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What is wrong with sports these days?
We have fans fighting with players and players fighting with fans. All sorts of drug use, both performance enhancing and recreational is out of control. There are murders, accomplices to murders, double murders. I see rape, thievery, ramped amounts of unsportsmanlike conduct and cheating. The word quagmire has been thrown around a lot lately. Forget Iraq, we have our own right here at home.
I grew up in the 80’s, and similar to every other rambunctious young country boy, I followed sports religiously. When I was idealizing Joe Montana, Nolan Ryan and Michael Jordan, my parents never had to worry about me acquiring imitative bad habits. Forget about fighting, unlawful actions and suspensions, when we watched a game everyone was eligible, sober, and respectful, teaching us how to play hard, fair, and conduct ourselves honorably. The worst thing I ever witnessed was Darryl Strawberry’s rapid drug induced decline from baseball which clearly illustrated how not to act.
Today’s athletes do not teach our kids what honor is, or how to conduct themselves respectively on the field of play. Instead, we see increasingly egregious behavior rewarded with larger contracts. What does this teach our children? That cheating and lying is alright if you put fans in the stands?
Lets deal with a few specifics. What Sammy Sosa did was completely inexcusable. If Bud Selig was replaced with Chris Papst, Mr. Sosa would never play again, and his records would be erased. The same applies to Ron Artest and the rest of his sparing partners, the only difference here is that these gentlemen would also enjoy a few months in the lavish Hotel State Pen. Ray Lewis, Jamal Lewis, Ricky Williams are gone. Roberto Alomar, both Clemson and South Carolina, Joey Porter and William Green will be taking long vacations.
What about Barry Bonds, Mark McGuire, Jose Canseco, Jason Giambi and the other 90% of baseball players who juice? Technically, specific to baseball they did nothing wrong. Baseball has not outlawed steroids, but the Feds have. Under the Anabolic Steroids Control Act of 1990, steroids are in the same legal class as barbiturates, LSD, veterinary tranquilizers like ketamine and narcotic painkillers like Vicodin. Simple possession is a federal offense punishable by up to one year in prison and/or a minimum fine of $1,000, and most states have added anabolic steroids to their list of controlled substances. The intent to sell can get you a sentence of up to 7 years in prison, depending on the state.
Nothing is going to change with baseball unless we make it happen. Everywhere Bonds goes sells out, and Bud Selig will do nothing to jeopardize MLB’s profits. Secondly, don’t worry about the records. Records are stupid. The game has evolved so much that you can not compare today’s technological marvels and short porches to yesterday’s hard working farm boys and open outfields. We need to focus on what is wrong and what is right, not who is breaking whose records.
The severity of all this lies in the following; if I fail a drug test, get arrested, or start a fight with a customer or co-worker I immediately become unemployed. Why is it different for athletes? Why can they do whatever they want and get endless chances to correct it? And, most importantly; what are the lessons our kids are learning? Most of them will not be professional athletes, and they have to learn that this type of behavior is completely unacceptable.
Finally, who is to blame for this chaos? We are. We are the customers and therefore, we make the decisions with our dollars. If we don’t like the car, we don’t buy it. If we don’t buy it, it gets modified to our liking. Nothing will ever be revamped if the money continues to pour into Bud Selig’s bank account. The same applies to David Stern, Paul Tagliabue and who ever else hands down the punishments, retains order, and upholds justice in the world of athletics.
What is wrong with sports these days? A lot, and just like everything else in this country, the burden to correct it falls upon us. I won’t go to a baseball game anymore. Will you?
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