How to inflame a crowd

After Oregon’s LeGarrette Blount made what might turn out to be the mistake of his life — punching Boise State’s Byron Hout after the latter taunted him for the Broncos’ 19-8 victory — the big screen at Broncos Stadium showed the punch over and over and over.

That was helpful exactly how?

Jeter and Gehrig

Derek Jeter passing Lou Gehrig as the all-time Yankee hits leader is as perfectly appropriate as Barry Bonds passing Henry Aaron as baseball’s all-time home run leader was perfectly inappropriate.

Friday column: More than one punch thrown

Boise State’s Byron Houk has been around football for a while and should know better than to tap a losing player on the shoulder after a game and taunt him to his face. Broncos coach Chris Peterson was right to get in the linebacker’s grill for his actions eight days ago, and right to discipline Houk. Still, it’s worth remembering Houk is 21.

Oregon’s LeGarrette Blount has been around football for a while and should know better than to punch an opposing player, regardless of the provocation. Ducks coach Chip Kelly was right to suspend the running back. Still, it’s worth remembering that Blount is 22.

Looking considerably older are the yahoos in the Bronco Stadium stands who helped incite Blount’s actions in the moments following the punch, when Blount had to be first restrained, then wrestled into the safety of the locker room.

From the YouTube video “Boise State Fan Hits LeGarrette Blount,” you can see Blount moving toward the locker room, looking composed. Then you see a Broncos fan moving though a row to get closer to Blount.

Finally positioned near the athlete, the fan screams an obscenity and points at Blount, which sends the newly agitated Blount away from the fan, who follows Blount’s movements — through still from the safety of the stands. As Blount, now being restrained, sees a different fan lift a chair as if to hit him with it, the first fan throws a punch at Blount.

It’s unclear from the video if the punch connects; Blount says it did. In any case, it’s at that point where Blount has to be wrestled into the locker room.

That scene of an out-of-control Blount having to be manhandled to keep from going into the stands certainly contributed to the decision to suspend him for the year. Now, he’s lost his senior season and, some say, his chance at an NFL career.

What’s wrong with people?

We all know "fan" derives from "fanatic," but the over-identification that some have with “their” team never ceases to amaze me. These Broncos backers — only on the scene because they paid to be there — acted as though they were personally victimized by Blount’s fist.

While Oregon suspended Blount for the season, the school preserved the player’s scholarship and his opportunity to practice with the team. Blount would be wise to embrace both the academics and the practice. He has something to learn from the situation, and something to show — his audition for the 2010 NFL draft starts now.

Houk, whose need to gloat served as a trigger to the nastiness, also has something to learn from whatever internal discipline Peterson has imposed.

And the yahoos?

The only discipline they face is the embarrassment of the video of them going Neanderthal — that’s assuming, of course, they’re capable of embarrassment. The way they acted — at their age — makes one wonder.

Contact Jim Gordon at gjames43@msn.com.

No, William; bombs AREN'T funny

You’re 38 years old and you live in an age of terrorism. You were alive and presumably sentient during such incidents as the Oklahoma City bombing, the Centennial Olympic Park bombing and, of course, the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

Yet you think it’s a good idea to plant a fake bomb at Tropicana Field before a Rays-Red Sox game?

Well, yes you do if your name is William L. Jordan and you work as a mechanic for the Tampa Bay baseball team.

The device, which had wires sticking out and emitted a “beeping” sound, was found about 2 p.m. Tuesday by maintenance workers who, not having Jordan’s sense of humor, called police.

When the police arrived, Jordan came forward and explained the “bomb” was a hoax. Police, also not sharing Jordan’s sense of humor, arrested him.

In an e-mail notable mainly for its corporate stiffness, Rays vice president Rick Vaughn wrote, "His actions were in very poor taste and do not reflect the values of the organization.”

(Well, that’s a relief.)

Bad publicity (what else?) for Formula 1

Formula 1 hasn’t gotten the best pub the last few months.

There was Max Mosley, the president of its governing body, and hookers being filmed engaging in S&M activity with — some thought — Nazi concentration camp overtones.

