Friday column: A changed man? Only time will tell

Let us now praise famous men.

Especially quarterbacks who have managed to go a full 10 months without being accused of sexual assault.

Yes, the re-deification of Ben Roethlisberger has begun.

After the Pittsburgh Steelers held off the New York Jets 24-19 Sunday to earn a Super Bowl berth, a writer for SI.com purred, “This effort illustrated the entire palate (sic) of greatness Roethlisberger possesses … He improvised, extended plays and showed the will of a champion.”

He gave Roethlisberger an “A” for his performance.

Pretty high mark for a quarterback with a passer rating of 35.5.

But Roethlisberger’s team won, and winning is the all-powerful deodorant, strong enough to lead team president Art Rooney II to gush, “I’m proud of the way he picked himself up and acted like the man he really is.”

The man he really is.

As if Rooney knows.

Rooney’s comment, of course, wasn’t — ostensibly — about Roethlisberger’s play on the field but his actions off it, specifically his keeping his nose clean since the March incident in Milledgeville, Ga., in which he was accused of buying alcohol for a group of young women, then assaulting one in a bar bathroom while his creep cop friend guarded the door.

The district attorney, you might recall, didn’t prosecute Roethlisberger — but not because he believed the incident didn’t happen.

This was the second time in recent years Roethlisberger had been accused of rape. Less-serious black marks on his character also surfaced, painting a portrait of a rich, boorish athlete with a serious case of entitlement-itis.

Asked if the Steelers had considered dumping their franchise quarterback in March, Rooney said, “You go through a lot of different thoughts at times like that. But, at the end of the day, I knew Ben and I knew his parents. I just believed that if he got back to being the type of person he really is deep down inside, he is still the type of person we want to be around. He hasn’t disappointed us.”

He certainly hasn’t disappointed his handlers, staying out of trouble and saying the right things, which shows he has some brains. Good for him.

But for his being a changed man, in 10 short months?

I’m a believer in repentance, and I hope Roethlisberger’s purported turn-around is genuine. But his cleaning up his act during one season isn’t enough to convince me. Like with Michael Vick and his story of regeneration, time will tell.

But part of repentance is facing up to what you’ve done wrong.

Which brings me to an exchange Roethlisberger had with a reporter following the Steelers’ victory Sunday.

Asked if he thinks about what he did in Milledgeville, Ga., Roethlisberger said, “I don’t. I don’t. I’ll stop you now. Not at all.”

Not at all?

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

Dumb and not-so-dumb

Mathias Kiwanuka is smarter than Ben Roethlisberger.

How do I know this?

In June 2006, Roethlisberger was injured in a motorcycle accident. He went over his handlebars and hit — head-first — into the windshield of a car. He was not wearing a helmet.

According to Wikipedia, police sources said “Roethlisberger suffered fractures to the jaw and right sinus cavity, as well as a nine-inch laceration to the back of the head, the loss of two teeth, and several chipped teeth. His facial injuries were severe enough that witnesses on the scene did not immediately recognize him, even after he identified himself as ‘Ben.’ ”

Yet after the accident, he continued to ride — sometimes, despite pledges to the contrary — sans helmet.

New York Giants defensive end Mathias Kiwanuka wasn’t even in an accident and has decided to stop riding — period. Watching his brother get seriously injured was enough.

Benedict Kiwanuka reportedly broke several bones, suffered internal injuries and there were doubts for two days about his survival.

"You go through something like that and you realize how much of a gift life is and how short it can be," Kiwanuka said. "(You) just try to make better decisions and for me, in the position I was in watching that and knowing what I have left to do, not in just football but on this Earth, it's enough to wake you up and realize there are better ways to have fun."

Kiwanuka is smarter than Roethlisberger — which, admittedly, isn't saying much.

Hey, lackey work is hard to find

Ed Joyner's not giving up his night job without a fight. No, sirree.

The Pennsylvania state trooper, barred from working as a bodyguard-gopher for the Mr. Ben Roethlisberger, esquire, wants his bosses to allow him to resume his illustrious part-time employment.

I guess the thrill of standing guard outside a dingy bathroom while a liquored-up quarterback tries to bop a liquored-up coed is difficult to duplicate.

Roethlisberger suspension, first take

Recommended reading: Stephen A. Smith’s piece in the Philadelphia Inquirer on Roger Goodell’s suspension of Ben Roethlisberger.

