Bob, stop it ... you're killing me ...

Ready for a good laugh? No, I mean a REALLY good laugh ...

Take a look at what Oakland A's manager Bob Melvin said about his team's signing of two-time drug cheat Manny Ramirez:

“He can be a great example with his work ethic,” Melvin said. “We have some young kids and, who knows, maybe something will rub off.”

Well, yes, something could rub off — an illegal substance, perhaps; a bit of his selfish personality, maybe. They can learn how to feign injury, certainly.

Work ethic?

Earth to Bob: this is the same guy a former manager — Terry Francona, who knew him well — called the "worst human being he'd ever met."

Say, "Maybe his hitting will help us." Say, "Maybe the kids can look at his mechanics and patience at the plate." But "He can be a great example with his work ethic?"

You've just lost all credibility, Bob ...

Talk about a loose cannon

That would be Pat Knight — Bobby’s son — who was slightly perturbed by his team’s effort in Wednesday’s 62-52 loss to Stephen A. Austin.

"We've got the worst group of seniors right now that I've ever been associated with," he said minutes after the loss. "Their mentality is awful. Their attitude is awful. It's been their (custom) for the last three years. To come out in a game like this, with no emotion and flat, it's terrible."

That may sound harsh, but Knight, in his first year at Lamar after being fired from Texas Tech, was just getting started.

He also said:

* "These [seniors] are stealing money by being on scholarship with their approach to things."

* He inherited an “infestation” of players that are difficult to coach.

* "We've had problems with these guys off the court, on the court, classroom, drugs ..., If you act this way in the real world, you're going to be homeless, without a job."

Maybe his players would have a better shot at a good job if they had a famous dad. It’s hard to see how Pat Knight would have gotten the gig at Texas Tech — even a short-loved one — without his father arranging that his son would succeed him.

Pat Knight might be right about his players, but its’ hard to see how such a public and spontaneous trashing of them will do him or them much good. It would seem to speak of a coach’s frustration, and his inability to contain it. It smacks of a coach sending the following message: These players aren't mine, so I'm not responsible.

Lamar’s three remaining regular-season games and the Southland Conference tournament should be quite interesting.

Don't worry about Lin

Recommended reading:"The Evolution of a Point Guard" by Howard Beck of The New York Times, detailing how Jeremy Lin became an "overnight success."

Not surprisingly, it has to do with tremendous persistence, study and hard work.

There were reasons Lin was overlooked coming out of Harvard: He had had a slight build, which meant he could be pushed around on the court and he lacked a decent outside shot, among other things. And there are reasons he overcame all those deficiencies: He's outworked and outstudied everyone else.

Wrote Beck on Lin's arrival in New York: " ... the same traits Lin showed in Golden State quickly emerged. He was the first to arrive every day, and the last to leave. He sought and devoured game tapes. When he requested his own clips, Lin asked to see his turnovers and missed jumpers, not his assists."

What the Beck story tells me is not to worry about Lin's recent poor game against the Heat. Said one of Lin's Harvard coaches before the Miami game: "I’m sure in the next couple weeks, someone’s going to figure out how to slow him down and stop him. It’s a chess match. He’s going to figure out how to beat that. That, to me, is a kind of a testament of who he is.”


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/25/sports/basketball/the-evolution-of-jeremy-lin-as-a-point-guard.html?_r=1&ref=basketball

Follow the money?

Recommended reading: Sarah Ryley's story in The Daily about business ties involving former Penn State coach Joe Paterno and board members of The Second Mile that may have played a role in the decision to not call the police about the alleged sexual crimes of Second Mile founder Jerry Sandusky, Paterno's former defensive coordinator.

http://www.thedaily.com/page/2011/12/05/120511-news-paterno-business-1-5/

Let the parade of excuses begin

So.

It was all a misunderstanding.

It was just horseplay.

Jerry Sandusky is innocent of those 40 charges of child sex abuse.

He just shouldn’t have showered with those kids, he said. Gave the wrong impression.

Right.

Meanwhile, of course, eight people have come forward to charge Sandusky with the sexual abuse, and another 10 suspected victims reportedly have gone to police.

Whatever little sympathy I had for Sandusky — and it was damned little — just vanished.

