is the exact portion of the "portion of proceeds" that goes towards the breast cancer fight? A company that donates crumbs instead of cookies probably isn't worth your time. Next is which organizations get these proceeds and what do they do with the money once they get it? It's important to be certain your consumer dollars are being put towards maximum affect. New office chairs don't do a lot to save lives for cancer victims. Lastly, is there a cap on the funds available. This is mind-boggling for some people to even think about but it's a pretty common practice for corporate "philanthropy." There is a program with a local baseball team, for instance, where a credit card company donates a certain amount of money to a selected cause for each home run the team hits. If you read the fine print, the really, really, really fine print, they say their maximum donation is $50,000. That's still a nice sum of money. However, while there is still a benefit and motivation for a team to hit more than 50 grand-worth of home runs, money spent on pink products once a cap has been reached is literally doing cancer patients no good. Further, there is frequently no means (or effort) to inform the public once a predetermined cap has been reached. There are no drum rolls and tote board numbers tumbling once consumers have bought a million bucks-worth of yogurt.
There are other things you can do as a consumer to ensure your purchases are having the impact you intend, but these three simple questions are a good place to start.
I'm grateful my loved ones who survived breast cancer are still here to enjoy life. The money raised in the past and the research that resulted is something I'm endlessly thankful for. And for whatever small benefit seeing my favorite football team dressed in pink has, I'm happy for that, as well.
Equally, I'm thankful and hopeful for future generations of people who can tell their own survival stories or, better yet, won't develop those stories to begin with. It's just a shame, amid all of these pink products, if the only thing a glut of yogurt purchases gets me is improved calcium levels and nothing else.
But all this pink is troubling. If we cared as much about breast cancer as the abundance of pink products would suggest, breast cancer would have been eradicated ten times over years ago. But it hasn't been and the amount of products with pink ribbons on them increases year after year.
That leads me to a concept initiated by Breast Cancer Action they dubbed, "pink washing." Perhaps you've heard of white washing as it relates to Tom Sawyer? Pink washing is the same idea, splashing pink on products during October for the purposes of...well, that's just it. The purposes aren't always clear. Breast Cancer Action's "Think Before You Pink" campaign attempts to drive this point across.
The NFL, for instance, sells many of the pink-laced items online and donates the money to breast cancer research. Most of these pink-laden products promise the same and certainly money is raised and donated. Most people, like me and my family, like to do what we can to support breast cancer advocacy. Research in the past, after all, helped save the lives of some people we love. We'd like to think we're helping, in some small way, save the lives of many others in years to come. I have to believe we're not alone in that thought. And so we happily buy these pink products. And, in kind, companies donate some of the revenue to breast cancer research and advocacy groups. But how much? Some. Like roughly? A portion.
If I broke off a tiny crumb of a chocolate chip cookie and gave you the bulk of the cookie, that's a portion. But so is just a single chocolate chip. I can imagine which portion you might prefer.
Sure, every little bit helps, but does it seem appropriate that companies put these pink ribbons on their products, encourage consumers to buy them to support breast cancer causes and then take the bulk of the cookie and leave advocacy groups with mere crumbs?
So where does that leave consumers? Unfortunately, if consumers are serious about their desire to help eradicate breast cancer, they have to do a little work. Responsible companies--and there are some--will be able to easily answer some basic questions. First and most obvious is, what is the exact portion of the "portion of proceeds" that goes towards the breast cancer fight? A company that donates crumbs instead of cookies probably isn't worth your time. Next is which organizations get these proceeds and what do they do with the money once they get it? It's important to be certain your consumer dollars are being put towards maximum affect. New office chairs don't do a lot to save lives for cancer victims. Lastly, is there a cap on the funds available. This is mind-boggling for some people to even think about but it's a pretty common practice for corporate "philanthropy." There is a program with a local baseball team, for instance, where a credit card company donates a certain amount of money to a selected cause for each home run the team hits. If you read the fine print, the really, really, really fine print, they say their maximum donation is $50,000. That's still a nice sum of money. However, while there is still a benefit and motivation for a team to hit more than 50 grand-worth of home runs, money spent on pink products once a cap has been reached is literally doing cancer patients no good. Further, there is frequently no means (or effort) to inform the public once a predetermined cap has been reached. There are no drum rolls and tote board numbers tumbling once consumers have bought a million bucks-worth of yogurt.
There are other things you can do as a consumer to ensure your purchases are having the impact you intend, but these three simple questions are a good place to start.
I'm grateful my loved ones who survived breast cancer are still here to enjoy life. The money raised in the past and the research that resulted is something I'm endlessly thankful for. And for whatever small benefit seeing my favorite football team dressed in pink has, I'm happy for that, as well.
Equally, I'm thankful and hopeful for future generations of people who can tell their own survival stories or, better yet, won't develop those stories to begin with. It's just a shame, amid all of these pink products, if the only thing a glut of yogurt purchases gets me is improved calcium levels and nothing else.
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