We in the media — especially those working event broadcasts — have a horrible habit of blindly or wishfully reporting great achievers are additionally blessed: They’re great humans.
Among many others, we did it with Tiger Woods and Lance Armstrong. Last year, we began to do it with Adrian Peterson, before, and then after, he was selected the NFL’s MVP. With every big game — 2,037 running yards worth — the media bloated his profile: There runs Superman, a super guy, too.
“We talked with him after practice, and let me tell you this and that about Adrian Peterson.” “Adrian Peterson still finds time to do charity work in the Twin Cities area.” Blah, blah and blah. Good equals goodness.
Thus it was unsurprising Peterson’s downside went ignored. In 2009, he was busted for driving 109 mph in a 55 mph zone. He dismissed that as no big deal, which was doubly disturbing — his older, full brother was killed by a reckless driver.
Last summer, Peterson was in a club when he and friends were informed that it was closing time, past 2 a.m. Apparently, Peterson and pals felt they would decide when it was time to close. The police report noted three cops were needed to subdue Peterson.
He spent the rest of the night in jail, arrested for resisting arrest (a charge that was later dismissed).
Of course, we all have to operate from are our own set of values, our personal sense of right from wrong. Perhaps, given current standards among NFL players — mostly college men, no less — Peterson qualifies as a man of good character.
Still, I’m stuck with what I’ve got. And it’s sickening the NFL’s latest MVP, hours after his son died — allegedly murdered — declared he was “ready to roll,” ready to play football.
Me? I’d be fighting for breath, my knees weak with grief, demanding to know why, who, how. Then, I suspect, I’d seethe with rage, swearing retribution. I even think I’d take off a day or two from work. Maybe a week.
The suspect in the beating murder of Peterson’s 2-year-old is the boyfriend of Peterson’s “baby mama” — now the casual, flippant, detestable and common buzz-phrase for absentee, wham-bam fatherhood.
The accused, Joseph Patterson, previously was hit with domestic assault and abuse charges.
With his resources, how could Peterson, the NFL’s MVP, have allowed his son to remain in such an environment? Did he not know, or not care? Or not care to know? Or not know to care?
Peterson couldn’t have provided his son a better life, a longer life?
Money can’t buy love, but having signed a $96 million deal, he could not have provided his child — apparently his second from a “baby mama” — a safe home?
But given Peterson’s father did hard time for drug money laundering maybe we’re both stuck with the values in which we were born, raised.
On Friday, Peterson said he was “focused” on football. On Sunday, he played. But it’s not as if murder doesn’t now regularly afflict the NFL.
Maybe Peterson’s son is just one more stands-to-reason murder victim, just another child born to just another “baby mama,” one more kid who never had a shot, anyway. Maybe, by now, even if we can’t accept it, we can expect it.
Jets game shows CBS at worst
Steelers-Jets: A ridiculous world. As Jim Nantz spoke of how Pittsburgh running back Le’Veon Bell missed three games to injury, CBS showed a reel of Bell in needless, head-over-heels showboat leaps into the end zone.
Later, Steelers wide receiver Emmanuel Sanders celebrated his touchdown catch-and-run by somersaulting into the end zone, performing a one-point landing — on the tip of his spine. CBS quickly showed that twice more, once in slo-mo.
Worse, Nantz, Phil Simms and Bill Cowher (the former Steelers coach, pulled from the studio for the day, often was indecipherable as his gruff voice was muffled by crowd noise) did not offer a word of discouragement or caution. Immodesty, at all risk, is good?
And could the three have more softly or briefly spoken Kellen Winslow’s performance-enhancing drugs suspension? He had been the Jets’ leading receiver, yet not a word of condemnation!
In a TV rarity, a stat was debunked using context! After a graphic noted the Steelers were last in the league in offensive starting position, Nantz said that in large part was because its defense had no takeaways.
Line of the Game: After Nantz said Simms’ quarterback son, Matt Simms, made the Jets, but hasn’t yet played, Simms said, “And I will say: He warmed up great, today.”
Broadcast booth “chemistry”? Some chemistry blows up the lab. Other experiments can discover the cure for common boredom. On Islanders’ MSG-telecasts, the Howie Rose/Butch Goring blend is becoming smoother.
On Friday, the Isles’ super-fast Michael Grabner crossed Chicago’s blue line in a bust-out. But suddenly, oddly, he left a drop pass — to Blackhawk Marian Hossa.
“I wonder,” said Rose, “if he [Hossa] wasn’t calling for that.” Goring: “It looked like Hossa was tapping his stick on the ice, and that fooled Grabner.”
Sure did.
ESPN: Making the absurd commonplace
ESPN continues to post the preposterous as well worth our attention.
Saturday, its “Bottom Line repeatedly reported: “Missouri QB James Franklin (separated shoulder) out for regular season after leaving in 4th quarter, according to ESPN and media reports. Injury earlier reported by CBSports.com.”
In other words, in its haste to credit itself, ESPN finished tied for last.
Late in Oklahoma-Texas, the Sooners were going for it, fourth-and-8 and desperate, when ABC/ESPN posted, “OU 4th down conversions, season: 2/3.”
After decades of such absurdities — as if this fourth down had anything to do with others — ESPN is still eager to distract national audiences with stupid info.
Oklahoma was then flagged for delay of game, thus it became fourth-and-13. So what? Oklahoma still was two-for-three on fourth down. Hey, that’s 67 percent!
On Saturday, TBS did a nice job showing dugout reactions throughout the tense Dodgers-Cardinals NLCS Game 2. But the moment the 1-0 game ended — strike-three, swinging! — it cut to a series of crowd shots, including one from a blimp!
What could we see from a blimp?! Thousands and thousands of itty, bitty dots doing “The Shimmy.” Even the guys watching from the blimp expected to see better.