The amount of media coverage for the Kobe Bryant hearing yesterday – did it actually last for all of 10 minutes? – was bordering on obscene. Here is an angle that all of these reporters have not yet focused on. How much money will Playboy offer to pay the jurors to pose nude for the magazine? I haven't heard that aspect of the case discussed yet. But I am a patient man…
I have only one comment on the hiring of Rush Limbaugh to be part of the MNF announcing team. ABC tried Dennis Miller and it did not work out. Dennis Miller is a genuinely funny man but he just never found his niche on MNF. So the hiring of Rush Limbaugh makes good sense because whatever you want to say about Limbaugh on the radio, he is definitely not a "genuinely funny man". So it just might work. Yeah, right…
It had to happen. The AP reports that scientists in Italy report that they have cloned the world's first horse. It is a "small, sturdy work horse" and it is now two months old. The thoroughbred industry is checking this out carefully considering the implications of cloning a champion such as Secretariat or Forego or Cigar. Imagine if someone mixed up the samples and cloned another Zippy Chippy? What's even scarier is that this means that the world is even closer to the possibility of cloning Anna Nicole Smith. [shudder]
This is a bad time for women's professional sports. The economics just aren't working out despite all of the feelgood journalistic support that they have gotten over the past decade or so. The women's pro bowling tour has suspended operations. It drew TV ratings less than 1.0 and folded. The WNBA is flirting with ratings numbers in that range and would fold in a heartbeat without the financial and promotional support of – and the negotiation leverage provided by – the NBA. The women's American Basketball League dried up and blew away years ago. Women's pro softball and women's pro football remain curiosity attractions and not economic engines. And now the word is that the WUSA – the league that was sure to flourish because of all the young girls who play youth soccer in the US and would want to be like the American Women's World Cup Champions – is close to ceasing operations. The league will get a bounce from the Women's World Cup Games held here this year - after the Chinese had to give them up during the SARS scare. Nonetheless, the WUSA is on life support.
At least two major sponsors of the WUSA – AOL/Time Warner and Comcast – are re-evaluating their partnerships with the league. Translation: there is at least an 80% chance they will pull out. And that would doom the WUSA. There just does not seem to be a viable business model for a nationwide professional sports league that will draw something like 6,500 people to a game and earn less money from its TV and radio deals than it takes to mow the grass on the fields. Most teams use volunteers to work at games and to sell tickets; players and coaches around the league have taken pay cuts; teams are still losing money. The message is pretty clear. It sounds good to say that all of these girls playing youth soccer form a large and loyal fan base that will prop up a league for years to come. Problem is that it just doesn't work. Funny thing about reality; it does not read the papers and go along blindly and in lockstep with all the puff pieces that get written about this kind of stuff.
Women's tennis is a financially solid enterprise. The LPGA is solid this year given the attractions generated by Annika Sorenstam, Suzy Whaley and Michelle Wie. Other than women's tennis and women's pro golf…
Speaking of Annika Sorenstam, those wacky folks at PETA have approached her and asked her to take a stand in favor of the oppressed and disrespected chickens and to talk to the folks at KFC – who use Annika as a spokesperson – to arrange for more humane living conditions for the birdies. The last person they convinced to do this was Jason Alexander who was told – ever so politely by KFC – to take his commentary and his advocacy and stuff it in a flat hat. Alexander is no longer in the employ of KFC. Presumably, Ms. Sorenstam has had the good sense to "go to school" on his misfortune and will tell the PETA people to think about this more clearly. The chickens are going to be killed and cooked by KFC; then people are going to eat them. Worrying about their dignity and living conditions when this is their eventual outcome is like worrying about whether the string quartet should play Mozart or Schubert in its second set of the evening on the Titanic.
Yesterday I alluded to the nonsensical involvement levels of skating parents. Well, there is a story out of Paris that makes skating parents seem laid back. A French tennis parent was reported by the BBC to have been arrested on suspicion of administering an anti-anxiety drug to at least three players who were tournament opponents of his 15-year old son. He allegedly did this by spiking their drinking water. One of the opponents, a 25 year old man who was a school teacher, fell asleep at the wheel and was killed while driving home from the match – after he had to retire in the match because he said he was too tired to continue. If any of this is true, this man deserves to go into the Parental Hall of Shame without the obligatory five-year waiting period.
Speaking of parents who should be in the Hall of Shame, the Chicago father who joined his son in the attack on the KC Royals first base coach in whatever they call Commiskey Park these days was sentenced to probation yesterday. This guy needs some time in the Crossbars Hilton trying to explain to his cellmate "Tiny" just why he thought it was a good idea to lead his son onto the field for this attack. Presumably, "Tiny" could then explain to him the social order of prison life and since "Tiny" would – hopefully - be someone who is 6'5" tall and weighs 310 lbs.
Yesterday, I mentioned some of the large NFL linemen who are trying to get ready for the season. I forgot to tell you that Aaron Gibson – who bombed out with the Lions and Cowboys – is back for another shot as an OT with the Bears. The Bears' website says he weighs 390 lbs; I suspect that he is at least 20 or 30 lbs over that number because he played at 390 in college and bulked up from there. You can believe it if someone tells you that he was timed at 5.1 in the 40-yard dash. Just remember that is 5.1 days…
Bernie Lincicome must have been in a grouchy mood on 6 August because his column in the Rocky Mountain News was filled with short commentaries that were really snarky. Here are a few examples:
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"Second-choice point guard, Andre Miller, will be as useful to the Nuggets as a birdbath is to a warthog."
"As the savior of the Nuggets, Carmelo Anthony is a cubic zirconia in the rough."
"Before every Rockies game, someone ought to go through the opposing dugout and take up a collection for José Jimenez's cab fare to the game."
"So the first question to ask Kobe Bryant is, how's the knee?"
But don't get me wrong, I love sports...
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