Bye-bye, Hank

Am I OK with Hank Williams Jr. losing his Monday Night Football gig for using an analogy between President Obama and Hitler?

Sure.

In fact, I propose a general rule:

Anytime anyone compares anything or anyone to Hitler and/or the Nazis, he or she loses their job immediately.

Not for lack of taste — though that could be sufficient grounds, too — but for lack of brains and for laziness.

The Hitler/Nazi analogy — whether coming from Hank Williams Jr., or Congressman Steve Cohen or anybody else — is meant as an argument clincher. All it indicates is that the person is incapable of making an intelligent case for his/her position.

It’s meant to be a show-stopper; instead, it’s a think-stopper.

Of course, it’s nothing new: Academic ethicist Leo Strauss coined the term Reduction ad Hitlerum, a play on reductio ad absurdum, when?

1953.

Bye-bye, Brett (I wish)

Brett. Brett. Brett.

He can’t help himself. I know. Still, it’s unseemly for Brett Favre to be damning his Green Bay successor with faint praise.

In case you missed it, Favre said he wasn't surprised Aaron Rodgers won this year’s Super Bowl, adding “the biggest surprise to me would be that he didn't do it sooner” and that Rodgers “just kind of fell into a good situation.”

Of course, Brett, one of the reasons Rodgers didn’t “do it sooner” was that you wouldn’t leave the stage.

On the other hand, now that I consider it, Rodgers won a Super Bowl in his third year as a starter. You, Brett, won a Super Bowl in your fifth year as a starter.

Rodgers being Rodgers, he deftly deflected Favre’s implied criticism.

“I'm just going to say that I was really proud of our team," Rodgers said. "It takes 53 guys to win a championship and we had the right recipe last year and we're trying to do the same thing this season.”

Ultimately, Rodgers may have more success than Favre. Or me may not. But the question of who has more class is already decided.

Friday column: Tragedy doesn’t always have the last word

In the last few days I’ve been thinking about healing.

The thoughts began with seeing photos of 6-year-old Cooper Stone visiting Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, Texas, where his father fell to his death July 7.

You remember: Cooper had watched as his father, Shannon, reached for a ball thrown into the stands by Cooper’s favorite player, Josh Hamilton, only to lose his balance and fall to concrete 20 feet below.

Shannon kept consciousness long enough to ask people to look out for his son; then he died.

Less than three months later, Cooper returned to the park to throw out the ceremonial first pitch before Texas’ playoff opener with Tampa Bay. He threw it, of course, to Hamilton.

Hamilton grappled with what to say to Cooper and his mother, Jenny, but the right words came — providentially.

“I’m not good with speeches,” Hamilton said. “Not good with knowing what I’m going to say before. Because I rehearse it too much and it don’t sound genuine.

“So I just kind of let it happen. It worked out good. … You could tell she was really emotional about coming back to the park,” Hamilton said about Jenny.

“The little one, he’s young enough where he understands but at the same time it’s not as emotional for him as it is mom.”

One has the feeling that Jenny went through the experience of visiting the place her husband died for Cooper’s sake.

“They have turned a difficult return to The Ballpark into a once-in-a-lifetime experience for Cooper,” she said in a statement. “Nothing could be more exciting for a boy than throwing out the first pitch to his favourite player.”

Healing is a process, a journey — often a long one — but from the look on Cooper’s face in The Associated Press photos of the day, it appears that at least that journey has begun.

To see the photos, go over to Newser.com, find the sports category (under “more”) and scroll down to the story. It’s worth your time.

And it’s worth your time to find a recent Religion News Service story about Terri Roberts.

If the name doesn’t ring a bell, try that of Charlie Roberts, her son.

If that doesn’t do it, try 10 Amish schoolgirls shot in Nickel Mines, Pa., in 2006.

Charlie was the shooter.

Three girls died at the scene, two more died the next day. Five were seriously injured. After shooting the girls, Charlie killed himself.

In a suicide note, the 32-year-old said he was angry at God for the miscarriage of his first child.

I bet you remember this: The response of the Amish community was exemplary, amazing, gracious — pick your adjective.

A grandfather of a murdered girl told his pastor, “We must not think evil of this man.”

