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One of the problems with TV’s oh-so-hip propensity to hire the bad boys is they become the gifts who keep on giving. These same, er, sportsmen, are asked to deliver their opinions on issues of the day, thus those opinions tend to skew in favor of current bad boys.
In other words, sports, both the ideal and the reality, become the victim that keeps taking a beating.
FOX last week let it be known that longtime analyst Jimmy Johnson disagreed with the NFL’s decision to punish the Saints for its three-year cash-for-carnage bounty system, essentially a form of violent, organized crime.
“I’m shocked,” Johnson said in a FOX press release. “It’s too severe, and I 1,000 percent don’t agree with it. To lose your head coach for a whole year. … That’s wrong. Drew Brees will stay in New Orleans, step up and rally the troops, but this is going to cripple the Saints.”
Interesting that Johnson would use the word “cripple” in a figurative sense, when the Saints were punished for a system that sought to cripple opponents in a literal sense.
Regardless, Johnson’s position is unsurprising given his contributions to football, much of them predicated on means and ways so malodorous that, 18 years later, it remains a betrayal of all sports that FOX would choose Johnson to be one of its top guys.
As the head coach of Oklahoma State, 1979-83, Johnson’s star defensive end was Dexter Manley, who was able to matriculate although it was later infamously revealed that Manley was a functional illiterate. So what if he couldn’t read the playbook, itinerary or, if there were any, the team rules.
Then it was on to the University of Miami, where Johnson’s Hurricanes became a steady national symbol of everything wrong with big-time college sports, including the recruitment and indulgence of criminals.
A documentary about those Miami teams that appeared on ESPN included an interview with Michael Irvin, one of Johnson’s bad acts who also would play for him in the NFL, where he’d continue to be a bad act — then land TV analyst positions with several networks.
Significantly, Irvin said that while criticism of Johnson’s mostly black Miami teams was, at the time, countered with claims of racism by a predominantly white media, the truth was that those teams, in fact, were loaded with bad guys.
Next, Johnson replaced, of all people, Tom Landry as coach of the Dallas Cowboys. Those teams, on Johnson’s watch, became notorious for lawlessness, including the rental of the infamous “White House,” a suburban home depot used by players for drugs and sex.
Yet when the opportunity arose. FOX couldn’t wait to hire him, throw money at him, reward him, renew him.
And last week FOX wanted us to know that Jimmy Johnson, who left a stench in so many places, didn’t at all agree with the NFL’s decision to recognize the Saints’ three-year bounty program for what it was: a lawless, brutal enterprise that will leave a lasting stink. What a surprise.
Sugar had way with words like no one else
He would talk all day, all night, and to everyone. Yet Bert Sugar told almost no one how sick he was. My favorite Sugarism: “I went to Michigan Law School because Yale Law suggested I apply there.”
* In poker, clues are called “tells.” Jonathan Holton, the 6-foot 9 University of Rhode Island basketball player this week arrested for recording and perhaps distributing video of his sexual encounters with female students, is, according to reports out of New England, either a 21-year-old freshman or a freshman who turns 21 in November. Either way, that kinda “tells” plenty.
* Soundalikes: CBS’ Greg Anthony and radio play-by-player Dave Sims.
Look at it this way: Teams call them “ticket convenience fees” only because they’re uncomfortable using “price gouging fees.”
A commercial for Cleveland golf’s new driver claims the club will allow you to play “with a swagger.” Odd, the guys I know who play with a swagger have a tough time finding a game.
* ESPN’s “Outside the Lines,” Sunday at 9 a.m. (repeated on ESPN2, 10 a.m.) provides an update and retrospective of Al Campanis’ “blacks lack the necessities” comment, made on ABC’s “Nightline,” 25 years ago, this Tuesday.
* All Gizmos Must Be Used, Regardless: Still haven’t seen how that floating overhead camera has benefitted viewers of NCAA tournament games. It tends to distort rather than enhance. Some passes look as if they’re being thrown from across the street.
* Steiner Collectibles next week will begin to sell limited edition microscope slides of excess Joba Chamberlain skin graft tissue. The perfect gift for Father’s Day!
Mikey’s Tebow flipflop
There’s now another fabulous YouTube posting that reveals Mike Francesa for what he is. This one contains his expert take on Tim Tebow in December, compared to his expert take in March, after Tebow became a Jet.
In December, Francesa went into a long sermon praising Tebow as a “special talent” who knows how to win. “Some guys just have the ability to get things done.” On and on; he even cited Tebow’s nine-to-one TD-to-interception ratio. By then, Francesa was late to hop the Tebow Train, but OK.
Next, his March diatribe. It accused the Jets of acquiring Tebow as a publicity stunt, “to create buzz, sell jerseys” and the denunciation of Tebow as a player who won’t help and can only hurt.
Par for Francesa’s discourse. Imagine if you were as consistently, as loudly and authoritatively wrong, and as consistently dishonest on your job? How long, outside of a scamdicapper’s boiler room, would you last?
Incidentally, at least twice, in past weeks, as if he had the inside poop, Francesa asserted the Giants will open against Green Bay. This week the NFL announced that the Giants will open against Dallas. Hey, he was due to get one wrong.
* A reminder to those reading/hearing Bill Parcells quotes, vis a vis the Saints job: In 1991, Parcells flatly denied he’d spoken about the Buccaneers job with team owner Hugh Culverhouse. In fact, though, Parcells had met with Culverhouse, and to discuss just that.
* From reader Joseph Tout: “We conquered polio, defeated the Nazis, put a man on the moon. … My question is this: Why can’t we stop the ‘Get in the hole!!!’ guy at golf tournaments?”