But if he had been a touch younger ...

Monday morning I turned on the tube and learned two things about Bernie Madoff:

1) In a statement before the court, his wife enthusiastically threw him under the bus;

2) Madoff was sentenced to 150 years in prison. Note that number.

Regarding the prison sentence — and no, I’m not making this up — Fox News anchor Jon Scott said that considering Madoff’s age, 71, the 150-year sentence was "tantamount to a life sentence."

Considering his age?

It might not be right but it probably is lucrative

Marty Appel has taken another run at Thurman Munson’s life.

Munson wrote Munson’s “autobiography” 31 years ago, naturally putting in whatever details the Yankee catcher wanted and leaving out whatever details he wanted out.

That’s what he was getting paid for.

Now Appel has penned a biography — unauthorized by Munson’s family, which largely refused to cooperate with Appel.

Having worked with Munson decades ago, Appel did have a running start in knowing things that might make for more interesting reading — things Munson didn’t want mentioned in 1978. Munson died in a plane crash a year in 1979.

So, is writing about them now ethical or unethical?

I’m not sure. But I note that in both cases — 31 years ago and today — Appel did what would bring him the money.

Just like most athletes.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/sports/baseball/29sandomir.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=appel&st=cse

Temper, temper

OK.

If you grab a bat and pound the living daylights out of a Gatorade dispenser when things go wrong — like the Cubs’ Carlos Zambrano — it doesn’t show much in the way of maturity.

On the other hand, if you deal with frustration by trying to put your fist through a door — like the Braves’ Jeff Bennett — it doesn’t show much in the way of brains.

Wednesday, after allowing a couple of runs to score in a loss to the Yankees, Bennett punched a door with his left hand, which means the right-hander deserves a little credit.

But only a little. He was still placed on the 15-day disabled list.

It’s not good — but it could be worse

When I saw photos of Iranian soccer players wearing green wrist bans in support of Mir Hossein Mousavi — standard bearer of the nation’s political opposition — I thought, “Ballsy, but dangerous.”

Now there are reports that some of those players have been punished by being forced off the team. Considering what we’ve seen in the streets of Tehran, they’re lucky if that’s all that happens to them.

Still, it’s unlikely they’ll face what the Iraqi players did back when Saddam Hussein’s son Uday ran that country’s soccer program.

According to a Genocide Watch document, among Uday’s toys were “a sarcophagus, with long nails pointing inward from every surface, including the lid, so victims could be punctured and suffocated.”

And “a metal framework designed to clamp over a prisoner’s body, with footrests at the bottom, rings at the shoulders and attachment points for power cables,so the victim could be hoisted and subjected to electric shocks.”

Such, uh, motivational techniques … never seemed to translate into victories for Uday’s team.

Oddly enough.

Friday column: In the long run, is the money enough?

Who steals my purse steals trash; ’t is something, nothing;
’T was mine, ’t is his, and has been slave to thousands;
But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him
And makes me poor indeed.
— from Othello

The outgoing head of baseball’s player union was all about the purse; not its filching — its filling, and fill it he did.

Under Donald Fehr’s leadership, the average major league salary grew from $293,000 to $2.9 million. So, too, grew players’ power and perks.

All this is fine. What worker doesn’t want more money and more control over his environment? Baseball players, who for decades had been abused by management, had to battle owners hard for fair compensation and basic rights. In this, they were more than well served by Fehr.

Fehr’s never-give-an-inch mentality and his focus on improving the financial well-being of the players helped baseball’s union become the envy of professional athletes everywhere. His tooth-and-nail fight against drug testing has to be seen largely in the light of taking care of the players’ pocketbooks: Steroids meant greater performances, and greater performances meant more money.

But that mind-set came with costs.

The vast number of major league steroid users from the “glory days” remain anonymous, which means determining the effects of the illegal performing-enhancing drugs on their aging bodies will be difficult to impossible. But as steroid use can lead to liver tumors and cancer, high blood pressure, heart attack and stroke, there’s no question Fehr, the union and all of baseball put players’ long-term health at risk for financial gain.

Fehr’s long resistance to drug testing came with another price, one easier to gauge.

