The arm of a champion

If you're wondering how Matt Price found the strength to pitch in three consecutive games to clinch a second straight College World Series championship for the South Carolina Gamecocks, look no further than the ace right-hander's left arm.

Go Gamecocks!

Giving the "good Christian" a bad name

A few years ago, my parents bought a house from a previous owner who introduced himself to them as "a good Christian businessman." Had they asked for my advice, I would have told them to get as far away from the man as possible. The "good Christian" is a person to be avoided at all costs. No one is "good" (even Jesus was reticent about being so called) and the Christian, of all persons, should know this. There is something suspiciously duplicitous about the person who is constantly reminding others what a "good Christian" he is.

The Jim Tressel debacle which has rocked the football program at Ohio State is bound to give the "good Christian" a bad name yet again. Tressel's public persona of a devout man of faith, honor, and integrity has been blown to smithereens by revelations about his involvement in unethical, and possibly illegal, activities not only over the last few years, but throughout his lengthy coaching career. An investigation by Sports Illustrated portrays Tressel as a man who preached the virtues of doing the right thing while practicing precisely the opposite. The bulk of the story focuses on an eight year pattern of violations during his tenure at the helm of Ohio State's football program. But perhaps the most damning piece of evidence that Tressel is not the man he presents himself to be is this anecdote from the mid-1980's when he was an assistant under Earle Bruce.

One of Tressel's duties then was to organize and run the Buckeyes' summer camp. Most of the young players who attended it would never play college football, but a few were top prospects whom Ohio State was recruiting. At the end of camp, attendees bought tickets to a raffle with prizes such as cleats and a jersey. According to his fellow assistant, Tressel rigged the raffle so that the elite prospects won -- a potential violation of NCAA rules. Says the former colleague, who asked not to be identified because he still has ties to the Ohio State community, "In the morning he would read the Bible with another coach. Then, in the afternoon, he would go out and cheat kids who had probably saved up money from mowing lawns to buy those raffle tickets. That's Jim Tressel."

From a personal angle, nothing about this scandal surprises me. I must confess there is something about Jim Tressel that has always struck me as phony or, to be more charitable, inauthentic. When he won the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year Award in 2002, he gave an acceptance speech in his usual professorial tone while holding up a copy of Bobby Dodd on Football, claiming it was one of the most influential books he had ever read. The cover and binding of the book were of 1950's vintage, but it was in mint condition. It was obvious that no one, least of all Tressel, had read this particular copy. He was simply using it as a prop. Something about that just did not sit well with me and, from that time on, I never bought the public persona Jim Tressel was selling.

Jim Tressel presented himself as a "good Christian" but, at the very least, allowed some decidedly un-Christian shenanigans to go on around him. The scandal, however, is not that he presented himself as someone he is not. Rather, the scandal is that he presented the Christian faith as something it is not. The substance of the Christian faith is not virtue or honor or integrity. The substance of the Christian faith is Jesus Christ himself. Our Lord does not say "Follow my virtue" or "Follow my honor" or "Follow my integrity." He says, "Follow me."

No one should dare to cast the first stone at Jim Tressel. He is, in the end, guilty of nothing more or less than what every "good Christian" has done at one time or another. He has disembodied the principles of the faith from the Person who embodies them. That is always a prescription for failure. It is such failure, however, that can become fertile soil for genuine repentance and a deeper, more abiding faith.

Lord, let it be.

How many days until kickoff? The suspense is killing me!

Great expectations for 2010!

Did Lou Gehrig really die of Lou Gehrig's disease?

As a hospice chaplain, I have been witness to the sheer agony brought upon a person by the ravaging effects of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), popularly known as "Lou Gehrig's disease" for the baseball great who was, so it has long been believed, its most famous victim. A new study, however, raises questions about the actual cause of the demise of the New York Yankees' legendary "Iron Horse" and may offer a glimmer of hope to patients have been misdiagnosed.

