I am a huge sports fan. I’ll watch just about any sport on television. I will watch basketball, baseball, football, golf, tennis, the major horse races, etc. I will watch just about any event when the Olympics are happening. I’ll give just about any sport a try in my personal life as well. I don’t watch any television shows at all. I do, however, watch a ridiculous amount of sports. I have programmed my remote control to turn on ESPN when the TV, receiver, etc. is powered on. I look at current stats, historical stats, standings, etc. I am addicted to sports.
This past week I was talking to some friends and we were talking about how depressing sports is now. If you looked at www.espn.com a few days ago the headlines would read:
1. Tim Donaghy fixing games as an NBA official (http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?page=expertexplainsNBAbets)
2. Barry Bonds is about to break one of the most unreachable records in all of sports, but is clearly marked as a product of steroids (http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=2948334&name=olney_buster&action=login&appRedirect=http%3a%2f%2finsider.espn.go.com%2fespn%2fblog%2findex%3fentryID%3d2948334%26name%3dolney_buster)
3. Mike Coolbaugh died after being hit by a line drive while coaching first base with his two kids and pregnant wife at home (http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=2948334&name=olney_buster&action=login&appRedirect=http%3a%2f%2finsider.espn.go.com%2fespn%2fblog%2findex%3fentryID%3d2948334%26name%3dolney_buster)
4. Michael Vick going to court for allegedly being the ring leader of a dog fighting ring (http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/columns/story?columnist=munson_lester&id=2950481)
5. The Tour de France is in the middle of more doping scandals (http://sports.espn.go.com/oly/tdf2007/columns/story?id=2949477)
If you were a parent and your child wanted to idolize an athlete or simply buy a poster or them to put on their wall or buy their jersey to wear in the backyard game was football or baseball or basketball, wouldn’t you have to do some research on that individual before you allowed your child to grab hold of that athlete? Michael Vick is an exciting player to watch on a football field. If I had kids, I would not want them wearing a Falcons #7 jersey. I suppose times change with the generations and we are forced to adapt. I remember my parents screening the movies we watched or tapes we wanted to buy. Today I guess along with movies and CDs, parents also have to monitor internet usage and the athletes their kids want to follow.
Beyond the athletes, it is just a depressing time in sports. Fixing NBA games challenges the integrity of all sports. Most depressing of all is the young coach dying on a freak accident. A husband with two young children and another on the way.
This is terribly depressing as a sports fan. I long for lead stories to be of players getting better and hitting game-winning homeruns in a critical game during the pennant race.
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