And so, my fellow American morons . . .
These are extraordinary times, when highly paid athletes in big trouble hire legal and media management (public relations) teams to speak for them, to speak as them, only to further solidify the original suspicion that the athlete is in big trouble for good reasons.
Such suspicions are often intensified by “statements” issued by the troubled party’s reps, statements ostensibly quoting the athlete, statements that, remarkably, reveal that athlete to have become, in recent seclusion from familiar media, Winston Churchill, with a drizzle of Albert Schweitzer.
Late last week, Alex Rodriguez’s reps issued a statement quoting him. Buckle up:
“I am deeply troubled by my [legal] team’s investigative findings with respect to MLB’s conduct. How can the gross, ongoing misconduct of the MLB investigations division not be relevant to my suspension, when my suspension supposedly results directly from that division’s work?
“It is sad that Commissioner Selig once again is turning a blind eye, knowing that crimes are being committed under his regime.
“I have 100 percent faith in my legal team. To be sure, this fight is necessary to protect me, but it also serves the interests of the next 18-year-old coming into the league, to be sure he doesn’t step into the house of horrors that I’m being forced to walk through.”
As Red Barber said after the sudden-end of Game 4 of the 1947 World Series, “Well, I’ll be a suck-egg mule!”
Shucks, if Rodriguez were that smooth he wouldn’t need a paid spokesman to quote him. Who knew his altruism, vision and sense of noblesse oblige were so extensive!
How did he ever get past his strong sense of higher purpose and service to the greater good to join Barry Bonds in an autograph session, $7,500 per head to enter?
He’s concerned with the rights of future kid ballplayers being trampled on? You betchya! He’s fighting on their behalf, too!
Stands to reason. After all, during Game 1 of last year’s ALCS he chose to demonstrate his Constitutionally guaranteed right to pursue happiness when he had a ball boy deliver his phone number to two box-seated beauties.
But, hey, these must be both his thoughts and his words. They have to be. His folks released the statement, quotation marks, before and after.
His rep and legal teams believe that you’d believe that he was accurately quoted; those were his words. And you believe that, don’t you? Professionals hired to serve A-Rod’s best interests would never mess with his credibility.
After all, it’s not as if Alex Rodriguez ever before lied to us.
More meaningless talk from Mayock
Navy-Notre Dame on NBC, Saturday. Good game watched under systemic duress:
If there’s any doubt Mike Mayock loves to hear himself talk — that he’s like having all 12 pages of a long-form car lease being read to you — he eliminates all doubts early, often.
Just 2:48 in, after Notre Dame running back George Atkinson broke free for a touchdown, Mayock, who might’ve let the self-evident speak for itself or simply noted that Atkinson’s “very fast,” chose, “Atkinson is one of the fastest football players in all of college football.”
Minutes later, he and play-by-player Dan Hicks chatted about how Navy-Notre Dame, as seen on national TV, annually serves Navy as its greatest recruiting tool. They agreed that it allows recruits to see that Navy can “play with the best.”
OK, but in being recruited to play football for Navy, don’t you also have to agree to, er, ah, enlist in the Navy?
Near the game’s end — ND won it, late, 38-34 — Hicks and Mayock praised coach Brian Kelly for his team’s uncanny ability to pull games out at the end.
But because Notre Dame was a 16-point favorite against Navy, and that this season it was losing late to a dreadful Purdue team, that’s a compliment?
We’ve long figured that TV’s game producers and directors, instead of working from inside a broadcast truck, should be in the press box level, giving their instructions with the game right there, in front of them.
But because that hasn’t happened, a lot depends on luck — and occasionally guys in the booth who get it. Sunday, first quarter of Saints-Jets, FOX analyst John Lynch interrupted himself to say “… as they [the Saints] go no-huddle.”
FOX then quickly cut from a just-got-there close-up of a Jets DB to a standard line-of-scrimmage pre-snap shot. Lynch seemed to have saved the play — or at least the snap — from being lost. It’s the little things!
Mike Francesa, quoting himself, Friday, told Tim McCarver this about McCarver’s Cardinals teams that went to three World Series (1964, ’67, ’68): “I always say, that was a dynasty that went unnoticed.”
It went unnoticed because, as reader Ron Cole was the first to point out, after the ‘64 Series, the Cards finished seventh, then sixth.
College gush-fest for ESPN’s Fowler
ESPN’s fanny-kissing of winning college coaches now seems requisite. Saturday’s “GameDay” included Chris Fowler’s gush-up of Baylor’s Art Briles.
Fowler couldn’t have tossed in a politely asked change-up, perhaps, “Coach, you’re undefeated and averaging 56 points per game. Two weeks ago you were up, 58-0, late against Iowa St. But you kept throwing, running misdirection plays, stopping the clock. Why, at 58-0, were you so eager to make it 64-0?”
Fat chance.
ESPN college football expert Reece Davis, Saturday, hyped ESPN/ABC’s up-next Michigan at Michigan State, “where Michigan hasn’t won since 2007.” Given that they alternate home fields, Davis instead could’ve said that since 2007 Michigan is 1-2 at Michigan State, but ESPN frowns on such context.
So Saints’ tight end Jimmy Graham, though he mightily suffers from a bad foot, Sunday was still able to twice perform his mighty jump/heavy landing slam-dunk over-the-crossbar routine, which FOX dutifully showed — in slow-motion. Makes sense.
Graphics of the Weekend: Saturday, during Virginia Tech-Boston College, ESPN2’s “Bottom Line” displayed an interesting college football score: “1-0.” Runner-up: Channel 4’s news crawl, Sunday morning, repeatedly reported the Rangers lost, 5-1, to Carolina, Saturday night. Rangers won, 5-1.
All of those dropped and tipped passes — one tipped to the Jets — thrown by Drew Brees, Sunday, made no difference. They all counted against his tell-all QB Passer Rating. Nurse!