Within hours of the tragedy, an Amish neighbor went to the home of Charlie’s parents to comfort Terri and her husband, Chuck. Dozens of Amish neighbors attended Charlie’s funeral.

The Religion News Service story tells of the Robertses’ response to that kindness.

Three months after the shooting, Charlie’s parents began visiting the victims and their families, and Terri started inviting the surviving girls and their mothers to picnics and tea parties at her home.

Think of that.

And they came. Think of that.

Then Terri found the nerve, the heart, the — pick your adjective — to begin visiting Rosanna King, the most damaged of the survivors of her son’s rampage.

Terri, the story says, bathes and talks to the paralyzed girl weekly, brushes her hair and sings hymns.

The story continues: “After the first few visits, Terri cried all the way home. ‘Lord, I can’t do this,’ she said. But she went back the next week, and the next.”

Pain — off-the-chart pain — all the way around.

I’m not naïve enough to think that emotional healing, let alone the beginning of emotional healing, takes away all pain. But with so many things, people, situations today appearing beyond healing, I find it healing to simply see it in progress.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

Friday column: New York’s Reyes loses by the way he won

Ted Williams was a difficult character. Prideful and touchy.

Prickly, you could say.

This attitude — some of which probably stemmed from a childhood that was less than nurturing — resulted in a fractious relationship with reporters and columnists, whom he sneeringly referred to as “knights of the keyboard.”

That, in turn, cost him some major awards voted on by said “knights,” who questioned Williams’ commitment to the defensive side of the game and his commitment to team.

But no one — not even his press box prosecutors — questioned Williams’ courage, not after his service as a naval aviator in World War II and Korea.

Williams showed his guts on the baseball field, too, most notably on Sept. 28, 1941.

Williams entered the day with a batting average of .3996. As that would be rounded out to .400 and make Williams the first hitter to achieve that lofty mark since 1924, manager Joe Cronin suggested his left fielder sit out the season’s final day, a doubleheader against the Philadelphia Athletics.

“Teddy Ballgame” back into a .400 average? Not bloody likely.

“If I can’t hit .400 all the way,” Williams said, “I don’t deserve it.”

Williams played — both games — going 6-for-8 to finish at .406.
Fast forward precisely 70 years.

Going into the last day of the regular season, Mets shortstop Jose Reyes isn’t flirting with .400, but he does have a very slight lead over Ryan Braun in the National League batting race.

So he conceives a stratagem: Get a hit in his first at-bat, then leave the game for a pinch runner. That way, Braun will have to go 3-for-3 or 3-for-4 to beat him for the Silver Bat.

Reyes gets manager Terry Collins’ approval and executes his plan perfectly, dumping a bunt single down the third-base line in the first inning, then heading for the dugout — and infamy.

The first indication of the response Reyes would get came in the form of boos from his own fans, many of whom came to the game — meaningless in terms of the standings — to see the star shortstop play.

Reyes’ reaction to the hubbub was predictable for a professional athlete who’s just used very poor judgment: The fans have to understand the situation, he said, and, in any case, he “doesn’t care what anyone says.”

Which is good to know. That being the case, let me say the following: Reyes’ move was nothing short of gutless, and one that he will come to regret.

Furthermore, the move by necessity involved his manager’s cooperation, and now Collins, too, is tainted.

Yes, Collins could have told his 28-year-old star to man up, could even have told the story of Williams and .406, but it is a rare skipper who would question the cojones of a soon-to-be free agent whom he hopes will re-sign with his team.

It is said that comparisons are invidious; perhaps, but they certainly are inevitable. Reyes and Williams’ names are now inextricably linked.

Reyes will get his Silver Bat, but it will come with an asterisk. In baseball’s record book, the keystroke will be invisible — but perfectly readable all the same.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com. The Anti-Fan will be moving to Sundays in November.

Shrug this

So.

Manny Ramirez wants to play winter ball in the Dominican Republic. And why?

The president of the Cibao Eagles said the steroid cheat wants to “play before the Dominican fans and to perhaps motivate other Major League stars to also play in the country.”

Yes, always thinking of others — that’s our Manny.