A peer-reviewed paper to be published Wednesday in a leading journal of neuropathology, however, suggests that the demise of athletes like Gehrig and soldiers given a diagnosis of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, might have been catalyzed by injuries only now becoming understood: concussions and other brain trauma.

Although the paper does not discuss Gehrig specifically, its authors in interviews acknowledged the clear implication: Lou Gehrig might not have had Lou Gehrig’s disease.

Doctors at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Bedford, Mass., and the Boston University School of Medicine, the primary researchers of brain damage among deceased National Football League players, said that markings in the spinal cords of two players and one boxer who also received a diagnosis of A.L.S. indicated that those men did not have A.L.S. at all. They had a different fatal disease, doctors said, caused by concussionlike trauma, that erodes the central nervous system in similar ways.

The finding could prompt a redirection in the study of motor degeneration in athletes and military veterans being given diagnoses of A.L.S. at rates considerably higher than normal, said several experts in A.L.S. who had seen early versions of the paper. Patients with significant histories of brain trauma could be considered for different types of treatment in the future, perhaps leading toward new pathways for a cure.

“Most A.L.S. patients don’t go to autopsy — there’s no need to look at your brain and spinal cord,” said Dr. Brian Crum, an assistant professor of neurology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. “But a disease can look like A.L.S., it can look like Alzheimer’s, and it’s not when you look at the actual tissue. This is something that needs to be paid attention to.”

The finding’s relevance to Gehrig is less clear. But the Yankees legend had a well-documented history of significant concussions on the baseball field, and perhaps others sustained as a battering-ram football halfback in high school and at Columbia University. Given that, it’s possible that Gehrig’s renowned commitment to playing through injuries like concussions, which resulted in his legendary streak of playing in 2,130 consecutive games over 14 years, could have led to his condition.

“Here he is, the face of his disease, and he may have had a different disease as a result of his athletic experience,” said Dr. Ann McKee, the director of the neuropathology laboratory for the New England Veterans Administration Medical Centers and the lead neuropathologist on the study.

Gehrig’s name does not appear in the paper; his case was discussed in interviews merely as an illustration of the new uncertainty surrounding cases resembling his, said Dr. Robert Stern, who serves with Dr. McKee as co-director of Boston University’s Center for the Study of Traumatic Encephalopathy. The cause of his disease will most likely never be determined because his remains were cremated, and now lie in Kensico Cemetery in Valhalla, N.Y.

H/T to MCJ.

Kickoff: Olbermann relieved of football gig

Good news for fans who like their football politics-free!

Keith Olbermann has been removed and will not appear on NBC’s Football Night In America during the Sunday evening NFL broadcasts this season.

Last season, Olbermann anchored Football Night In America, which served as the lead-in to NBC’s ratings monster Sunday Night Football.

NBC stacked the show with on-air talent last season. In addition to Olbermann, Dan Patrick, Bob Costas, Tony Dungy, Rodney Harrison, and Peter King appeared.

Some members of the cast and crew of Football Night In America were made aware of the news at a preseason production meeting in New York City on Monday.

After the cast and crew heard the news, they all drowned their sorrows by heading off to Yankee Stadium to watch the New York Yankees take on the Toronto Blue Jays. The Blue Jays won the game 8-6.

Believe it: Patience and longsuffering will at last be rewarded

Go Gamecocks!

Just for Laughs: A Modest Proposal for a Better March Madness Experience Which Will Force ESPN Analysts to Get Real Jobs

I don't recall exactly when it began--sometime between the last week of January and the second week of February, I think--but by the time it ended, I had the strangest feeling that I'd heard it all before, but in a different setting. The "experts" started talking about which teams were "in" and which ones were "out," which teams were "on the bubble" and which bubbles had burst. They threw around a bunch of complicated terms like "RPI" and "strength of schedule." They berated teams with impressive won/loss records against "weak" opponents, but sang the praises of teams who put up valiant but unsuccessful fights against nationally ranked powerhouses. This conference, on the whole, was having a "down year," but that conference might get nine teams in the "Big Dance" with four #1 seeds!

