A work ethic that really works

Recommended reading: Dave Caldwell's New York Times piece on New Jersey's Martin Brodeur, now the winningest goalie in NHL history.

The story, written just before Brodeur broke Patrick Roy's record, details the meticulous way Brodeur goes about his business — and the way he continually strives to improve his performance despite his 15 years in the league.

Brodeur told Caldwell he has a hybrid style that is still evolving, with techniques picked up from other goalies.

"Anything I think will be good for my game, I’ll steal from them," Brodeur said. "It's fair game."


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/17/sports/hockey/17brodeur.html?ref=hockey

Friday column: Sometimes tweets not all that sweet

Maybe I'm a Luddite, but my sympathies are with Milwaukee coach Scott Skiles in his Twitter tilt tug-of-war with Charlie Villanueva.

The 6-11 third-year forward tweeted (for the technologically challenged among us, that’s posting a note to his Twitter feed on the Internet) at halftime of a recent game between the Bucks and the Boston Celtics.

The post, received by some 1,600 or so who subscribe to Villanueva's feed, was short and inoffensive, but Skiles was upset at what the tweeting suggested."
"You know, (we) don’t want to blow it out of proportion," Skiles said. “But anything that gives the impression that we’re not serious and focused at all times is not the correct way we want to go about our business."

Skiles didn’t fine the third-year player but made it clear he thinks refraining from tweeting in the middle of a game was a "no-brainer."

But the coach, old school as he is, might also think it a no-brainer for jury members to refrain from doing cell-phone Internet investigations in the middle of a trial — especially when they've been admonished not to.

And apparently he would be wrong.

A Tuesday New York Times story indicates playing Sherlock Holmes is all the rage among jurors, leading to mistrials and an enormous waste of time and money.

John Schwartz's Times story begins with a federal drug-trial juror admitting to the judge he had secretly been doing research on the case over the Internet, "directly violating the judge's instructions and centuries of legal rules."

The story continues: "But when the judge questioned the rest of the jury, he got an even bigger shock. Eight other jurors had been doing the same thing."

A hallmark of the U.S. justice system is the principle that jurors are to decide a case only on the evidence a judge rules admissible. Now they're basing judgment on whatever they can dig up on their BlackBerrys during lunch. Schwartz writes that jurors doing Google searches or posting trial information — another legal no-no — "is wreaking havoc on trials around the country."

Which is costly, but not lethal. For lethal, you have to go to Chatsworth, Calif., where last year a Metrolink engineer sailed through a red light and hit an oncoming train, killing 24 and injuring 130. The engineer, who was among those killed, was text-messaging close to the time of the crash.

Now, it's a long way from Villanueva's halftime tweeting to a lethal accident. On the other hand, Maryland just moved to ban text-messaging while operating a vehicle, which means that that kind of distracted driving probably is being done everywhere.

So my plea to the technocrats out there — especially those on the road — is the same as Skiles' to Villanueva: Hey, pay attention.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

That's showing him, Pierre

So.

The French surprised Lance Armstrong with a test, and no, it wasn’t “who’s buried in Napoleon’s Tomb?”

It was a doping test — just a little hello from the French to the American they love to hate, or at least love to suspect.

Armstrong was approached for a hair sample Tuesday in Beaulieu-sur-Mer, where he is training, and the French weren’t exactly gentle about it. According to reports, an “anti-doping inspector armed with a pair of scissors this week took six clumps of the former Tour de France champion's hair that now will be tested for signs of drug use. Armstrong says his hair was so ‘butchered’ by the test that he had to get a buzz-cut to hide the mess.”

Boasted Pierre Bordry, chief of the French anti-doping agency, "He needs to know that he is like everyone else. To have done this test … was a good way to make him realize that he is like everyone else."

I hate to break it to you, Pierre, but he isn’t like everyone else. Everyone else hasn’t won the Tour de France seven straight times. Let's see ... that’s your race, isn’t it, Pierre?

The newest ‘ugly American’

That would be Chipper Jones, for kvetching about having to exist in Toronto — of all places — to play in the World Baseball Classic.

Complaining about having too many days off, the Atlanta third baseman said, “We stayed in Toronto for a week and played three games. I don’t know if you ever stayed in Toronto, but it’s not exactly Las Vegas. To say that we were plucking our eyebrows out one at a time would be an understatement.”

Here’s an idea, Chipper: Don’t like the venue? Don’t like the way the WBC schedule is arranged? Then … DON’T ... FREAKIN' … PLAY.