Unfortunately, being a steroid cheat, Manny still owes Major League Baseball a 50-game suspension. And now Manny’s ready to serve it, if only some big-league team will sign him.

“It would be really sad if I'm not allowed to play.” Manny said Wednesday.

Sad? It would be tragic.

Especially since Manny apparently needs to get out of town — thanks to a domestic-violence beef he’s facing.

His wife told police he slapped her. Manny says he just “shrugged her” and she hit her head on a headboard.

I have a feeling every team in Major League Baseball is going to “shrug” him.

Friday column: Conferences and money, money and conferences

So.

An audit shows the Department of Justice overspent just a smidge on food at conferences.

Like $16 per muffin overspend. Like $5 per meatball overspend.

Well, lawyers gotta eat, right?

The department’s inspector general reviewed 10 conferences held between October 2007 and September 2009. The conclusion:

“Some conferences featured costly meals, refreshments, and themed breaks that we believe were indicative of wasteful or extravagant spending.”

Like beef Wellington appetizers at $7.32 a pop. Speaking of pop, a “themed break” of popcorn, Cracker Jack and candy bars cost — you’re sitting down, yes? — 32 bucks a shot.

Surprised? Of course not. That’s what happens when people (in this case, bureaucrats) spend money that’s not theirs (in this case, ours).

But I don’t want to talk about money. I want to talk about college football.

No, about money.

No, about college football.

Wait? What am I thinking? Talking about college football is talking about money.

The 68 teams that comprise the six largest conferences made $1.1 billion in 2010, and many schools are looking to make more, mainly by establishing so-called mega-conferences.

Conferences are breaking up and re-forming, not unlike amoebas.

As you’ll recall from your high-school biology days, “the amoeba moves by continually changing its body shape, forming extensions called pseudopods [false feet] into which its body then flows. The pseudopods also are used to surround and capture food — mainly bacteria, algae, and other protozoa.” (Thank you, encyclopedia.com.)

But whereas amoebas move to capture food, football schools move to capture money, television money. Thus:

Nebraska to the Big 10, Colorado and Utah to the Pac-10, Boise State, Fresno State and Nevada to the Mountain West, Texas A&M to the SEC, Pittsburgh and Syracuse to the ACC, etc., etc. Texas and Oklahoma also may leave the Big 12 and, despite recent pronouncements to the contrary, perhaps to the Pac-whatever-integer-it-is-now.

That would be something: Texas in the same conference with Oregon, which is over 2,000 miles away. On the other hand, if Texas Christian can play in the Big East — which it will beginning next season — why not?

The losers in all this are the smaller football schools — the Kansas States and Iowas of the world, say — and fans who care about traditional rivalries, many of which date back to the early part of last century. (The rivalries, I mean … though some of the fans do, too.)

But while rivalries and tradition and, of course, concern over increased travel time for the student-athletes, surely count for something, that something can’t begin to compete with the lure of increased dollars.

Syracuse basketball coach Jim Boeheim put it this way:

“If conference commissioners were the founding fathers of this country, we would have Guatemala, Uruguay and Argentina in the United States,” he said during a speech to the Monday Morning Quarterback Club in Birmingham, Ala. “This audience knows why we are doing this. There’s two reasons: money and football.”

He’s right, of course, but also wrong. College football and money are the same thing.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

The Anti-Fan will be moving to Sundays in November.

Instant perspective

Recommended reading (highly): Paul Daugherty's piece on a high school golfer named Ryan Korengel.

Here's the lead:

"In a persistent and healing rain, the 15-year-old golfer summons sunshine. He limps a little; he is legally blind. He plays one-handed, because the tree limb that fell three years ago crushed his skull and paralyzed his left side. It hasn’t affected his game much, though, or his spirit at all."

Later in the story, asked why he isn't depressed, Ryan answers,
“I can still go to school,” says Ryan. “I’m alive. I can play golf.”

The story's worth a read:

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20110912/COL03/309120122/Doc-one-arm-nearly-blind-golfer-succeeds

Friday column: Money has nothing to do with it

Plaxico Burress doesn’t like New York Giants coach Tom Coughlin, which he made clear in a recent interview for Men’s Journal.