Where had I heard this before? I had to think for a while, but the answer finally came through loud and clear.

This felt like the BCS.

That's right, the BCS! Suddenly, the most exciting postseason in all of college sports had been hijacked by the same "experts" who never tire of telling us that a playoff system would ruin college football. For years, the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament, a.k.a. "March Madness," has produced for fans everywhere that most satisfying outcome of a real national champion actually decided through a real national championship tournament. But, like nearly every great event in American sports, this one is on the verge of being ruined by the four-letter network (ESPN) due to the proliferation of "experts" whose subjective criteria for judging the worthiness of a team is, no doubt, beginning to have an undue influence on the final decisions of the selection committee.

In order to prevent the ruination of "March Madness," several reforms are needed in order to root out the encroaching subjective criteria and set in stone a few objective criteria which would eliminate weeks of speculation and greatly reduce the face time of all the ESPN "bracketologists." In the interest of full disclosure, let me say up front that my main purpose in proposing these reforms is not to enhance the quality of teams participating in the tournament but, rather, to get all these so-called "experts" to shut up and find a real job.

1. A team must win 20 regular season games in order to be "bid eligible." This will eliminate the "strength of schedule" argument for 18- and 19-win teams with 0-7 records against nationally ranked non-conference opponents on the road being chosen over 20-win teams with 2-1 records against nationally ranked non-conference opponents at home early in the season when the nationally ranked opponent's leading scorer was absent due to a death in the family.

2. A team must have a record of .500 or better within its own conference in order to be "bid eligible." This will eliminate speculation about sixth and seventh-place teams who played a "tough conference schedule" and probably would have won at least two more games if the floor on their home court had been repaired earlier in the season before their pre-season all conference point guard slipped and broke his leg in the season opener against a Division III opponent.

3. Provided they meet criteria 1 and 2, the top four regular season teams from the major conferences will receive automatic bids. A fifth automatic bid will go to the winner of the conference tournament if that team was not one of the top 4, provided that team meets criteria 1 and 2. A sixth "at large" bid may go to the best remaining conference team, provided that team meets criteria 1 and 2. Under no circumstances will more than six teams from one conference receive bids.

4. Provided it meets criteria 1 and 2, the regular season champions of all mid-major conferences will receive automatic bids. A second automatic bid will go to the winner of the conference tournament, provided that team meets criteria 1 and 2. Mid-majors, like majors, may receive as many as, but not more than, six bids.

5. To be considered for a #1 seed, a team must win either the regular season championship, conference tournament championship, or both. This will prevent the fiasco of having one team win both titles but have two teams that finished below it getting preferential treatment because of the "overwhelming strength" of the conference.

6. Expand the field from 65 to 68 teams, with play-in games for each of the four regions to be played during a preliminary "Mad Tuesday" round prior to the opening round on Thursday. This will give eight teams, instead of just two, the opportunity to play for the right to get their butts kicked in the first round. It will also require national coverage by ESPN, meaning their analysts will actually have to provide play-by-play commentary at courtside instead of sitting in the studio and telling us who is going to win the tournament before the first game has been played.

Webb: Soccer is Ruining America

Stephen H. Webb at First Things confirms a sad fact which I have known for quite some time: Soccer is ruining America!

What other game, to put it bluntly, is so boring to watch? (Bowling and golf come to mind, but the sound of crashing pins and the sight of the well-attired strolling on perfectly kept greens are at least inherently pleasurable activities.) The linear, two-dimensional action of soccer is like the rocking of a boat but without any storm and while the boat has not even left the dock. Think of two posses pursuing their prey in opposite directions without any bullets in their guns. Soccer is the fluoridation of the American sporting scene.

For those who think I jest, let me put forth four points, which is more points than most fans will see in a week of games—and more points than most soccer players have scored since their pee-wee days.