As you're 0-10 with six strikeouts in the WBC, I think the USA can survive your absence.

Quote marks all around

Ten teams, 61 athletes. Those are the numbers involved in Florida State’s academic fraud.

So is 14 — that’s the number of wins Bobby Bowden’s football squad, the most notable of the teams affected, might have to surrender for using ineligible players.

So is the number 3. It stands for the learning specialist, the academic adviser and the tutor who not only helped the “student-athletes” cheat, but took tests and wrote papers for them. Wait — if I’m going to put quotes around “student-athletes,” I also should around “learning specialist,” “academic adviser” and “tutor.”

I sure the three … whatever they are … rationalized they were doing something good for the school and the kids — got to keep them on the field and on the court and in the pool, after all. The reputation of the university is at stake.

Now Bowden (that's him above), one behind Penn State’s Joe Paterno on the all-time college football winning list, might see his last chance to pass Paterno go down the drain.

Which I’m sure will bum out a legion of Seminole football fanatics — but doesn’t bother me one bit.

A predicament difficult to conceive of

I hope Travis Henry isn’t counting on a boatload of sympathy.

Nine kids. Nine different mothers. Nine demands for child support.

“They’ve got my blood; I’ve got to deal with it,” the former NFL running back told The New York Times — from Denver where, until recently, “he was under house arrest until recently for the drug matter.”

Now 30, Henry conceived his first child while he was a high-schooler. “I’m like, ‘Whoa, I’m going to be a dad,’ ” Henry recalled.

Guess what, Travis: Being the biological father doesn’t make you a dad though, unfortunately for you, it does make you financially liable.

Not surprisingly, Henry blames the mothers of his children. Seems as though they convinced Henry protection wasn’t necessary — and no, I’m not talking about pass blocking.

“My counselor asks me, ‘How can you do the same thing over and over?’ ” he told The Times.

“Knock on wood, or something, I’m blessed not to have AIDS. That never crossed my mind.”

I'm guessing there are many, many things that never cross your mind.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/12/sports/football/12henry.html?_r=1&ref=football

Friday column: Reality sometimes reassures

A recent issue of The New Yorker looked at the economic rise and collapse of Iceland — which soared on much of the same financial maneuvering and hubris that led to our own recession, then crashed and burned when credit tightened worldwide.

One Icelander compared the nation’s heady days to the “dream season” on the TV show Dallas, adding, “People were thinking, ‘Wow, we’re one of the richest countries in the world.’ Then they woke up.”

The waking up has been hard on the tiny country but is not without a plus side. As one writer puts it: “The people who couldn’t understand how money could be created this way are relieved that it wasn’t reality. It was true what your grandmother said: Don’t owe too much, don’t take risks, use things well.”

In the sports world, too, verities sometimes prove eternal.

Take the New York Yankees and Alex Rodriguez.

In December 2007, the Steinbrenners — known for unapologetically trying to corner the market on talent — decided it prudent to throw $275 million at A-Rod.

This even though the Yankees had won zero World Series since Rodriguez had moved to the Big Apple, and even though he would be 42 when his nine-year contract ended.

Since that time, Rodriguez has been outed as a steroid user and a liar — just the sort of bloke you want as the face of your franchise for most of a decade. Now an injury has made his future even more uncertain.

Verity confirmed: You can’t just go out and buy a title.

Take the Dallas Cowboys and Terrell Owens.

In March 2006, Jerry Jones decided that Owens’ talent and star power were more important than the wide receiver’s track record as a clubhouse cancer.

Since that time, there have been plenty of touchdowns, but also plenty of backbiting — and not a single playoff win. So now, Owens has been cut loose, free to ply his trade — and his mouth — in Buffalo.

Verity confirmed: Character matters.

Take Manny Ramirez and Scott Boras.

In the summer of 2008, Ramirez began acting out more than usual — including benching himself with phantom injuries — in order to get out of the last two years of his Boston contract. Word is, his agent Boras promised he’d get him A-Rod money in a bidding war.

Well, Ramirez got out of his Boston deal. But this winter, the Dodgers were the only team interested in him, and they signed the outfielder for roughly what he would have made in Boston.

Verity confirmed: Bad behavior — especially quitting on teammates — can be bad for business.

If none of these individuals or teams have crashed and burned like Iceland — or the Dow Jones industrial average — they’ve still experienced downturns, what Wall Street types call corrections, and in today’s moral climate all corrections are welcome.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.