Burress discussed Coughlin’s reaction to the wide receiver accidentally shooting himself in a nightclub — a gun-law violation for which he would spend 20 months in prison.
“After my situation happened,” Burress said, “I turned on the TV and the first words out [Coughlin’s] mouth was ‘sad and disappointing.’

“I’m like, forget support — how about some concern? I did just have a bullet in my leg. And then I sat in his office, and he pushed back his chair and goes, “I’m glad you didn’t kill anybody!’ Man, we’re paid too much to be treated like kids. He doesn’t realize that we’re grown men and actually have kids of our own.”

As a Pittsburgh Steeler, this grown man was fined for not bothering to show up for practice. As a New York Giant, he sulked and reportedly feigned injury when unhappy with his contract and was suspended and fined for violating team rules.

This grown man twice has had temporary restraining orders issued against him after domestic disturbances. This grown man has been sued nine times since joining the NFL in 2000, including by a woman who claims Burress’ $140,000 Mercedes Benz hit the back of her car, causing her permanent injury. The accident occurred three days after the millionaire athlete’s insurance had been canceled for nonpayment of premium.

Burress is 34.

* * *

Kurt Busch doesn’t like the truth, an attitude he displayed in a couple of ways Saturday after a NASCAR race in which he tangled with Jimmie Johnson — again.

Joe Menzer’s mild questioning of Busch about his contentious relationship with Johnson resulted in the driver yelling expletives at Menzer and calling him names. Reportedly, Busch had to be physically restrained from going after the NASCAR.com reporter.

Later, Jenna Fryer of The Associated Press asked Busch a question about the driver claiming to be “in Johnson’s head” only to be cut off with “I didn’t say that.”

Shown the transcript, Busch grabbed it from Fryer and tore it up and threw it down.

Busch has a history of run-ins with other drivers and is no stranger to poor decisions — witness his 2005 arrest on charges of drunken driving and reckless driving.

Busch is 33.

* * *

The Williamses — Serena in particular — do not like facing up to facts.

Type in Serena’s name followed by the word “blame” and you’ll find “Williams blamed a headache,” “Williams blamed the tennis balls,” “Williams blames not tying her shoelaces right” and so on.

On Sunday, her mother, Oracene, took up Serena’s cause after her loss to Samantha Stosur in the finals of the U.S. Open, a loss low-lighted by Williams’ invective against the chair umpire that included the following:

“Aren’t you the one who screwed me over last time here? Do you have it out for me?

“You’re out of control.”

“You’re a hater, and you’re just unattractive inside.”

In 10 days Serena will be 30.

Serena, of course, also blew up in a 2009 U.S. Open semifinal when called for a foot fault against Kim Clijsters, her profanity-laced tirade at a line judge leading to a $10,000 fine from the U.S. Tennis Association and a record $82,500 fine from Grand Slam committee director Bill Babcock.

Oracene seemed to encapsulate the family attitude Sunday when she told reporters, “It’s just always something. And it seems to happen to us.”

Seems to happen to us.

It doesn’t happen to the Williams sisters; they create it. The same way they created their rise from the municipal courts of Compton, Calif., to centre court at Wimbledon.

That was their doing. Serena has won eight Grand Slam singles titles and is arguably the greatest female player in history. That’s her doing.

She’s also arguably the most boorish female player in history; that’s also her doing.

“Man,” Plaxico Burress complained, “we’re paid too much to be treated like kids.”

Really?

Friday column: The girl’s all right; the toddler, too

I think Michelle Wie had too much too soon.

Too much ability; too much publicity; certainly too much parental involvement in her golf career.

Now, according to Annika Sorenstam, she doesn’t have enough — enough interest in her sport.

“I think her focus, in my opinion, should be more on golf,” the retired champion said. “She’s very distracted with school, doesn’t really play as much full time as I thought she would. I think she needs to come out here and compete more regularly.”

Wie’s reply was spot-on.

“I think everyone’s entitled to their own opinion,” Wie said. “I’m making my own decisions, though, and going to Stanford was something I needed to do for myself. It was not a decision made for my golf career, it was really solely a decision I made. It’s been one of the first things in my life I did for myself.”

In other words, it wasn’t a golf career decision, Annika; it was a life decision.

