betED.com - The View from the Couch - by Gavin McDougald!
Aug 2nd, 2006 - Guilty until Proven Innocent
Watching the events of the past week unfold, I have come to realization that we sports fans are officially out of our minds.
As in, we are living in an alternative reality when it comes to how we judge athletes.
A long time ago, in a sports galaxy far, far away (say the 60?s) kids hung pictures of athletes on their walls, and sports heroes were seen as role models - not just for youth, but for grown ups as well.
However, time has revealed that idyllic picture was more manufactured than true. Sure, athletes could be heroes on the field, but off it, they were just ordinary people. In some high profile cases, they were terribly flawed or sometimes tragic people. Due to burdens such as alcoholism, clinical depression and the physical toll taken on these men, later in their lives it was revealed just how bad many of them had it.
When I was growing up everyone I knew wanted to be Bobby Hull. The generation before mine, it was Mickey Mantle. Then Public Relations machines sheltered athletes, and us, from reality. Once an athlete retired however, those machines no longer worked for them. While playing, if there was something that should not come out during their careers, it didn?t.
After it was all over however, it usually did: Bobby Hull beat his wife with a door. Mickey Mantle was a chronic alcoholic who sometimes played drunk.
Now, we are supposedly living in the real world. With 24-hour news, the internet and instant access to instant imagery, athletes have no such protection. Today it is literally a case of what you see is what you get.
Yet, apparently, we refuse to believe it.
The current scourge of sports is drugs. Year after year and case after case, athletes have been busted for using performance enhancing substances and then universally denying using them. It?s happened thousand of times, yet off the top of my head I can count on exactly one finger the number of cases where an athlete was found innocent. After seeing this same story time-and-time again, what we should really be surprised by is if someone tests clean.
So, why, or more like how, can we give them the benefit of the doubt anymore?
Why was anyone surprised that a ?hero? like Floyd Landis was caught with 11 times as much testosterone in his system than the average porn star?
Yet, in the press, Landis?s apologists were legion. Columnists from the NY Times to USA Today were lined up giving him every possible out - as if he somehow deserved one. They trotted out the lines, ?presumption of innocence,? and ?innocent until proven guilty.?
How about we all simply declare that enough is enough and when it comes to athletes, the regular system of jurisprudence no longer applies.
They are guilty, all of them, until proven innocent.
Sprinter Justin Gatlin, the reigning Olympic champion and co-owner of the world record in the 100 meters, was caught a few days after Landis. He insisted, ?I have never knowingly used any banned substance or authorized anyone else to administer such a substance.?
Bzzzzz! Wrong answer! Those who test positive all deny it - every one of them every single time. In Gatlin?s case, he?s really pressing it considering what he said is not even true. While competing at the 2001 U.S. Junior Championships, he was caught using amphetamines.
So - along with the presumption of guilt, let?s add another rule. From now on, once an athlete is caught with a positive result, he or she should not be allowed to comment unless they are going to confess.
Freedom of speech is once thing. Freedom to lie is another.
All of this isn?t about them however. This is about us. Why do sports fans continue to fall for it? Why are we so willing to forget so we don?t even have to forgive?
Perhaps it?s because PR works. Athletes have handlers, spokespeople, agents and image consultants all working together in an effort to paint their clients in as kind a light as possible.
How well does it work? Since his playing career began, Allen Iverson has been charged with 14 different offenses. Despite all that, my nephew recently told me he wanted to be just like Iverson.
Time heals PR wounds as well. You go to an autograph show now; you will see a lineup a mile long of guys my age looking for a Bobby Hull signature.
As well, late in life some of those special athletes really do get it. Mickey Mantle was dying after killing his own liver with drink, and from his hospital bed, he made a public service announcement against alcohol abuse.
"This is a role model: Don't be like me", he said.
Okay, sometimes they are heroes off the field as well.
Cheers - Gavin McDougald - AKA Couch
betED.com
Aug 2nd, 2006 - Guilty until Proven Innocent
Watching the events of the past week unfold, I have come to realization that we sports fans are officially out of our minds.
As in, we are living in an alternative reality when it comes to how we judge athletes.
A long time ago, in a sports galaxy far, far away (say the 60?s) kids hung pictures of athletes on their walls, and sports heroes were seen as role models - not just for youth, but for grown ups as well.
However, time has revealed that idyllic picture was more manufactured than true. Sure, athletes could be heroes on the field, but off it, they were just ordinary people. In some high profile cases, they were terribly flawed or sometimes tragic people. Due to burdens such as alcoholism, clinical depression and the physical toll taken on these men, later in their lives it was revealed just how bad many of them had it.
When I was growing up everyone I knew wanted to be Bobby Hull. The generation before mine, it was Mickey Mantle. Then Public Relations machines sheltered athletes, and us, from reality. Once an athlete retired however, those machines no longer worked for them. While playing, if there was something that should not come out during their careers, it didn?t.
After it was all over however, it usually did: Bobby Hull beat his wife with a door. Mickey Mantle was a chronic alcoholic who sometimes played drunk.
Now, we are supposedly living in the real world. With 24-hour news, the internet and instant access to instant imagery, athletes have no such protection. Today it is literally a case of what you see is what you get.
Yet, apparently, we refuse to believe it.
The current scourge of sports is drugs. Year after year and case after case, athletes have been busted for using performance enhancing substances and then universally denying using them. It?s happened thousand of times, yet off the top of my head I can count on exactly one finger the number of cases where an athlete was found innocent. After seeing this same story time-and-time again, what we should really be surprised by is if someone tests clean.
So, why, or more like how, can we give them the benefit of the doubt anymore?
Why was anyone surprised that a ?hero? like Floyd Landis was caught with 11 times as much testosterone in his system than the average porn star?
Yet, in the press, Landis?s apologists were legion. Columnists from the NY Times to USA Today were lined up giving him every possible out - as if he somehow deserved one. They trotted out the lines, ?presumption of innocence,? and ?innocent until proven guilty.?
How about we all simply declare that enough is enough and when it comes to athletes, the regular system of jurisprudence no longer applies.
They are guilty, all of them, until proven innocent.
Sprinter Justin Gatlin, the reigning Olympic champion and co-owner of the world record in the 100 meters, was caught a few days after Landis. He insisted, ?I have never knowingly used any banned substance or authorized anyone else to administer such a substance.?
Bzzzzz! Wrong answer! Those who test positive all deny it - every one of them every single time. In Gatlin?s case, he?s really pressing it considering what he said is not even true. While competing at the 2001 U.S. Junior Championships, he was caught using amphetamines.
So - along with the presumption of guilt, let?s add another rule. From now on, once an athlete is caught with a positive result, he or she should not be allowed to comment unless they are going to confess.
Freedom of speech is once thing. Freedom to lie is another.
All of this isn?t about them however. This is about us. Why do sports fans continue to fall for it? Why are we so willing to forget so we don?t even have to forgive?
Perhaps it?s because PR works. Athletes have handlers, spokespeople, agents and image consultants all working together in an effort to paint their clients in as kind a light as possible.
How well does it work? Since his playing career began, Allen Iverson has been charged with 14 different offenses. Despite all that, my nephew recently told me he wanted to be just like Iverson.
Time heals PR wounds as well. You go to an autograph show now; you will see a lineup a mile long of guys my age looking for a Bobby Hull signature.
As well, late in life some of those special athletes really do get it. Mickey Mantle was dying after killing his own liver with drink, and from his hospital bed, he made a public service announcement against alcohol abuse.
"This is a role model: Don't be like me", he said.
Okay, sometimes they are heroes off the field as well.
Cheers - Gavin McDougald - AKA Couch
betED.com