This year, Mark McGwire, a man with 583 home runs, received 21.9 percent of the votes for the Hall of Fame. Needed for election: 75 percent.

Monday, the Oakland A’s began to honor their 1989 world champion team by giving away replicas of McGwire’s jersey. But the former slugger, who was invited to throw out the first pitch, wasn’t on hand. It seems that even in Oakland he won’t risk being booed, or being hounded by reporters. He might as well be in the witness-protection program.

Ask McGwire today if he would like his reputation back. For that matter, ask Alex Rodriguez or Barry Bonds. Ask Roger Clemens or Raphael Palmeiro. I’m guessing that if they had it to do all over again, they’d take less green in exchange for a good name.

Fehr didn’t make anyone take steroids, but he made it easier for players to do. As Fehr retires, and his legacy is discussed, I’m thinking he, too, would like a do-over with the drug era.

For his name’s sake.

A euphemism is born

Mark Sanford’s transgression is bad news all around — his wife, his children, his staffers, the people of South Carolina all being hurt by his philandering and his lying.

OK; maybe it’s not bad news all around.

Democrats, of course, benefit. And so do writers and reporters who love the use of euphemism.

I can see it now: another press conference where a politician is suspected of “straying,” as The New Mexican headline so gently put it.

“Sir, there are rumors to the effect that … well, I mean, we’ve heard that you … let me put it this way, Governor (or Senator or Congressman or President): Have you been, um, hiking the Appalachian Trail?”

Good for him

Give Dirk Nowitzki some credit.

The Dallas Mavericks’ star might have been foolish in love — becoming engaged to a grifter isn’t the smartest life move — but he’s stepping up in the matter of the pregnant woman’s baby.

The jailed Christal Taylor, aka Krista Santiago, aka Debra Johnson, aka Shana Mancini, aka ... well, you get the point, says she’s carrying Nowitzki’s child. Nowitzki wants a paternity test, which only makes sense.

But, if the child IS his, Nowitzki will pursue sole custody.

Such a tough decision

So.

Scott Boras wasn’t questioning Jim Leyland’s integrity, after all.

Boras took some fire from the Detroit Tigers’ manager this week after he seemed to imply the recent benching of Boras client Magglio Ordoñez was not due to Ordoñez poor hitting but to his contract — if Ordoñez gets 215 plate appearances this season, his $15 million contract option for next year becomes vested.

It was all a misunderstanding, Boras now insists. He would never question the probity of the Tigers manager.

That’s a relief, because if it did come down to an integrity contest between the two men ... I mean ... who would I know to go with?

Jim Leyland or the Prince of Darkness?

Jim Leyland … Prince of Darkness?

Jim Leyland …

Can you hear me now?

The legal system, along with the family of the victim, might have thought that a month in stir was enough punishment for Donte Stallworth, but Roger Goodell thinks otherwise.

Indefinite suspension was the word from the NFL commissioner. But not the only word.

“The conduct reflected in your guilty plea resulted in the tragic loss of life and was inexcusable,” Goodell said in a letter to Stallworth, who in March killed a 59-year-old man while driving drunk. “While the criminal justice system has determined the legal consequences of this incident, it is my responsibility as NFL commissioner to determine the appropriate league discipline for your actions, which have caused irreparable harm to the victim and his family, your club, your fellow players and the NFL.”

"There is no reasonable dispute that your continued eligibility for participation at this time would undermine the integrity of and public confidence in our league," he said.

Alcohol-related misconduct continues to be a problem for the league, and Goodell not only came down on Stallworth, he wrote a memo to all 32 teams stressing that “DUI is a serious matter which poses great risks to both those who drive under the influence, and innocent third parties.”

"In the past few years,” Goodell said, “I have not hesitated to impose discipline, including suspensions, on club and league employees who have violated the law relating to alcohol use. Every club should advise its employees of their obligations and our commitment to hold people accountable for alcohol-related violations of law.”

With his indefinite suspension of Stallworth, Goodell has sent a message. The question is, will it be heard?

A month? Really?

After doing something horribly wrong, Donte Stallworth did everything right — he stopped, he called police, he took responsibility. Good for him. No, I mean it: Good for him.

