Thursday, July 31, 2008
Manny Goes Hollywood
Not a bad week for Yankee fans: Bombers get Xavier Nady and reliever Damaso Marte from Pittsburgh for next-to-nothing. Pudge Rodriguez comes in as a more-than-adequate fill-in for Jorge Posada (bonus: Kyle Farnsworth leaves town in the bargain). And now, Manny Ramirez gets to take his tired act out West!
Manny gets to be Manny in Hollywood! Joe Torre should have much fun.
By the way, all those people who complain about the Yankees free-spending ways: please note that the Red Sox are paying all of Manny's remaining salary this season just to get rid of him! Once upon a time, the MLB commissioner would have blocked a trade that relied so much on cash exchanging hands. Not anymore.
P.S. Mets fans should be happy as well. Most reports today had Ramirez going to the Florida Marlins -- who are right behind the Mets in the National League East (and just knocked the Amazin's out of first place by taking two of three).
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Manny gets to be Manny in Hollywood! Joe Torre should have much fun.
By the way, all those people who complain about the Yankees free-spending ways: please note that the Red Sox are paying all of Manny's remaining salary this season just to get rid of him! Once upon a time, the MLB commissioner would have blocked a trade that relied so much on cash exchanging hands. Not anymore.
P.S. Mets fans should be happy as well. Most reports today had Ramirez going to the Florida Marlins -- who are right behind the Mets in the National League East (and just knocked the Amazin's out of first place by taking two of three).
Labels: baseball, Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, Sports
Tuesday, April 01, 2008
Black Men Can Think; ESPN Can't
LZ Granderson has an excellent column over at ESPN.com's Page 2, discussing race in sports. More accurately, the column is about the media's view of race in sports.
What was both brave, yet ultimately disappointing, about Granderson's piece is that the "journalists" that he was taking to task worked for ESPN. Yep, it's true: The conversation occurred last Friday on ESPN2's "First Take" morning show. In the regular segment "First-and-10", host/moderator Jay Crawford, regular Skip Bayliss and Robert Parker (who is black) had the above described discussion. Indeed, it was Parker that made the laces comment.
Not one of them stopped to consider how racist the discussion was -- the subtext being that none of these white college players have much of a shot in the NBA.
One of the things that stunned me was that in this conversation, no one mentioned that a white guy has been named NBA MVP for three years in a row -- Steve Nash twice and Dirk Novitski. Furthermore, the second best player on San Antonio is, arguably, Manu Ginobli. The Lakers went from a part-of-the-pack team to legitimate contenders when they got Pau Gasol.
Are we then to say that because these players are all non-American that they aren't "white"?
Granderson himself often sits in the "First-and-10" chair opposite Bayliss. Thus, the disturbing part of the piece is that either he felt compelled not to "out" his colleagues in this column -- or was told by higher-ups at ESPN.com that he couldn't. On the face of it, I can't believe an editor would allow a writer to get away with saying "a pair two journalists were talking about so-and-so" -- without identifying the participants and the show in which the discussion took place.
If so, that's even more troubling. It suggests that ESPN is happy to use its power to have "journalists" trade in offensive stereotypes -- but are unwilling to take the heat when one of their other writers calls them on it.
Well, good for Granderson for going as far as he could.
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Could you imagine what would happen if Hollywood released a comedy about football entitled "Black Men Can't Throw"? Rush Limbaugh would be sitting in the theater chuckling with a box of Ho Hos in his lap as movie execs tried to explain to Jesse Jackson and/or Al Sharpton why he/they should not be offended.
Yet men and women of both races who are otherwise intelligent not only embrace
the notion inherent to "White Men Can't Jump," but it is spoken about as if it's scientific fact.
This is true in the barbershop.
This is true at the local Y.
Apparently it's true on national television as well.
Just last week I watched a pair of journalists dismiss the pro potential of both Tyler
Hansbrough and Kevin Love for no other reason than their skin color.
"The last time a big white guy from college especially went from a big-time star to a
big-time star in the NBA, I think there were still laces on the ball," one of
them said.
What was both brave, yet ultimately disappointing, about Granderson's piece is that the "journalists" that he was taking to task worked for ESPN. Yep, it's true: The conversation occurred last Friday on ESPN2's "First Take" morning show. In the regular segment "First-and-10", host/moderator Jay Crawford, regular Skip Bayliss and Robert Parker (who is black) had the above described discussion. Indeed, it was Parker that made the laces comment.
Not one of them stopped to consider how racist the discussion was -- the subtext being that none of these white college players have much of a shot in the NBA.
One of the things that stunned me was that in this conversation, no one mentioned that a white guy has been named NBA MVP for three years in a row -- Steve Nash twice and Dirk Novitski. Furthermore, the second best player on San Antonio is, arguably, Manu Ginobli. The Lakers went from a part-of-the-pack team to legitimate contenders when they got Pau Gasol.
Are we then to say that because these players are all non-American that they aren't "white"?
Granderson himself often sits in the "First-and-10" chair opposite Bayliss. Thus, the disturbing part of the piece is that either he felt compelled not to "out" his colleagues in this column -- or was told by higher-ups at ESPN.com that he couldn't. On the face of it, I can't believe an editor would allow a writer to get away with saying "a pair two journalists were talking about so-and-so" -- without identifying the participants and the show in which the discussion took place.
If so, that's even more troubling. It suggests that ESPN is happy to use its power to have "journalists" trade in offensive stereotypes -- but are unwilling to take the heat when one of their other writers calls them on it.
Well, good for Granderson for going as far as he could.
Labels: ESPN, race, Robert Parker, Skip Bayliss, Sports
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Is The NHL Happy...
...that nobody cares about the sport? Look what happens to the sports that have real fans in the U.S.:
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- MLB: Feds going after Barry Bonds over perjury in Balco steroid investigation.
- NFL: Feds going after Michael Vick over alleged dog fighting.
- NBA: Feds going after alleged point shaving and mob ties by ref.
- WWE: Feds looking into murder/suicide of professional wrestler (with steroid implications).
As long-time RT supporter ERA (who came up with the idea) says, "ESPN should launch a new channel with Court TV."
Labels: gambling, Sports, steroids