1) Any sport that limits you to using your feet, with the occasional bang of the head, has something very wrong with it. Indeed, soccer is a liberal’s dream of tragedy: It creates an egalitarian playing field by rigorously enforcing a uniform disability. Anthropologists commonly define man according to his use of hands. We have the thumb, an opposable digit that God gave us to distinguish us from animals that walk on all fours. The thumb lets us do things like throw baseballs and fold our hands in prayer. We can even talk with our hands. Have you ever seen a deaf person trying to talk with their feet? When you are really angry and acting like an animal, you kick out with your feet. Only fools punch a wall with their hands. The Iraqi who threw his shoes at President Bush was following his primordial instincts. Showing someone your feet, or sticking your shoes in someone’s face, is the ultimate sign of disrespect. Do kids ever say, “Trick or Treat, smell my hands”? Did Jesus wash his disciples’ hands at the Last Supper? No, hands are divine (they are one of the body parts most frequently attributed to God), while feet are in need of redemption. In all the portraits of God’s wrath, never once is he pictured as wanting to step on us or kick us; he does not stoop that low.

2) Sporting should be about breaking kids down before you start building them up. Take baseball, for example. When I was a kid, baseball was the most popular sport precisely because it was so demanding. Even its language was intimidating, with bases, bats, strikes, and outs. Striding up to the plate gave each of us a chance to act like we were starring in a Western movie, and tapping the bat to the plate gave us our first experience with inventing self-indulgent personal rituals. The boy chosen to be the pitcher was inevitably the first kid on the team to reach puberty, and he threw a hard ball right at you.

Thus, you had to face the fear of disfigurement as well as the statistical probability of striking out. The spectacle of your failure was so public that it was like having all of your friends invited to your home to watch your dad forcing you to eat your vegetables. We also spent a lot of time in the outfield chanting, “Hey batter batter!” as if we were Buddhist monks on steroids. Our chanting was compensatory behavior, a way of making the time go by, which is surely why at soccer games today it is the parents who do all of the yelling.

3) Everyone knows that soccer is a foreign invasion, but few people know exactly what is wrong with that. More than having to do with its origin, soccer is a European sport because it is all about death and despair. Americans would never invent a sport where the better you get the less you score. Even the way most games end, in sudden death, suggests something of an old-fashioned duel. How could anyone enjoy a game where so much energy results in so little advantage, and which typically ends with a penalty kick out, as if it is the audience that needs to be put out of its misery. Shootouts are such an anticlimax to the game and are so unpredictable that the teams might as well flip a coin to see who wins—indeed, they might as well flip the coin before the game, and not play at all.

4) And then there is the question of gender. I know my daughter will kick me when she reads this, but soccer is a game for girls. Girls are too smart to waste an entire day playing baseball, and they do not have the bloodlust for football. Soccer penalizes shoving and burns countless calories, and the margins of victory are almost always too narrow to afford any gloating. As a display of nearly death-defying stamina, soccer mimics the paradigmatic feminine experience of childbirth more than the masculine business of destroying your opponent with insurmountable power.

In the words of those eminent theologians, Simon and Garfunkel, "Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?"

And Then, There's This . . .

From Shutdown Corner:

I'm not sure how a man named "Ravenstahl" got elected in Pittsburgh to begin with, but that is indeed the mayor's name. At least, it was.

In light of the big Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Baltimore Ravens matchup this weekend, mayor Luke R. Ravenstahl has officially changed his name to Luke R. Steelerstahl. The change is only temporary, but he's gone so far as to change the nameplate on his office door. He said he wants to "eliminate the Ravens just as the Steelers will on Sunday."

Clever, Mr. Mayor. I like the move. I like to see the stakes raised a little bit above than the usual "I'll bet you a Primanti brothers sandwich against some Baltimore crab cakes" type of deal that's typically made in these situations.

It's up to the mayor of Baltimore now to answer the call. The name Sheila Dixon might seem harmless, but check the depth charts. Dixon is the name of the Steelers third-string quarterback. Gasp! She better act quickly to change that to Sheila Bouman. Or Sheila MyHairIsSlightlyPrettierThanTroyPolamalu's.