If anyone’s questioning the justice of Goodell’s hammering — considering the lack of criminal charges against the quarterback — Smith provides you with answers.

Writes Smith, in part:

What Goodell did was remind professional athletes of what everyone from Pop Warner coaches to college coaches evidently haven't done a good enough job of teaching: that eventually, come hell or high water, you will answer to someone. None of us are immune. We are all accountable to someone.

To which I say, "Amen.

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/columnists/stephen_a_smith/20100422_Stephen_A__Smith__Goodell_s_call_was_just_and_needed.html

Roethlisberger suspension, second take

As should be obvious by today’s column, I like Myron Rolle. I like that a football player sees there's more to life than the game.

Rolle may not be a brain surgeon — though he’s hoping to become one — but he is a Rhodes Scholar — so let’s let the NFL rookie wannabe have his say on the suspension of Ben Roethlisberger:

“I think it's awesome,” Rolle told an interviewer "(NFL commissioner Roger Goodell is) showing his stance on character issues by the suspension and by his positioning with a lot of players."

“I'm happy to see a league that values good men,” Rolle said.

Have I mentioned I like this kid?

Your job? 'Protecting' this

A friend of the coed who claims Ben Roethlisberger assaulted her in a dingy, nightclub bathroom told police she went up to one of the two bodyguards outside the room and told him, "This isn't right. My friend is back there with Ben. She needs to come back right now."

The coed’s friend said the bodyguard — now identified as Ed Joyner, a Pennsylvania state trooper — said he didn’t know what she was talking about. The friend also said the bodyguard wouldn’t look her in the eye.

I can't imagine why.

Oh, and please drink responsibly …

Sometimes, when I examine a week or a fortnight’s worth of incidents in toyland, I look for a common thread. One wasn’t hard to find in a series of recent stories.

1) According to a Georgia district attorney, Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger bought shots of alcohol for the 20-year-old coed — yes, that’s under the legal drinking age in Georgia — who later accused him of sexual assault.

I think it’s safe to assume that with the liquor flowing in the nightclub, Roethlisberger imbibed, too. That couldn’t have helped his decision-making which, off the field, needs all the help it can get.

2) Santonio Holmes was traded from the Steelers to the Jets after being accused of throwing a glass of booze in a woman’s face. Holmes has a history of substance abuse, and in fact will miss this season’s first four games for violating the NFL’s drug policy. I’m guessing that — somehow — the hooch that went into his mouth contributed to the hooch that allegedly flew into the woman’s face.

3) An obviously inebriated Cowboys owner Jerry Jones was caught on video bad-mouthing former coach Bill Parcells and slamming former Florida quarterback Tim Tebow. The video has gone viral on YouTube and even made it onto ESPN. If Jones hadn’t been so pie-eyed, he just might have noticed the cell phone camera pointed in his direction.

4) Word that a Notre Dame football recruit on spring break who fell to his death from a fourth-floor balcony was “very drunk” was actually news to whom? For shock value, this rates up there with the study that informed us that most people who drive the wrong way on freeways are under the influence of alcohol.

Friday column: For Roethlisberger, another message coming

In the battle of public perception, messages matter.

Georgia district attorney Fred Bright said this week that he wouldn’t prosecute Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger for sexual assault. There wasn’t enough evidence, he said.

The rape kit used on the 20-year-old accuser at the hospital did collect some male DNA, but not enough to be useful, Bright explained. Though the woman sustained injury to the genital area, there was not enough bodily evidence to prove penetration. And the accuser apparently was intoxicated, a fact that would have made it more difficult to secure a guilty verdict.

Bright could have stopped there, but he didn’t.

Instead he made it a point to say, “We do not condone what Roethlisberger did,” adding “we do not prosecute morals. We prosecute crimes.” He also pointed out that Roethlisberger “provided shots of alcohol” for the underage accuser and her friends.

That was one message.

Another message was sent Monday when not a single Steelers exec stood by Roethlisberger when the quarterback read a statement before the TV cameras. Last year, when he was denying another accusation of sexual assault — in this case a civil complaint — Roethlisberger had coach Mike Tomlin and general manager Kevin Colbert on hand.