But it should be remembered that in doing those things he only did what one is suppose to do, what is expected, what is right.

Despite doing those things, he still killed a 59-year-old crane operator with his car because he was driving drunk — and for that he plea-bargains for a month in jail?

Yes, I understand there are other elements to his sentence — eight years’ probation, 1,000 hours community service, lifetime loss of his driving privileges — but unless he’s suspended by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, the Cleveland Browns wide receiver won’t even miss training camp.

Yes, I understand Stallworth has reached a monetary settlement with the family of Mario Reyes, and that the family supported the plea bargain. But those two facts, taken together, only make the deal creepier. Would the family have supported such a deal if Stallworth wasn’t a multi-millionaire who could afford what I assume is a generous settlement?

Justice is suppose to be blind (I’ll pause here to allow for laughter) …

In this case, it seems as though Justice raised its blindfold long enough to peek into a billfold.

Nothing deodorizes like winning

Kobe Bryant, onetime pariah for sexual-assault charges, is now a monarch — witness Conan O’Brien’s excessive homage to the NBA star after the Lakers beat Orlando in the NBA Finals and Bryant was named Finals MVP.

O’Brien brought a 25-foot statue of a pharaoh from the Universal Studios lot and placed it in his studio in order to make Bryant "feel like a king."

Which is thoughtful, because I’m certain Bryant’s ego needs the boost.

O’Brien provided the statue for Bryant, but Bryant also had a gift for O’Brien — game-worn signed sneakers! Wow! Imagine, actually worn shoes with actual foot odor from an actual NBA star! Why he didn’t he just give Conan a game-worn signed jock instead?

The bloom’s definitely off this Rose

Derrick Rose, lionized in his first season as an NBA pro for his talent and his team-oriented outlook, hasn’t had much to smile about lately.

First, he was accused of having a ringer take his college boards.

Next, it was said someone changed his high school grades to help him get into the University of Memphis for his obligatory “one-and-done” season.

Now a photo has surfaced seeming to show Rose flashing a gang sign.

Rose apologized, saying the “sign” flashed during his year at Memphis was “meant as a joke.”

What isn’t a joke is the hit his once-sparkling reputation has taken in just a few short weeks.

Oh, well never mind, then …

The University of Florida is trying its best.

After the Orlando Sentinel published a list of 24 Gator football players who have been arrested since 2005, the school provided the following facts in an attempt to put the situation in a better light:

* Only three arrests from the last three recruiting classes (including 2009)

* At least 14 of the charges were dropped in the 24 cases

* 14 of the 24 player arrests have been from players (coach Urban Meyer) did not recruit or were in his first recruiting class

* The 24 arrests represents 19 different players

* Arrests by recruiting class

Six did not recruit

Eight in first class

Seven in second class

Two in third class

One in fourth class

None in fifth class

College Football Talk puts the matter succinctly: “It's never good when you've got your media relations department breaking down your recruiting classes by arrest …”

Eight reasons for suspicion

Thirty-six-year-old Raul Ibanez is off to an amazing start (.325 average, 20 homers. 55 RBIs entering Friday's games), leading to press and blogger speculation that the Phillies outfielder is on the juice.

Which has Ibanez fuming.

“I'll come after people who defame or slander me,” he said. “It's pathetic and disgusting.”

For all I know, Ibanez deserves the presumption of innocence, but there are several good reasons he doesn’t get it. They are, in no particular order

1) Barry Bonds

2) Mark McGwire

3) Rafael Palmeiro

4) Roger Clemens

5) Manny Ramirez

6) Gary Sheffield

7) Troy Glaus

8) Paul LoDuca

I could go on, but you get my point. Rather than fuming at bloggers, Ibanez might direct his anger at those players who, cowed by the union or just content with rising salaries, didn’t complain — loudly — against the suspected use of steroids and human-growth hormone by some of their bretheren.

Come to think of it, I don’t recall Ibanez speaking out against chemical cheating. And he's been in the league since 1996.

It's true, nonetheless

You’re a Little League coach.

You’ve got some of your players with you, including your son.