“Growing up in the spotlight, playing tournaments when I was 12, I grew up a lot faster than maybe I had to,” Wie said. “Going to college helped me be a normal 18-year-old and that was something I needed. I could keep training, but I needed something more to help me be well-rounded.

“I dreamed all my life about going to Stanford. My grandpa was a visiting professor; both my aunt and uncle went to Stanford. My dad, he didn’t get into Stanford so that was kind of a competitive thing for me. I’ve been obsessing about going there since I was 4. It was never an option for me to not go to school.”

There were times I wondered about Wie; now I rather have the feeling that she’ll be OK — and she’ll probably win a few golf tournaments, too.

* * *

As a rule, I don’t root for teams, but I’ll make an exception for Western Missouri this season after two of its football players saved a toddler from death.

Following their Aug. 23 practice, on a day when temperatures hit 95 in St. Joseph, Mo., defensive backs Jack Long and Shane Simpson were driving away when they saw a woman desperately beating on the window of a car.

They could have kept driving — someone else’s problem, you know?

They didn’t.

“We thought she maybe had locked her keys in the car, but then thought that was kind of an extreme thing to do for keys,” said Long.

Well, Teresa Gall had locked her keys in the car — along with her 17-month-old grandson, Liam. The child, after crying and vomiting, now was beginning to lose consciousness.

“I was panicked and horrified,” Gall said. “He was crying and getting sick, and I couldn’t get to him.”

Gall couldn’t break the car window. No such problem for Simpson — one swing.

“I couldn’t believe it. We were hitting the glass as hard as we could and nothing,” Gall said. “All I could think was ‘God, please send somebody.’ ”

Prayer answered. Child saved.

The players refused any money for the rescue, appropriately enough (how much is your grandchild worth?)

In any case, Go Griffons.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

Friday column: Not sure I’d cash these assertions

Former NBA player Javaris Crittenton, best known for playing quick-draw (with real weapons) with then-teammate Gilbert Arenas in a gambling dispute, has a new claim to fame — murder suspect.

Police say Crittenton, who was robbed of some bling in April, thought he saw the perp walking down an Atlanta street. So, allegedly, he did what any of us would do — whip out a gun and fire from his SUV in the perp’s general direction.

Unfortunately, the specific direction turned out to be the leg of Jullian Jones, a 22-year mother of four standing outside her house. She died in surgery.

On the lam for a few days, Crittenton has now turned himself in, professing innocence. I’m sure you can take his avowal to the bank.

Of course, if you took his denial of the 2009 locker-room showdown with Arenas to the bank, you found his veracity lacked sufficient funds.

Both of Crittenton’s gun incidents (one proven, one alleged) seem beyond stupid. Yet Crittenton is not a stupid man, evidenced by his a 3.5 high school GPA. The explanation for his latest screw-up, if true, may lie not in his head, but in his heart.

Asked about his former teammate after Crittenton was put on probation and suspended for a year for the locker-room gun incident, Arenas said he had heard Crittenton had become “more hard.” More hard as in “more gansta.”

“You know, like some people turn over a new leaf when something bad like that changes their life,” Arenas said. “I heard Javaris went the other way — he became more ’hood, more hardened in that way. I don’t know if that’s the case, but that’s what I heard.”

If Crittenton is convicted and imprisoned, he’ll get all the gansta he can handle.

* * *

A fondness not for gangsta life but for John Barleycorn seems behind another incident, less damaging but still repugnant, in which a number of LSU football players were involved in a bar fight that sent four people to the hospital.

One of the victims has a facial fracture, a concussion, fractured teeth and facial and body bruises. The fractured teeth might have come courtesy of LSU starting quarterback Jordan Jefferson, whom a witness recalls seeing kicking the man in the head.

After being hit with felony charges of second-degree battery, Jefferson (along with linebacker Josh Johns) was suspended indefinitely, a miscarriage of justice that his attorney seeks to repair by asking LSU head coach Les Miles to reverse his decision.

“It is more than unjust to destroy this young man’s career if it’s all about a bunch of nothing, which is what I think,” defense attorney Lewis Unglesby said Monday.

Actually a true translation of Unglesby’s last phrase from lawyer into English would read, “which is what I am paid to think, or at least am paid to say I think.”