Tuesday, PLB Sports, a Pittsburgh-based marketing firm with ties to athletes, ended its relationship with Roethlisberger, its company president saying, “Enough is enough. I hope there is a suspension. At some point in time, Ben has got to put himself in the right position and understand what it means to be a celebrity, a quarterback, a Steelers player.”

Consider that a third message.

Of course, Roethlisberger’s side can send messages, too, and did when the quarterback’s high-priced mouthpiece, Ed Garland, announced to the world that the decision not to prosecute had “exonerated” his client.

How’s that line playing in the heartland?

Well, in Findlay, Ohio, hometown of one Benjamin Todd Roethlisberger, a normally popular Steelers jersey — No. 7 — is collecting dust. Complained Findlay merchant Sue Cataline: “We can sell everybody else’s, but not his. We can’t sell any of his stuff.”

With CBS reporting that allegations of a third sexual incident involving Roethlisberger has surfaced, don’t expect a buying spree anytime soon — in Findlay, in Pittsburgh or in Santa Fe.

E-mailed one local reader, a longtime Steelers fan: “Well, I’m a retired psychotherapist, I’m tellin’ ya, this guy is a sexual predator. This isn’t about ‘hooking up.’ It’s about sexual assault.”

That reader isn’t alone in her opinion. Google Roethlisberger and “sexual assault” and you’ll get more than 20,000 hits.

It’s a fact Roethlisberger has avoided prosecution. It’s also a fact that his behavior has tarnished not only his reputation but that of the NFL. That being the case, look for commissioner Roger Goodell to send his own message very soon.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

Friday column: Giving 'friend' a bad name

I’ve been thinking about the nature of friendship.

My thoughts began with leaks that Tiger Woods’ assignations were arranged — and concealed — in part by the efforts of a childhood friend, Bryon Bell.

Bell apparently arranged for Rachel Uchitel to fly Melbourne for last year’s Australian Open, flew with her — I’m sure he didn’t want her to get lost — and paid for her nights in the Crown Towers Hotel, where Woods was staying.

Texts and e-mails released by another Woods inamorata, a porn actress, indicate Bell also handled her transportation needs. One of the travel-related e-mails Bell sent to Joslyn James was from Bell’s work account — but not to worry. As Bell is president of a business by the name of Tiger Woods Design, I’m confident he’s not in too much trouble with his boss.

How close are Woods and Bell? The golfer was supposed to be Bell’s best man at his December wedding until a certain Thanksgiving Day incident turned Woods into paparazzi catnip.

Woods has said more than once that “nobody” knew about his extra-marital affairs, but that’s obviously not true. If Woods’ purpose in his most recent lie is to protect Bell, it’s a little late for that.

Woods used Bell to deceive his wife and facilitate his affairs. Is that what one does to a friend, turn him into a procurer, into an accessory to adultery? And what kind of friend does this kind of bidding? I guess the kind of friend who ties his entire life to the fame and fortune of another.

This is friendship? Really? It debases the name of friendship.

As slimy as the Woods-Bell uh … brotherhood … seems, I’m not sure it can match that of Ben Roethlisberg and an unnamed “friend” who did sentry duty outside a nightclub bathroom while the Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback was doing … something … to or with a 20-year-old college student.

Was the chum told to guard the bathroom door or did he do so on his own? Was he a veteran of making sure Roethlisberger was uninterrupted in pursuit of casual coitus or was this the first time?

It’s bad enough, of course, if whatever went on in the lavatory was consensual. But if it wasn’t — and the coed has claimed she was sexually assaulted — might the friend’s actions even be criminal?

I’m sure that in Pittsburgh, being Roethlisberger’s buddy/flunkie carries a certain distinction. But I wonder if, whoever this person is, he’s bragging about “his pal Ben” at the moment.

A Confucian saying advises, “Never contract friendship with a man that is not better than yourself.” From a character viewpoint, I’d say Woods and Bell, as well as Roethlisberger and his unnamed sidekick, have all violated that principle.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

Not using his head

Tuesday’s apology or no, I doubt Hines Ward is still on Ben Roethlisberger’s best-buddy list after publicly questioning why the quarterback didn’t play in the Steelers’ 20-17 loss to Baltimore.

Roethlisberger only had suffered a concussion the Sunday before and had experienced exercise-induced headaches the week before the game. What’s the big deal?

After the game, Ward told an interview that the Steelers players were split 50-50 on whether Roethlisberger should have played. He also said he himself had lied to doctors and played with concussions, adding that, “these games, you don’t get back.”