Maybe you’ll teach them some batting fundamentals. Maybe you’ll teach them some pitching fundamentals. Maybe you’ll teach them to break and enter.

According to Arlington, Wash., police, Little League coach George Spady Jr. was with his son, a nephew and another of his players when he broke into a vacant shop and stole overhead lights and bolts.

Spady’s son allegedly crawled through a vent on the back side of the shop and unlocked the door for his father. Then Spady, his son and Spady’s nephew went inside and came out with the goods, according to court documents.

One of the boys — I’m guessing the one non-Spady relative — told his stepfather about the heist, and the police were called, leading to the arrest of the 31-year-old coach, who’s been charged with second-degree burglary, a felony.

So far, none of the boys have been charged.

Spady reportedly told the police he was sorry.

He also told them he was an idiot slimeball.

(OK — I made that last one up).

Living good? Maybe. Thinking good? Definitely not

In April, with Southern Cal in the midst of an major NCAA investigation into alleged improprieties into the Trojans basketball program, University of Arizona athletic director Jim Livengood reportedly offered Trojans coach Tim Floyd the Wildcats’ job.

Floyd turned him down.

Two months later, following a new accusation that Floyd personally handed a recruit’s associate $1,000 in cash, Floyd has resigned as Trojans coach. The guessing now is that serious NCAA penalties are headed the Trojans’ way, and that Floyd is finished as a Division I coach.

All of which makes Livengood the luckiest AD in the land.

Friday column: This silence is not golden, but all too common

Accountability is big in sports — in concept, anyway — and is preached constantly, sometimes with the help of visual aids.

I remember former NFL coach Bum Phillips famously brandishing a short piece of white cord — the idea being, as I recall, that players were accountable to each other like mountain climbers. If you were headed over a cliff, you really needed the person on the other end to “hold the rope.”

But while accountability is preached in Toyland, it often is not practiced.
Take Tim Floyd at USC.

The Los Angeles Times said that at his team’s March 31 banquet, the men’s basketball coach pleaded with his most talented players to not turn pro but stay and help the Trojans win an NCAA title.

The next day — April fools! — Floyd flew to Tucson to interview for the University of Arizona job.

In May, Floyd — whose program already was the target of an NCAA probe into alleged goodies provided to former “one-and-done” star O.J. Mayo — was accused of acting as his own bagman in handing $1,000 in cash to a Mayo associate during the “recruitment” process.

More Trojan players and recruits jumped ship.

Tuesday, Floyd did, too, but how he did it is revealing. He gave a newspaper in his home state of Mississippi his resignation letter — before faxing it to USC. He told the newspaper he “intended” to contact his players and assistants — then turned off his cell phone. And presumably hid in the cellar.

To be fair to Floyd, who in his last weeks never so much as issued a simple denial of the charges facing him, he’s pretty much following USC’s modus operandi.

The Trojans’ football program is also under investigation for alleged NCAA infractions — serious infractions — yet neither coach Pete Carroll, athletic director Mike Garrett nor school President Steven Sample will say “boo” about the matter.

Things aren’t much better a few miles away at Dodger Stadium, where Manny Ramirez did talk to the press — but refused to answer questions about his 50-game drug suspension.
Ramirez said he had apologized to his teammates, fans and ownership but felt no need for further discourse. I guess being a star doesn’t mean never having to say you’re sorry but does mean never having to explain exactly what you’re sorry for.

“I didn’t kill nobody, I didn’t rape nobody, so that’s it,” Ramirez said.

Rape and homicide — so that’s where the accountability bar is set.

By that standard, Ramirez, Floyd, Carroll, Garrett and Sample don’t owe us a thing.

On the other hand, I wouldn’t want any of them at the other end of my rope.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

Titanic tasks

Poor Vince Young.

He lost his starting quarterback job with the Tennessee Titans with erratic play and even more erratic behavior. So to get it back, he essentially issued a “play-me-or-trade-me” demand.

Good luck with that.

Poor Vince Young’s agent.

After his client popped off to a Baltimore television station about being the starter or else, Major Adams went into damage-control mode, trying to convince the people that sign Young didn’t mean any of it.

Good luck with that.