Not that I for a minute would question the attorney’s sincerity or his opinion of the young man in question.

I’m quite sure you can take them both to the bank.

Friday column: Changes likely? Not with cash on the table

There are real divisions in our society and in the world, and then there are made-up divisions that sometimes can match the real divisions in terms of passion.

Team sports are made-up divisions.

My team vs. your team; my city vs. your city; my school vs. your school; my colors vs. your colors.

Made-up. Silly. Infantile.

So why do made-up divisions exist? Two reasons:
1) In the form of athletic competition, such divisions often prove entertaining.

2) From such divisions there is money is to be made.
One of the ways it is made is the selling of alcohol at sporting events.

Big business.

And big trouble.

A 1999 study by the Harvard School of Public Health College concluded that 53 percent of sports fans usually binge when they drink.

Fueled by booze, fan behavior is often coarse and can turn criminal — witness Saturday’s shooting at Candlestick Park, reportedly sparked by a combination of alcohol and someone’s decision to wear a shirt that said “[Bleep] the 49ers.” Yes, the reported shooter was wearing a Raiders jersey.

Another man also was shot, and in an unrelated incident, a third man was savagely beaten in a bathroom.

Ironically, the victims were taken to the same hospital where Giants fan Bryan Stow tries to recover from a beating on opening day at Dodger Stadium, another incident apparently fueled by booze and someone’s dislike of the logo on someone else’s shirt.

Hey, take me out to the ball game!

On second thought, don’t.

I’ve played sports most of my life, and have had many wonderful moments watching sports. I am not against competition.

I am against the loss of perspective that leads to the poisoning of 130-year-old trees at Auburn, that leads to a beating in L.A., shootings in San Francisco and more fan thuggary than pro sports would like to admit.

I am against the loss of perspective that leads to universities selling their integrity for TV money and booster donations (hello, Miami and Nevin Shapiro).

Yes, I know, schools peddle their virtue for more than dollars — they do it also for the reflected glory of “their” team scoring more points than someone else’s team on a given day.

Pathetic, really.

But as in so many things, the bottom line is the bottom line.

While fans find made-up divisions entertaining, pro teams find them profitable — and more profitable with alcohol sales and alcohol sponsorship. Universities — many of which, incidentally, also sell booze in their stadiums and arenas — find that a winning football team can do more for student recruiting and for attracting alumni dollars than a lineup of top professors.

All of which means …

Despite all the hand-wringing about the corruption in Miami and the violence in L.A. and San Francisco, expect college corruption and fan violence both to continue.

Why?

Too much money to be made. And that’s not made up.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

Somebody tell poor Al (OK, I will)

You have to feel for Al Golden.

He's the man took the Miami football coaching job without knowing about the bubbling NCAA investigation into truly mind-boggling allegations of corruption.

Before he took the reins of a program that might be line for the NCAA "death penalty," Golden sort of wishes he'd been told about the probe.

"Only if they knew," Golden said, being much more charitable than I think he'll be down the road. "If they knew this was percolating, I believe they did have a responsibility to tell me."

Trying to make lemonade out of lemons, he added, "But look, I'm happy here. My wife is happy here. We've got great kids on this team. We have commitments from 24 young men and their families that appreciate and share our core values moving forward."

Hate to break it to you, Al: You HAD commitments from 24 young men and their families. With the U looking to be on probation till, quite possibly, Kingdom Come, you can kiss those commitments goodbye.

A nugget from Andrew

After a while, you get a nose for these things.

So, as soon as I saw the deck head on the Los Angeles Times interview with Andrew Bynum, I sensed there would be gold in them thar words.

The 7-footer Lakers center last made news on the court when he viciously slammed his forearm into Lilliputian Mavericks guard J.J. Barea in Game 4 of Dallas’ sweep.

He last made news off the court by parking his BMW in two — count them, two — handicapped parking spaces at a Bristol Farms Market in Playa del Rey, then fleeing from a TV reporter wanting to ask him about it.

So when I saw a story with the headline “Andrew Bynum says Lakers 'need to come back ... ready to win' ” and with a deck that included, “He won't discuss disabled-parking reports,” it was time to go prospecting.