Hines, you know what also you don’t get back once it’s gone? Your brain.

At one point in the interview, Ward boasted, “I’m a competitor.”

If this is how you really think, Hines, you’re also a fool. So be a fool with your own brain, and leave your teammates’ brains — and futures — to them.

Friday column: More than dumb, this defense is dumb-dumb

So.

Whoopie Goldberg doesn’t believe a 43-year-old man sodomizing a girl of 13 after giving her alcohol and drugs is rape.

Well, it’s rape, she said in explaining why Roman Polanski should not be extradited to the U.S., but not rape-rape, thereby somehow offering Polanski license for a crime he admitted to but for which he never paid.

The only way I can account for this interesting … um, thinking … is the fact that Polanski is a film director — you know, an artiste, and therefore not liable to the standards the rest of us proles are held to. That seemed to be the thrust of Debra Winger’s impassioned defense of Polanski — he’s an artist.

But then, he’s not that great of an artist, right? I mean, granted, he gave us Chinatown and The Pianist. But he also brought us The Fearless Vampire Killers and Pirates. Personally, I’m not sure I’d give the director of Bitter Moon a pass on jaywalking.

But that got my wife — the RISD and CalArts grad — and me to wonder: Using the reasoning of the Polanski defenders, what level of artist do you have to be to get a pass on a terrible crime against another human being?

Staying for comparison’s sake in a single category, painters, here’s what we came up with:

A Renior-level artist could commit crime.

A Jackson Pollock-level artist could commit crime-crime.

A Picasso-level artist could pretty much do anything he damn well pleased.

(A Dalí-level artist, on the other hand, could and should be arrested for spitting on the sidewalk.)

This Whoopie-and-Winger-inspired rating system could apply to athletes, as well. After all, they’re artists of a sort, aren’t they?

Kobe Bryant, I recall, was accused of rape — I don’t know if Ms. Goldberg considered it rape-rape or not — but he most certainly did something to that young Colorado hotel worker. Yet he walked without it costing him a little more than lawyers’ fees, settlement money and, of course, that nice, big rock for Mrs. Bryant.

With four NBA championships on his résumé, Bryant clearly is at or near the top of the basketball world, so whatever he did to the woman clearly should be covered by artistic license.

What about Ben Roethlisberger, the latest big-name athlete accused of rape?

On the one hand, the Steelers quarterback has won two Super Bowls. But on the other, he can’t be said to have reached Bryant’s level of accomplishment. So the precise level of violent sexual predation he should be allowed under the Whoopie-Winger system is unclear.

Now, if because of Roethlisberger’s unclear status, this method of determining who should get away with what seems inexact, it’s only as it should be. After all, the system isn’t science; it’s more, well, art.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

Dept. of Denials

It's not true, not any of it.

That's the word from Larry Woodward, a lawyer for Michael Vick.

A report that Vick spent his first night of freedom at a Virginia Beach strip club is, Woodward said, "absolutely, categorically false."

Vick, he said, was not been Virginia Beach Monday night, let alone at a strip club.

Ben Roethlisberger, meanwhile, says allegations by a Lake Tahoe casino hostess that he raped her a year ago are "reckless and false."

“Saturday was the first I heard of her accusations,” Roethlisberger said. “Her false and vicious allegations are an attack on my family and on me. I would never, ever force myself on a woman.”

This just in …

So.

ESPN finally has decided that a woman’s civil lawsuit claiming Pittsburgh Steelers star quarterback Ben Roethlisberger raped her is worth reporting.

That shouldn’t be a difficult decision, but ESPN was mum on the suit for days — even after it was reported on by no less than The New York Times, among other major media.

ESPN cited the fact that no criminal charges had been filed — not even a complaint made — as its reason for not reporting the story, but others have wondered if ESPN’s cozy relationship with the NFL didn’t play a role in the Worldwide Leader’s reluctance.

We’ll see in coming months if the suit has any merit but it’s filing clearly deserves reporting.

)Just last month, ESPN reported on the intent of a woman to file a civil lawsuit against Los Angeles Lakers guard Shannon Brown on sex-related charges.)

As for Roethlisberger, he’s reversed field by deciding to make a public statement about the case — today at noon. He will, however, not be taking questions. In the coming weeks as NFL camps open, he’ll be getting them, just the same.