Then there was Bernie Ecclestone, Formula 1 chief, publicly praising Hitler as a man who knew how to “get things done.”

Now we have the specter of a cheating scandal, the possibility that Renault driver Nelson Piquet was ordered to crash against the wall toward the end of last year’s Singapore Grand Prix to bring out the caution flag and enable teammate Fernando Alonso to win.

At the time, Piquet explained that his car had been virtually “undriveable” after bottoming over the bumps on his heavy fuel load.

But that was then — before Piquet was axed by Renault for failing to satisfy performance clauses in his contract.

Now, there’s an angry reaction from Piquet, references to “some strange situations” involving the team and whispers of an investigation by FIA.

The moral of this story might turn out to be, “Be careful whom you fire.”

http://www.itv-f1.com/news_article.aspx?id=46771

Ready for college? Heck, ready for life

A lot of prep athletes moving on to college have problems with maturity and judgment. That won’t be a case with one Kaleb Eulls, a Yazoo County (Mississippi) High School football player.

Eulls and three sisters were on a school bus Tuesday when a 14-year-old girl brought out a .380 semi-automatic handgun and began threatening to shoot.

While in fear of his life and the lives of his sisters, Eulls did four things perfectly.

First, he talked to the girl and tried to calm her down; as he did that, he opened the back emergency door and helped as many students out as he could. Then, when the girl — getting louder and louder — looked out the window for a moment, Eulls sprang forward and knocked the gun out of her hand.

Finally, he scooped the gun off the floor, ran out of the back of the bus and disarmed it.

Eulls is headed to Mississippi State, which means the Rebels will have at least one young recruit whose maturity level they won’t have to worry about.

Friday column: Some things you expect; others ...

You’re the Cincinnati Bengals (God help you).

You have a history of drafting athletes with “issues,” which helps explain your 46-49 record under Marvin Lewis. So you draft massive Alabama lineman Andre Smith, who has both character issues and weight issues.

Smith sits out all of training camp and most of the preseason before inking his contract, then shows up this week — all 335 pounds of him — and promptly fractures his left foot in a simple drill.

Surprise.

* * *

You’re a teenager in the little, nowhere town of Noosaville, Australia (pop. 6528), and you’re up to no good. You and a buddy enter a house at night and accidentally awaken what you take to be an old biddy.

No problem.

You just grab her by the throat and threaten her — that’ll keep her quiet, you think.

Only this biddy grabs you by the ear and strikes you in the groin — with her titanium knee, no less — then other people in the house show up and sit on you and your pal until the police arrive. Now you’re facing charges, as well as the ignominy of being taken down by a 72-year-old grandmother.

But this, you discover, isn’t your run-of-the-mill grandmamma. It’s Aussie swimming great Dawn Fraser, who won gold medals in three — count ’em, three — Olympic Games. And she appears to have taken umbrage at your actions.

“I was threatened by the way he spoke to me and I’d never been spoken to like what he called me,” Fraser said. “I think I lost it.”

Yes, it seemed like an easy score, but in life there’s always the unexpected.

Surprise!

* * *

You’re Michigan athletics director Bill Martin, the man who hired Rich Rodriguez to be the Wolverines head football coach, spiriting him away from West Virginia. (That's Rodriguez in the photo above, assuring somebody of something back in his Mountaineer days.)

When you employed him, you knew he’d once agreed in principle to coach Alabama, only to pull out at the last second, leaving the Crimson Tide red-faced.

You knew he’d promised Mountaineer recruits he’d be in Morgantown the rest of his career and had even signed an extension at West Virginia four months — count ’em, four! — before quitting to come to Ann Arbor.

You knew in West Virginia he’d agreed to pay a $4 million buyout to the Mountaineers if he broke his contract to jump to another school, then tried to weasel out of paying.

Now, your coach is flatly denying the charge by current and former players that he cut corners with the NCAA rules that limit the number of hours the student-athletes spend on football-related activities.

But the NCAA is investigating, and if it turns out Rodriguez’s word on this — as in so many other things — can’t be trusted …

Surprise?