Speaking of convincing, Young — who has thrown a one-person pity party on the sidelines and acted oddly enough to cause his family to be concerned for his mental health — needs to persuade somebody he’s stable and mature enough to lead an NFL football team.

Good luck with that.

Overstating his case

Tennessee Congressman Steve Cohen wants the NBA and the players union to drop the rule requiring governing the minimum age of players.

The rule mandates that players be 19 and a year removed from their high school graduation to be eligible.

Noting the rule affects mostly African-Americans, Cohen, a Democrat, called the it “a vestige of slavery.”

Now, with the corruption that seems to attend recruitment of the “one-and-done” basketball player, I’m leaning Cohen’s way in terms of policy. But not in terms of hyperbole.

“Vestige of slavery?”

Puh-leeze.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/04/sports/basketball/04webcohen.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=steve%20cohen&st=cse

Has he never seen a prize fight?

So.

LeBron James is too much of a competitor, too much of a “winner” to congratulate someone who’s just beaten him?

Give me a break.

James has handled both his enormous hype and his enormous success rather well. But his leaving the court without shaking hands with the Orlando Magic after Cleveland’s Game 6 defeat and his boycotting of the post-game news conference were childish moves.

"It’s hard for me to congratulate somebody after you just lose to them," James told reporters the day after the Cavs were eliminated. "I’m a winner. It’s not being a poor sport or anything like that. If somebody beats you up, you’re not going to congratulate them. That doesn’t make sense to me. I’m a competitor. That’s what I do. It doesn’t make sense for me to go over and shake somebody’s hand."

Hockey players — who go at each other significantly harder than basketball players — routinely shake hands at series’ end. And boxers — who literally, not figuratively, beat each other up — routinely embrace.

It appears that James, 24, still has some growing up to do.

Friday column: Cheating comes with a cost

So, what’s it all about, Alfie?

And Danica.

And Derrick.

Is it just for the moment we live?

And the fame, and the championship banners and, let’s see, there’s something else … something … oh, yeah, money — gobs and gobs of money. Is that what it’s all about?

Well, maybe.

In the last few days, we’ve seen race driver Danica Patrick opine that cheating isn’t really cheating — not if you don’t get caught. And we’ve seen NBA rookie of the year Derrick Rose accused of getting into the University of Memphis with a bogus SAT score — and perhaps an altered high-school transcript.

What’s surprising in all this? Not a darn thing.

What did Patrick say she’d cheat for? Winning the Indianapolis 500, which would bring her astounding fame and fortune. That’s something Rose ($4.8 million salary, not counting shoe money) already is acquiring, thanks in part to his alleged fraud.

So what? Good question.

I don’t mean to be judgmental. I can’t say with certainty that I wouldn’t have done what Patrick said she’d do or what Rose is accused of doing, especially at their age, if it meant such worldly riches.

Which doesn’t mean it doesn’t deserve scrutiny.

A few weeks ago, I referenced Thomas Aquinas. I’m going to do it again (forgive me; I’m taking an ethics course). Aquinas was a virtue ethicist. According to one definition, virtue ethics “is a branch of moral philosophy that emphasizes character, rather than rules or consequences, as the key element of ethical thinking.”

Aquinas’ ethic was also eudaemonistic, which means it was concerned with happiness. Now, this isn’t happiness in the sense of pleasure — the kind of pleasure one might buy with lots of money, say — but happiness in the sense of contentment, contentment that results from being the kind of person you’re meant to be.

Another way to put it, I think, is that the key to life is not what you obtain; it’s what you become.

Yet we all strive to obtain, for when we obtain, we’re able to materially provide for those we care about. And who’s to say that’s not good? But how we obtain still matters, whether you’re a race car driver, a basketball player or a Wall Street investment banker.

Patrick premised her idea of cheating with the caveat of not getting caught. If Rose cheated, he wasn’t caught, at least not when it could have affected him monetarily. Yet it seems to me that cheating — and the lying that goes along with it — does affect one, even if it’s never detected. It affects what we become.

So, what’s it all about?

Well, it’s at least about something more than obtaining. Because if all we are is what we obtain, we are, in truth, not very much.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.