Didn’t take me long to find what I was looking for.

There, in the answer to a reporter’s first question, are the words, “It's about being accountable. Me included.”

Three questions later Bynum is asked, “What happened in that parking incident at the grocery store?”

And his answer: “I'm not talking about that.”

Beautiful.

Friday column: College corruption has a new face

So.

Nevin Shapiro, in prison for a 20-year stretch for devising a $930 million Ponzi scheme, tells Yahoo! Sports he provided “impermissible benefits” to 72 of the university’s football players and other “student-athletes” between 2002 and 2010.

Impermissible benefits? How would you define those, Nevin?

Well, according to The Associated Press’ account, Shapiro told Yahoo that he gave players “money, cars, yacht trips, jewelry, televisions and other gifts … Shapiro also claimed he paid for nightclub outings, sex parties, restaurant meals and in one case, an abortion for a woman impregnated by a player.”

Cash, sex parties, an abortion. Yes, I guess those qualify as impermissible. Talk about your full-service booster. Shapiro puts all previous D-I sugar daddies to shame.

Shapiro, all 5-foot-5 of him, apparently liked basking in the reflected glory of strapping 19-year-old athletes while they, feigning friendship, liked basking in the bling and the babes. But when Shapiro was sent to the big house, Hurricanes past and present suddenly developed memory issues.

Nevin who?

This rather specific form of amnesia led to the well-researched and well-documented Yahoo story, with Shapiro starring as The Informer.

Hell hath no fury like a jock sniffer scorned.

“I can tell you what I think is going to happen,” Shapiro told Miami television station WFOR from federal prison in Atlanta. “Death penalty.”

“Death penalty” is slang for the NCAA banning a school from competing in a sport for at least a year. The death penalty has been given only five times in the history of college sports; programs do not recover from it easily or quickly.

And Shapiro might be right.

The NCAA on Wednesday said it has been probing Shapiro’s reputed malefactions for five months and that, if true, the allegations demonstrate the need for “serious and fundamental change” in college sports.

You think?

The Yahoo story is worth going to not only for the blow-by-blow account of Miami’s utter corruption but for the photos than help illustrate it.

There’s Shapiro in a 2003 shot, one arm around Hurricane star tight end Kellen Winslow Jr., the other holding a large bottle of … well, it doesn’t look like lemonade, in Shapiro’s VIP section of Opium Garden nightclub.

There’s Shapiro on his yacht playing best friends forever with linebacker Jonathan Vilma and lineman William Joseph.

There’s Shapiro leaning into the frame of a 2008 photo with then-basketball head coach Frank Haith, one of seven Miami coaches Shapiro says were well acquainted with his illicit activities.

But the best photo of all is a snap taken during a 2008 basketball fundraiser.

Shapiro, fairly glowing with self-esteem, is speaking into a hand-held mic. On his right, a smiling Haith rests his hand on Shapiro’s shoulder. On Shapiro’s left is university President Donna Shalala, looking like a kid at Christmas who’s just been given a shiny, red bicycle.

She’s gleefully staring at a $50,000 check from Shapiro as though it can’t be real.
Guess what, Donna? In a way — since it reportedly came from Ponzi scheme funds — it wasn’t.

But the NCAA investigation, Donna, and the possibility of the death penalty — along with the likelihood of your suddenly developing a pressing need to spend more time with your family — are very real, indeed.

College corruption has a new face, one that will be hard to top.

Go, Canes.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

For old times' sake

Ah, teamwork

It’s nice, isn’t it, when football opponents can put away their differences and work together on a common cause.

Robbery, say.

Colorado’s Bryce Givens and Syracuse’s Jonathan Miller, former high school teammates, got together in Boulder to reminisce, catch up on old times, and reportedly commit a crime.

The victim told police he was confronted by two men at 3:30 a.m. in Boulder. Miller allegedly hit the victim in the face before the pair grabbed the man’s cellphone and cash. Givens and Miller were later arrested.

Givens, smart child that he is, already was on thin ice in Boulder because of a vandalism arrest. Now he’s on no ice — having been booted from the Buffaloes’ program.

No word yet from Syracuse on what will happen to Miller.